The most important job interview question is, “When have you failed? Tell me about it.” The answer shows how one portrays their self to others, and what it’ll be like to work together. A job seeker can answer this question in one of three ways:

(1) beat around the bush, working the conversation to another topic,

(2) tell you story of how one almost failed but overcame it,

or (3) tell you a story of how one – for a reason or another – has failed before.

The world of work will not go as predictions of production indicate. It took me about 10-15 interviews with job seekers to learn that this is the most important question to ask a job candidate. Let’s examine the possibilities of how you can navigate this awkward question.

Failure 1

If the candidates beats around the bush and is unable tell you of a professional failure, you have learned that the candidate is one of the following:

(1) uncomfortable with the transparency of admitting failure (which may lead to an unwillingness to own up to mistakes committed in your company)

(2) in disbelief of failure’s existence,

(3) incapable of demonstrating the ability to explain the learnings from his or her failures in a traditional manner (Failure is unimportant. It takes courage to make a fool of yourself.);

or maybe, (4) one has never truly failed before.

This answer does not necessarily mean you should not hire this person. You have learned of their mindset, and there is a job for every mindset. Maybe they are too shy to admit a mistake in a job interview? Or did the candidate seamlessly redirect the conversation to another relevant topic? If so, the candidate has demonstrated tremendous skill and character flaw in the same maneuver. No one is perfect. Many jobs favor the ability to communicate without admitting mistakes.

Failure 2

If the candidate tells you a story of how one almost failed but overcame it, you have learned that the candidate is one of the following:

(1) portrayer of the world in a permanently positive view (possibly doesn’t believe in failure),

(2) still not fully comfortable with the transparency of admitting failure but willing to meet you halfway (possibly doesn’t believe in failure; results! Why, man I have gotten a lot of results. I know several thousand things that won’t work.),

(3) able to explain how one solved whatever difficulty of problem the example described;

or maybe, (4) one has never truly failed before (possibly does not believe in failure; if we will be quiet and ready enough, we shall find compensation in every disappointment).

Don’t underestimate the impact positivity can have on persistence and collaboration. Failure will never overtake me if my determination to succeed is strong enough. Ask yourself, why did the job seeker choose to tell me this specific failure? Pay close attention to how one solved the problem, turning the failure into a success, so to speak. Hire this person if their example is the type of problem solving the position demands.

See also:

• 10 Most Common Illegal Interview Questions
• Identifying the 10 Soft Skills of a Great Intern
• How to Interview Someone in the HR Industry

Failure 3

If the candidate tells you a story of how one – for a reason or another –  has failed before, you have learned that the candidate can:

(1) talk about a time when one has failed, and call it failure,

(2) talk about a time when one has failed, call it failure, and explain what one learned to become a better worker (failure is success if we learn from it.)

(3) talk about a time when one has failed and blame someone else for the failure;

or maybe, (4) the candidate has never failed before and is lying (the only real failure in life is not to be true to the best one knows.)

This may be the most candid answer of a well rounded human being, but it is not necessarily the right hire for every position. Will this candidate detail the wrong failure to an important client, partner or reporter? That question can only be answered by their body of work and the rest of the interview. To tell a true story of failing in a job interview is to understand that failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor. I like working with these people, on most projects. However, many issues involve multiple people, and I see a red flag if the job seeker blames the majority of the failure on another person.  

________________________________________________________________________________

Everyday, learning from failures changes how I share input in the hiring process. As always, I learned from that to write this. I like to work hands on with people who answer with a story of almost failing but overcoming it, or a story of how one – for a reason or another – has truly failed before, but that’s just me, and I also understand the value in hiring a person who beats around the bush, working his or her way to a topic that isn’t “failure.”

I failed yesterday. And the day before that. And who knows maybe it’s a failure to say the most important job interview question is …

Tell me about a time you failed

David Smooke fails everyday.

You need to make new hires, but with so much choice online, where is best to post your job openings and expect to find the right candidate? Niche job boards are one solution, that should allow you to attract top talent, and deliver quality candidates with experience or interest in your specific industry (updated Dec 2017). The best job search sites include not only niche job boards, but also niche communities and niche publications.  SmartRecruiters’ customers have posted over a million jobs using our online recruiting software. We’ve found that 62% of open jobs are posted to niche job sites.

The Best 50 Niche Job Sites in alphabetical order

To attract talent that is driven to work in your industry and be the best in their field, post your job openings to the appropriate niche job boards, niche job sites and publications. With SmartRecruiters free recruiting software, you can post job openings to all these sites in one click.
Post Jobs for Free

Adrants

Advertising jobs from your favorite advertising website, Adrants.

AllRetailJobs.com

The #1 job board for the Retail Industry.

Artconnect

Find artists from anywhere in the world. Sort postings by city or discipline and be inspired by the boundless creativity.

Authentic Jobs

Where companies and creative professionals meet to make a better web.

Beyond.com

Beyond.com is the one career network as focused as you are!

ClearanceJobs

ClearanceJobs is the premier secure job board focused exclusively on candidates with active or current U.S. government security clearances.

CollegeRecruiter.com

Newest job posting ads from CollegeRecruiter.com, the leading job board for students searching for internships and recent grads looking for entry-level jobs.

coroflot

Design-driven companies worldwide use Coroflot to recruit outstanding creative talent.

CrunchBoard

CrunchBoard gives you access to the millions of technology and business savvy readers of TechCrunch, MobileCrunch, CrunchGear, TechCrunch IT and is one of the most popular job boards for internet and tech jobs.

Culintro

Culintro is a national restaurant organization. Members have access to the fastest growing culinary job board, culinary internships and networking opportunities.

Dice.com

Dice.com is all about celebrating tech and tech careers – advice, community and having some geeky fun.

DiversityJobs.com

DiversityJobs.com is a job search engine that finds job listings from company career pages, other job boards, newspapers and associations.

Doostang

A community of over 1 million elite professionals with inside access to thousands of jobs from top employers.

eFinancial Careers

eFinancialCareers is the leading global career site network for professionals working in the banking and finance industry.

energyfolks

Energyfolks is a growing network of energy interested students and professionals from across the world’s top universities.

FinancialJobBank

FinancialJobBank.com is the premier career site for job seekers and employers in the Accounting and Finance industry.

FlexJobs

FlexJobs is an award-winning job site for part-time or full-time flexible jobs, such as telecommuting or flextime, in 50+ categories, entry-level to executive.

Geebo

Nationwide free classifieds for housing, rentals, roommates, employment, jobs, vehicles, autos, sale.

Vercida

Vercida connects your company to a diverse array of candidates, and help employers create a work environment that’s equitable for all.

Healthcare Jobsite

HealthcareJobsite.com is the premier career site for job seekers and employers in the Healthcare industry.

HireFlyer

HireFlyer.com is the top job search website solution online.

IT Job Pro

#1 IT Job Site, ITJobPro.com is a HUB for IT Professionalism world-wide looking for employment in Information Technology.

Joblux

Luxury Brands and Retail Careers Network.

JobsInLogistics.com

The #1 Job Board for the Logistics Industry.

JobsInManufacturing

For all positions in plant management, production planning, materials management, engineering, maintenance, purchasing and logistics.

JobsInTrucks.com

The #1 Driver Job Board.

Juju

Juju.com is a job search engine, not a job board. Juju’s comprehensive search results link to thousands of employer career portals, recruiter websites, job boards, and other employment sites all over the Internet.

Krop

Creative & Tech jobs.

The Levo League

Levo League is a thriving online and offline community of young professionals, role models, and innovative companies taking Gen Y by storm.

Mashable

The Mashable job board is great for finding bloggers, consultants, designers, developers, executives, marketers, and mobile programmers.

mediabistro.com

Community, jobs, courses, news, and resources from mediabistro.com and beyond. Please note that featured jobs posted to this feed are #paid.

RecruiterMedia

Offers a smart alternative to universal employment websites with the only national, city-specific, job board on the planet!

Sales Gravy

SalesGravy.com connects top sales professionals with organizations looking for sales talent.

SalesHeads

SalesHeads.com is the premier career site for job seekers and employers in the Sales industry.

Simply Hired

We are a job search company whose goal is to make finding your next job a simple yet effective, enjoyable journey!

SnagaJob

The largest part-time and full-time hourly job resource. Check out their 4 Easy Steps to Recruiting Hourly Workers.

StackOverflowCareers

Careers 2.0 matches great programmers on Stack Overflow with great jobs.

Tech Careers

TechCareers.com is the premier career site for job seekers and employers in the IT and Engineering industries.

TechFetch

Tech jobs for top talent. Their vision is to create a global tech workforce community and empower them with opportunities to deliver global technology solutions.

TipTopJob

TipTopJob is the Generic Job Board that covers over 35 industries – search and apply for jobs online.

TweetMyJobs

Leading social and mobile job distribution network. We provide job seekers with great job matches where they want them, when they want them.

VentureBeat

The VentureBeat Job Board is great for finding people in IT, tech marketing and advertising, product management, and business development.

WayUp

Your source for the latest internship trends, tips, and access to great internship opportunities.

YouTern

YouTern connects emerging talent with dynamic start-ups, change oriented non-profits and passionate entrepreneurs – through internships!

Post and share your job to 200+ job boards in minutes.

SmartStart is free recruiting software for teams and smaller organizations of up to 250 employees.

Post Jobs for Free

All good things must come to an end. I’ve run the SmartRecruiters Blog since the beginning, and I am leaving SmartRecruiters as a full time employee to write a book, consultant with cool companies (ArtMap Inc.), and volunteer.

In my time here, this corporate blog had 3,000,000+ page views and the company gained 125,000+ social media followers. In 2014 we had 750,000+ readers. I wish I could shake all your hands. All I can say is, Thank You Readers. Thank You Writers. Thank You Team.

Moving forward, SmartRecruiters new Recruiting Innovation Officer, Jason Buss, will be taking over the blog. What I started is in great hands. Read his blog post “Why I Decided to Become a Smart Recruiter” and get a sense of what’s in store for the SmartRecruiters blog.

Your new friend and erstwhile editor,

DavidSmooke@Gmail.com
LinkedIn.com/in/ClarkKent
@DavidSmooke

The market for recruitment technology is taking off. There’s been approximately $2.3 billion in human resources technology investments over the last 5 years. And the buyers are demanding more quality. In a 2014 study by Software Advice the 6 most common reasons to purchase an applicant tracking system were efficiency, company growth, current features missing, consolidate systems, current is cumbersome and modernize. Price is not the issue when purchasing technology to manage recruiting; it’s about solving the issue of how to manage the company’s recruitment efforts. Companies are willing to pay to solve this problem.

When evaluating the technology that powers your recruitment efforts, here are 4 reasons to look beyond the applicant tracking system:

1. Not Designed to Help You Source Across Channels

What good is an applicant tracking system without applicants? Even if the ATS has all the bells, whistles and workflows, using an applicant tracking system without sourcing channel integration is like going to a party where there are no other people. Your recruiting analytics needs a single dashboard.

2. Unwieldy & Poor Candidate Application Process

It’s amazing how much companies pay to drive traffic to job ads, career pages, and their social networks, only to fail to capture information from those interested people due to a lengthy application form.

CEO to HR: “I don’t understand. Why are we not getting good candidates?” pic.twitter.com/ni6Epo5r3f

— Jerome Ternynck (@jerometernynck) November 7, 2014

3. Cumbersome Experience & UI for Hiring Teams

Every time a clunky ATS scares the hiring manager from using the ATS, the company loses money from time and resources inefficiencies. Needing a manual reminder to take interview notes costs the company money. Missing a job interview to scheduling error costs the company money. Every time the job poster doesn’t know what screening questions to ask and not ask, it costs the company money. Every time a hiring manager doesn’t leverage a template to send a standard email, it costs the company money.

Long story short, before committing to an applicant tracking system, make sure that your hiring managers have a high propensity to actually use the system. Companies that hire the best have hiring managers that are highly engaged and collaborative participants in the hiring process.

4. Limited Insights as Sourcing & Hiring Data is “Off-system”

Sourcing channels depend on quantity and quality. If the sourcing budget is not tied to the candidate lifecycle, return on recruitment budget can not be accurately measured. Top talent acquisition professionals look for a dashboard with cost per candidate, cost per interview, and cost per hire across the entire company, each department and role. Seeing the company’s historical recruitment performance, and having it filterable by sourcing channel creates smart, data informed decisions for your next recruiting dollar.

If companies want to take their talent acquisition efforts seriously, they have to be ready to review what is working and not working. Too often the legacy applicant tracking system is holding companies back. But companies don’t want to rip and replace their entire recruitment management every year. The foundation of a company’s recruitment technology is a long term decision. In this age of APIs, end users and social media, my one recommendation is to think of applicant tracking as a mere feature within your integrated recruiting platform.

At HRTechTank San Francisco, presentations and discussions focused on the evolution of the roles of Human Resource Professionals and Talent Acquisition Leaders, as well as, what that means for the adoption of future recruitment technologies.

“It all comes down to the areas in the industry where HR Tech can actually add value,”  said TEqV investment advisor and HRTechTank co-organizer Taras Polischuk. “There are

around 500 investment opportunities that I have evaluated in the last 2 years. However, most of these products’ main problem is that they are a point solution; and are solving a very small part of the bigger problem that customers experience. What clients want is to buy a solution, not a product. They want a platform, and they are ready to pay premium for having it, for getting rid of their pain.”

1. Redefining the HR Experience

The Old Way: The HR experience used to be thought of as in charge of compliance, and frankly – amongst employees in other departments – HR too often possessed an unwelcoming reputation. Look no further than how HR has been portrayed in TV & film:

The New Way: There’s never been a better time to be in HR! HR is sitting on a gold mine of big data. HR is gaining a more prominent role the boardroom because they are better than ever at leveraging recruitment analytics and talent management analytics to prove their ROI.

2015 Prediction: The role of human resources will become more cross departmental. Specially look for HR to deepen its relationship with the marketing department.

#HR practitioner at #HRtechtank says: Sourcer is called Dev. Rep, Recruiter is called Salesperson & Recruitment budget is marketing budget.

— David Smooke (@DavidSmooke) December 2, 2014

2. Death of Applicant Tracking System

“What’s the most social process? It’s hiring,” says SmartRecruiters COO Brett Queener. “You bring in a bunch of people to meet a bunch of people.”

The Old Way: Applicant tracking systems gained market share on the following assumption – if you can run a widget through a factory floor, you can run a person through the hiring process.

The New Way: Applicant tracking is just a small part of recruiting. Applicant tracking is to recruiting as order tracking is to sales. Yes, the modern employer stays compliant and knows the stage of every applicant. However, the modern employer understands that applicant tracking is just a feature within an encompassing hiring platform.

2015 Prediction: The interface for managing interested candidates will continue to follow the consumer facing interfaces such as Facebook and Twitter. Meaning – in recruiting platforms – be on the lookout for the rise of the collaborative feed, recruiting friends of friends, and smart marketing of job opportunities via social media.

3. Maturation of B2B Virality

“Architect for the hiring team,” said SmartRecruiters CEO Jerome Ternynck. “By optimizing for the hiring team, you can help a group of people hire in organizations of any size.”

The Old Way: Candidate facing – having candidates complete a 45 minute application form so that the company can gather all the information that the company “needs.” Employer facing – a top down sales structure where a highly paid sales person sold hiring systems to VPs based on presentations and demos.

The New Way: Social media freed word of mouth marketing. If your product stinks, the hiring manager forced to use it will tweet about how awful it is. With every passing day, the professional end user becomes more influential in the B2B software purchasing decision.

#HRTechTank Theme of Day: Consumerization of Enterprise Software pic.twitter.com/g2F4aVgJ7T — SmartRecruiters (@SmartRecruiters) December 2, 2014

2015 Prediction:  More B2B HR and recruitment technology companies will take a ‘Yammer-like’ bottoms up approach to software adoption. Always remember that time is a customer’s most valuable asset. If they are willing to spend time with your product, they have a willingness to pay for your product.

4. Head of Talent Acquisition

The Old Way: Leading talent acquisition was about bringing in great people. The recruitment strategy, workforce planning and general decision of who to hire was surrounded in much corporate secrecy. The New Way: Social media is the dog unveiling the man behind the curtain playing Oz in the Wizard of Oz. The person in charge of bringing in great people must have an online presence of expertise on sites such as Twitter, LinkedIn and industry blogs. Ultimately, this role will increasingly lead relationship marketing efforts with candidates.

2015 Prediction: The most desired directors of talent acquisition will become public facing leaders of the company.

That’s where and why I see the direction HR technology in 2015. As Steve Wyn said, “Human Resources isn’t a thing we do. It’s the thing that runs our business.” Lets keep the technology up to the importance of the job.

This is the moment after HR Tech Europe 2014; a walking podcast with TRU Founder Bill Boorman and eiTalent Head of Product Marc Mapes. Below you can listen to podcast or read the transcription in its entirety. But first, here’s what I see as the 3 most important HR Technology learnings from Bill Boorman:

1. The Globalization of HR Technology:

“80% of the vendors are the same (at HR Tech & HR Tech Europe)… smaller players are playing a global game rather than a domesticated game.”

2. Glassdoor’s Role in the Candidate Experience:

“I’ve seen it, I’ve found it, I’ve looked at it, let’s just double-check. Before I actually apply for this job let’s double-check. And that’s what I think Glassdoor is.”

3. To Prioritize the Building of Desktop vs. Mobile:

“I saw a number of vendors saying, “We’ve had to catch up the desktop experience because we haven’t really been concentrating on that for a period of time, because we’ve been focusing on mobile.” And that maybe says to you well, and we still have a lot of desktop users.”

David Smooke:        Hello. I’m David Smooke and I’m here with Bill and Marc.

Bill Boorman:           Hi Everybody.

Marc Mapes:            Hello.

David Smooke:        We just finished HR Tech Europe. We’re walking down the street to the pub.

Bill Boorman:           In the dam.

David Smooke:        In the dam, to have a…

Marc Mapes:           In the rain.

David Smooke:        In the rain. So we’re really dedicated to podcasts. We just want to kind of go through a bit of a recap of what happened and how it’s different than Las Vegas. What’d you guys notice at HR Tech today?

Bill Boorman:           Well I think the first thing for me, when we’re talking about differences, is actually, about 80% of the vendors are the same. So on that scale, in terms of what that tells me, is…

David Smooke:         Yeah, international…

Bill Boorman:           That increasingly even the smaller players, you’d expect it of your Oracles and Cornerstones and so on, even your smaller players are playing a global game rather than a domesticated game.

David Smooke:      Like global workforce trends. Maybe we could graph the overlap in HR Tech vendors versus, I don’t know, something with international workforce.

Bill Boorman:           Yeah, something with international workforce.

David Smooke:        (laughs) Compare the vendors to the international workforce.

Bill Boorman:           Yeah, I also think that has a relevance. You know I work with investors, and investors are very much looking at the moment for global footprints, something more than domestic, something bigger than America. America, the World Series, it’s the only country that has a world series with one nation. So I think people are looking a bit bigger than that and saying, certainly Europe. Probably half the speakers are about the same, so message, there’s two things that stand out for me that people are for the most part getting a bit better at that I like: One is UX and design, I think compared with last year, the products designs look better, much more usable, better navigation…

David Smooke:        Isn’t that always going to be true though? Come back a year later, there’s new trends, new interface and you’re used to it because the other stuff is moving in the same direction…

Bill Boorman:          Well actually, no, it’s normally new buzzword.

David Smooke:        New buzzword?

Bill Boorman:           New buzzword, generally…

David Smooke:        What was the buzz…

Marc Mapes:           Buzzword Bingo.

Bill Boorman:           Buzzword Bingo.

David Smooke:        Buzzword Bingo.

Bill Boorman:           I think it’s new buzzword. But again, top three things. Actually, surprisingly, not a lot of fuss or talk about mobile.

David Smooke:        I saw the Glassdoor had a good quote. Glassdoor claimed that the number of reviews, no, the length of reviews were the same whether they did it on a mobile device, or they did it on their desktop.

Bill Boorman:           Yeah, I think that’s kind of interesting.

David Smooke:         I don’t believe it, but it is amazing.

Bill Boorman:           Well that may be true for Glassdoor, you know, maybe people are just lying around…

David Smooke:         Yeah, no, I’m not saying that it’s not real. Yeah, I don’t know, Glassdoor reviews, I guess some of them are small. Or their average length is probably not that long…

Bill Boorman:           The point with Glassdoor, this is something I asked Robert about, actually a previous SHRM Conference founder, which is what I was really interested is: whether people use Glassdoor as a shopping destination or a checkout destination? What I mean by that is, are people comparing one brand with another in the way I think they would like you to think they do, or are people only looking at it when they’re getting ready to actually apply. So is it a checkout site? And the answer I got back from that is they use it for two things: one is salary, and the other one is that they only check one company. So I think if you’re only checking one company, and I have no idea if that data is the same…

David Smooke:         If that’s true that means the candidates that are on it are probably pretty far down the funnel…it’s like a background check on the company…

Bill Boorman:           You have to remember Glassdoor was founded in 2008… Trip Advisor, Expedia, as it was at the time. I think what we know from TripAdvisor is, we don’t really shop and compare things on TripAdvisor but we use it, you’ll find the hotel in a destination where you know there’ll be like [inaudible], but you’ll just use TripAdvisor to validate it before you actually press, yeah I’m going to spend some money and all, I’m going to book it.

David Smooke:         Yeah.

Bill Boorman:           And I think the same pattern, which shouldn’t really surprise us, the same online behavior applies to jobs. People are saying…

David Smooke:         Right…

Bill Boorman:           …I’ve seen it, I’ve found it, I’ve looked at it, let’s just double-check. Before I actually apply for this job let’s double-check. And that’s what I think Glassdoor is, so that’s why it wouldn’t surprise me. The point about mobile is, while I’m saying people are not making a big deal out if it, I think that’s because we’ve generally accepted that everything has to be built for mobile. It’s not a big deal. Now one of the interesting things that a couple of the tech startups said to me is the difference they’ve seen in that they were building mobile first, and realized they were still leaving behind the majority of their desktop users.

David Smooke:         (laughs)

Marc Mapes:             Watch out David.

(street noise):            Bike, bike, bike.

David Smooke:         Oh, sorry! (laughs)

Bill Boorman:           That gives you authentic Amsterdam when you nearly get run over by a bike.

David Smooke:         Yeah! I nearly jumped into him.

Bill Boorman:           Yeah. So, I think…

David Smooke:         I wasn’t thinking of these bike lanes as two ways.

Bill Boorman:           No.

David Smooke:         I was thinking of them as one way, but…

Bill Boorman:           No, this is the most dangerous thing in Amsterdam.

David Smooke:        The bike lanes?

Bill Boorman:           Yeah, I don’t know what Marc’s view would be on that. No, I think that was an interesting thing that actually, whereas last year we were all talking about mobile, I saw a number of vendors saying, “We’ve had to catch up the desktop experience because we haven’t really been concentrating on that for a period of time, because we’ve been focusing on mobile.” And that maybe says to you well, and we still have a lot of desktop users.

David Smooke:         Yeah.

Bill Boorman:                 Marc what would you think about that from your point of view?

Marc Mapes:             [inaudible 00:06:08]

Bill Boorman:                 A lot of construction.

David Smooke:         Yeah.

(steet noise):

Bill Boorman:           Authentic podcast.

David Smooke:         (laughs)

Bill Boorman:           We could be killed in our impatience to report information.

Marc Mapes:             No, definitely less conversations about mobile and I didn’t hear anybody actually talk about it all…

Bill Boorman:           No, which I think is healthy. I think we’ve just accepted that this is what we have to do and that’s what we do.

Marc Mapes:             Yeah, it’s not as big of a deal as everyone kind of alluded to last year. It’s changed a lot, so it’s no focus on that. It’s just a given, right, especially in the startups, a lot of them and, not for us because it doesn’t fit our product, but they’re starting with mobile first and then going to desktop. And like you said, they’re improving the desktop version of things to make it more incorporated…

Bill Boorman:           What I think they’ve learned, certainly what the startups were saying in the DisruptHR area, is that you have to give equal attention to the desktop experience, and the desktop experience is going to be different visually, navigation wise, and everything else. And the fact that maybe they’ve sacrificed that in the desperate quest to be mobile, and they’ve suddenly gone, actually and interesting they said, we discovered we have to have a good desktop experience to sell the product. Because the buyers are still desktop.

David Smooke:         Yeah, and that’s it. The startups are more in a community where everyone else is a bit more ahead technology wise, so all their friends and all their peers are very focused on mobile and then you need to think about the buyer that is, you know, not using the mobile phone as much.

Bill Boorman:           Yeah. I also think we’re beginning to see real data products. We’re going to see some very good analytic suites and analytic products, from people surprisingly like BroadBean. I think William Tincup made the comment that he was really surprised when looking for innovation he always look to startups, but he’s seen really good innovation from a company like ADP.

David Smooke:         Yeah. (laughs)

Bill Boorman:           And that sometimes we’ve seen some good innovation in Oracle, doing some cool stuff. And that maybe…

David Smooke:         Oracle, my innovative Oracle moment of the conference was that they sponsored the Wi-Fi so you had to type their name in to get the Wi-Fi. The only time I typed in Oracle in the last, however many months…

Bill Boorman:           Yeah, but whatever it is I think that’s a valid point that you know, maybe the giants are beginning to go, “We need to get a bit more inventive and sharpen up a bit.”

David Smooke:         Yeah, and a lot them are broken off like the equity firms and the small elite teams. Yeah. And it’s good to see. All right, is this pub any good?

Bill Boorman:           I think so, we’re just looking for the HRTech guys, so…

David Smooke:         All right.

Bill Boorman:           Thanks everybody.

David Smooke:         Good walk guys.

Bill Boorman:           Thank you.

We are set to host HRTechTank on December 2 at our San Francisco HQ.

#HRtechTank is bringing top tier HR thought leaders, HR Tech vendors and investors together to take a look at what is happening in the HR Tech space and to share their expertise with the most promising HR Tech companies. It is not a pitching event and certainly not a competition but a real opportunity to discuss and share ideas with the brightest minds in our industry.

Program:

8.30 – 9.00 Registration, coffee

9.00 – 9:15 Opening words with SmartRecruiters CEO Jerome Ternynck and TEqV Investment Advisor Taras Polischuk 

9.15 – 10.00 Principal Analyst at KeyInterval Research  John Sumser: Understanding What Practitioners Really Do

10.00 – 10.30 SmartRecruiters COO Brett Queener: Why the ATS is a Disaster for Recruiting

10.30 – 11.00 Good.co CEO Samar Birwadker: Growth Tactics and Product Evolution

11.00 – 11.30 Rocket-Hire President/Founder Charles Handler: Making Best Use of HR Data

11.45 – 12.15 SmartRecruiters CEO Jerome Ternynck: Building Product to Delight Buyers and Candidates

12:15 – 1.00 Partner at Emergence Capital Santiago Subbotovsky: Investor perspective on Scaling B2B Ventures

1:00 – 1:30 Lunch

1:30 – 2:30 Panel Discussion: Vendor-Buyer Dialog: Is There a Match in Expectations? with Betts Recruitment CEO Carolyn Betts, CEO MapHR Dan Abouav, and SmartRecruiters Senior Director Pro Services Rebecca Meissner. 

2:45 – 3:45 Investor Panel Discussion

4:00 – 5:00 HR Tech Startup Presentations & Questions

For reading the SmartRecruiters Blog, you receive a 30% discount. Register Here.

If you are a SmartRecruiters Pro customer, this event is free. Email me (David@SmartRecruiters.com) to redeem your ticket.

“Unleash Your People” reads the sign as you walk into the Amsterdam RAI Convention Centre. But how do we do that?

The conference has grown to 2,000+ people, and each one of them has expertise on how business can be better for people. The themes of #HRTechEurope were the candidate experience, the future or work, Google!, HR problems, and ‘the truth about recruitment.’ In the words of the people:

Candidate Experience

Love the idea that Recruiters should adopt the same measures as marketing: lead to conversation rate of candidate #HRTechEurope

— Jennie Wright (@JennieWright) October 23, 2014

“Candidates are increasingly asking each other about your brand and researching before applying” @jerometernynck @elaineorler #HRTechEurope — Eduardo Vanoutrive (@EduVanoutrive) October 23, 2014

#HRTechEurope ‘The candidate is now your customer’ @SmartRecruiters pic.twitter.com/8zhfNpRpH3

— MervynDinnen (@MervynDinnen) October 23, 2014

Future of Work

12 outcomes employees want at work by @rwang0 #FutureofWork #HRTechEurope pic.twitter.com/DUNVWPGGrF — Holger Mueller (@holgermu) October 24, 2014

"The most successful technology is that which will make us more human" key theme in the learning steam at #hrtecheurope reported by @pmsurya

— Charles Jennings (@charlesjennings) October 24, 2014

Meetings are places for managers to hide from staff. Social drags them kicking & screaming out of them, via @euan #HRTechEurope

— Belinda Gannaway (@contentqueen) October 24, 2014

The UX/UI of your software systems has a direct effect on your staff retention #DisruptHR #HRTechEurope

— Matt Buckland (@ElSatanico) October 24, 2014

As a leader, you must think of you less and less as decision makers but as social architects. #garyhamel #hrtecheurope — Bertrand Duperrin (@bduperrin) October 24, 2014

Collaboration is when smart people (your employees) define in real-time an optimal process to achieve a specific goal. #HRTechEurope — Jerome Ternynck (@jerometernynck) October 23, 2014

Mobile isn’t about changing where we work, but how we work in smaller & shorter chunks, via @rwang0 #HRTechEurope — Belinda Gannaway (@contentqueen) October 24, 2014

Google!

.@google‘s successful culture is not about free food, it’s about Mission, Transparency & Voice #HRTechEurope pic.twitter.com/G4y3oIEMSD — Johnny Campbell (@socialtalent) October 24, 2014

#skeching live: Tips and tools from building a collaborative workplace by #thomasdavies @GoogleforWork #HRTechEurope pic.twitter.com/6L4HUy8UmI

— Frederic Williquet (@fredericw) October 23, 2014

It sounds like a key to Google culture is HR that believes in making people smile. #HRTechEurope

— John Sumser (@JohnSumser) October 24, 2014

3 tips from @GoogleforWork 1) sharing – builds trust 2) smart creatives 3) relevancy – rather than disruption #HRTechEurope

— Andrew Spence (@AndySpence) October 23, 2014

HR Problems

If I weren’t at #HRTechEurope I wouldn’t know that the FBI and Google are solving the exact same HR problems. — John Sumser (@JohnSumser) October 24, 2014

“If your give freedom to your employees they will amaze you” Yvonne Agyei #HRTechEurope — Eduardo Vanoutrive (@EduVanoutrive) October 24, 2014

#HRTechEurope Opportunities for personal growth come from developing skills not purely promotion pic.twitter.com/PWETMupf22 — MervynDinnen (@MervynDinnen) October 24, 2014

77% say company culture is just as important as salary. Too bad culture can’t pay your bills. #HRTechEurope — Matt Charney (@mattcharney) October 23, 2014

Labor productivity dropping. HR not doing it’s job. #HRTechEurope need Smart Simplicity. Yves Morieux @BCG pic.twitter.com/RPpXtZFkm6 — Josh Bersin (@Josh_Bersin) October 23, 2014

The Truth About Recruitment

“Recruiting is here to create an unfair competitive advantage by hiring better talent than your competitors” @jerometernynck #HRtechEurope — SmartRecruiters (@SmartRecruiters) October 23, 2014

Love this image – data is not the new oil, but the new soil… #HRTechEurope pic.twitter.com/uf5u6NJlaD — Ian Bird (@ibird001) October 23, 2014

Recruiting = Bring a bunch of people from outside to meet people inside to figure out if you all want to work together. #HRTechEurope — Jerome Ternynck (@jerometernynck) October 23, 2014

“Candidates are the customers, recruiters are the marketers, and hiring managers are the sales force,” said SmartRecruiters CEO Jerome Ternynck.

Talent Function CEO Elaine Orler and SmartRecruiters CEO Jerome Ternynck presented HR Tech Europe’s keynote, “The Great Power Shift” on the Amsterdam RAI main stage.

Orler explained that “candidate” covers the lifecycle of anyone who is interested in your company (a lead) through the process until hired. Ternynck followed up with, the apply and track generation is gone; we all need to reinvent talent acquisition practices from the ground up.

#HRTechEurope ‘Please apply, we’ll let you know if you’re selected’ is no longer an acceptable talent acquisition strategy @SmartRecruiters

— MervynDinnen (@MervynDinnen) October 23, 2014

According to Orler’s 78,000+ candidate survey, 44.8% said they needed to research the company before they applied to work there. And the average candidate researched the company for 2 hours. But what were they looking for? Orler reports:

1. Company Values (41.7%)
2. Product/Service Information (39.2%)
3. Employee Testimonials (33%)
4. Answers to ‘Why’ People Want to Work Here (31.3%)
5. Answers to ‘Why’ People Stay Here (23.2%)
6. Financial Information (21.8%)

Considering a new employer is an emotionally charged decision. When candidates consider expressing interest in your company, the company’s values and the details of the people who make up the company are far more important than the financial considerations.

With these seeming visceral factors carrying such importance, it can be tough to leverage metrics in your recruitment department. Ternynck pointed out two analytics that combine brand sentiment and recruiting technology to measure your company’s recruitment effort: the percentage of hires from inbound traffic and referrals, and the percentage of candidates from organic sources.

Think of organic recruitment traffic and employee referral volume as a direct measure of your employer brand. Referrals mean people like your employer brand so much, they are actively advising others to join. A marketer would call a referer an advocate. To a marketer this is common sense, but is there a truer measure of raw candidate demand than percentage of your candidates (and quality candidates) that come from organic traffic to job ads, career pages, and recruitment related content?

“The candidates are the customer. And they are the voice that really matters.” @elaineorler. #HRTechEurope

— SmartRecruiters (@SmartRecruiters) October 23, 2014

So simple, isn”t it? @SmartRecruiters @ #HRTechEurope pic.twitter.com/AJRb4zos8k — Marcus Fischer (@marcusfischer) October 23, 2014

“We recognize SmartRecruiters as a leader and we welcome the opportunity to serve joint customers in their efforts to acquire top talent and to help candidates find great opportunities,” said Scott Roberts, Head of Enterprise Business Development of LinkedIn.

LinkedIn’s flagship product, LinkedIn Recruiter now integrates with SmartRecruiters. We made this integration with the LinkedIn power user in mind. Within SmartRecruiters, your candidates from all sources can already apply with LinkedIn, your hiring managers can already advertise with LinkedIn, and now, your recruiters can source talent with LinkedIn Recruiter. This cross system awareness unites talent sourcing and candidate management.

SmartRecruiters Inside LinkedIn

All shared LinkedIn profiles will include a ‘SmartRecruiters’ button which allows LinkedIn Recruiter users to view a candidate’s SmartRecruiters details in LinkedIn. When sourcing for talent in LinkedIn Recruiter, all past candidate interaction via SmartRecruiters, such as status, title, reviews, and communications, will be available in LinkedIn.

LinkedIn Inside SmartRecruiters

Mutual customers can automatically import InMail messages, keeping all your job conversations up to date. This not only allows a recruiter to communicate with quickly with LinkedIn candidates, but also easily brings their profile and messages into SmartRecruiters for evaluation by the entire hiring team.

“Companies are demanding comprehensive solutions to improve recruiting performance,” said Jerome Ternynck, CEO of SmartRecruiters. “Traditional ATS tools are siloed, ineffective tools that prevent recruiters from collaborating to engage the best candidates. Our integration with LinkedIn redefines ATS integration and brings our customers the solutions they need to find the right people to propel their business forward.”

LinkedIn is largest professional network on the Internet with more than 313 million members in over 200 countries and territories. LinkedIn Recruiter offers access to this robust talent pool. By using SmartRecruiters with LinkedIn, your hiring team will be more united and the measurement of your recruitment ROI will be easier with all your sourcing analytics in SmartRecruiters.

To learn more, visit www.smartrecruiters.com/linkedin and register for the live webinar “LinkedIn for SmartRecruiters” on October 28 at 10am PT.