Sourcing and Recruiting: What Makes Them Different?

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Many get confused when it comes to the difference between sourcing and recruiting. So what is the difference?

Ambiguity Between The Two

There are various reasons why there is ambiguity between the terms sourcer and recruiter. One reason is that there are limitless boundaries in talent acquisition. There is also the growth of social media in identification and acquisition of new talent. For various companies, similar factors have caused confusion between sourcers and recruiters as their job descriptions overlap.

There are similarities between the job descriptions. However, there also basic differences between sources and recruiters. Generally, sourcing is performed at an earlier part of the recruiting process. Thus, there is a relationship between the two terms. Still, they are not synonymous.

What Do Sourcers Do?

Geoff Webb wrote an article published in LinkedIn that is entitled “Recruiting vs. Sourcing (A Day in the Life). He has been in the human resource profession for 17 years and has transitioned from a recruiter to a sourcer. His experience in both jobs has made him qualified to provide his perspective regarding the basic differences between sourcers and recruiters.

Webb defines the role of a sourcer as a person who seeks for passive candidates. These candidates do not apply through job boards or corporate website. Sourcers are hunters. A sourcer flames interest and attracts talent to the organization. This requires research through social media profiles, seeking organization charts, job descriptions, poring through search engines and competitor companies. This also entails engaging potential employees through email messaging, sending messages through social media platforms, and picking the phone. Hunting involves the chase, which means repeating, tweaking, and refining these steps until a hunter finds qualified prospects.

This might be similar to what a recruiter does. Various recruiters do the sourcing function through to placement; other recruiting professionals work best in only one phase of the recruitment cycle. Sourcers are professional recruiters who specialize only in the first stage of procuring names and candidates. A large number of specialist staffing firms and larger companies employ teams of sourcing professionals that focus only on the first stage of procuring candidates.

Sourcers have crucial roles in the recruitment process. They use tools such as data mining and string searches in order to seek qualified candidates who have not applied for a position within the company.

What Do Recruiters Do?

In select companies, this is the phase when the sourcer turns over the qualified candidates to the recruiter. Recruiters manage the relationships, guide the candidates and the hiring manager through the process of screening, selection, and hiring. This involves meetings, phone calls, and interviews.

Recruiters also take charge of administrative duties such as job posting, coordination of interviews, and creating formal employment offers. The job of the recruiter is to follow the steps until the position which is vacant is filled by the company. There are instances when the recruiter takes charge of the onboarding process.

Recruiters and Sourcers Collaborate

There is a complementary nature of the job of sourcers and recruiters. Both cooperate in identifying and retaining top talent for an organization. There must be strong communication between sourcers and recruiters to contribute to a stronger workforce and ensure that a company has a healthy talent pipeline.

Carrhure is a company that takes charge in the collaboration between all involved parties during the whole process of recruiting. You can check how Carrhure can work for your organization by asking for a demo today.