12 Proven Strategies for Sourcing Candidates at Scale

August 27, 2024

Cat Weber

In the quest to attract top talent for enterprise-level organizations, we’ve gathered insights from CEOs and Directors on the most effective strategies for sourcing candidates at scale. From leveraging ATS and social media to employing programmatic job advertising, explore the twelve distinct methods these experts deem crucial for successful large-scale recruitment.

Leverage ATS and Social Media
Implement Data Analytics Tools
Highlight Job Stability and Security
Build a Strong Employer Brand
Utilize AI-Powered Recruitment Technologies
Post General Open Positions and Proactive Outreach
Maximize Employee Referral Programs
Form Partnerships with Universities and Organizations
Tap Into Professional Networks and Agencies
Employ Programmatic Job Advertising
Conduct Boolean and Google X-Ray Searches
Attract and Retain Veteran Leadership

Leverage ATS and Social Media

From my experience of helping brands hire top talent, I can share that sourcing candidates at scale for enterprise-level organizations requires a strong combination of online and offline strategies to be the most effective.

By using the Applicant Tracking System (ATS) to its full potential, you can build targeted talent pools based on past successful hires and industry benchmarks. This allows you to proactively reach out to qualified candidates who might not be actively searching for jobs.

Social media recruiting, particularly on LinkedIn, has also proven valuable. By consistently showcasing the company culture, employee success stories, and industry contributions, you can attract passive candidates who are a good fit for the skill needs.

Another great strategy that you can’t underestimate is employee referrals. Through a strategic employee referral program, you can incentivize current employees to recommend qualified individuals from their networks. Referred candidates often integrate seamlessly into the company culture and tend to perform well.

With the right combination of all these strategies, we’ve been able to build a talent pipeline that keeps us competitive in the market.

Elena Bejan, People Culture (HR) and Development Director, Index

Implement Data Analytics Tools

One highly effective approach we’ve embraced at MyTurn is the use of data analytics to enhance candidate sourcing at scale. By implementing sophisticated data analytics tools, we can analyze trends in candidate behavior, job market dynamics, and recruitment outcomes.

These insights allow us to continuously refine our sourcing strategies, ensuring that we are targeting the right candidates at the right time. For instance, predictive analytics can help us forecast which candidates are most likely to engage with our job postings and which sourcing channels yield the highest-quality applicants.

This data-driven approach not only optimizes our recruitment efforts but also provides our enterprise clients with actionable insights to improve their hiring processes. Ultimately, leveraging data analytics helps us stay ahead of the curve in a constantly evolving job market, making it an indispensable part of our candidate sourcing strategy.

Amit Doshi, Founder & CEO, MyTurn

Highlight Job Stability and Security

The strategy I have found most effective for sourcing candidates for enterprise-level companies is emphasizing the improved job stability and security that generally come with larger companies. As part of my high-touch, multi-channel outreach to passive candidates, I focus the message or conversation on the predictability of enterprise-level companies. My message of stability especially resonates with candidates who have joined early-stage technology startups and have witnessed the lack of security that can occur as high-tech companies struggle with funding or product-market fit.

Mike Basso, Founder & CEO, salestalent.com

Build a Strong Employer Brand

The most effective strategy for sourcing candidates at scale in enterprise-level organizations that I’ve found starts well before you need to fill the roles by building a strong employer brand.

To do this, you need to have a well-established presence on LinkedIn and the other social media platforms that are relevant to your sector. Along with this, it’s also very beneficial to have positive ratings on sites like Glassdoor, as well as to be active in professional organizations for your industry and their associated forums, websites, or online communities. The final piece of this puzzle is strong employee advocacy, which can start with incentivizing them to leave reviews of your company on Glassdoor, sharing your posts with friends and colleagues, and otherwise promoting your brand through their network channels.

Once you have this kind of employer brand, sourcing candidates at scale becomes a much simpler process. In some cases, all you need to do is announce that you’re hiring and ask your network to spread the word. If you’re seen as a strong employer within your industry, and have a broad following, you will likely get a strong response from candidates without needing to put in a significant amount of extra effort.

There are definitely other strategies that you can use to source candidates at scale without a strong employer brand, but I’ve found none of them are as consistently effective as doing the work in advance to build an employee brand that you can activate when you need to hire.

Rob Boyle, Marketing Operations Director, Airswift

Utilize AI-Powered Recruitment Technologies

I highly recommend the use of AI-powered recruitment technologies, such as chatbots and automated screening tools, to streamline the candidate-sourcing process.

These technologies can handle initial candidate interactions, answer FAQs, and pre-screen applicants based on predefined criteria. This automation frees up recruiters’ time to focus on more strategic tasks, such as building relationships with top candidates and improving the candidate experience. AI can also analyze resumes and profiles at scale, identifying relevant skills and experiences that match the job requirements, thereby improving the accuracy of candidate matches.

By integrating AI into the recruitment process, enterprise-level organizations can achieve scalability, consistency, and efficiency in their candidate-sourcing efforts, ultimately leading to better hires and organizational growth.

Michael Hurwitz, CEO and Co-Founder, Careers in Government

Post General Open Positions and Proactive Outreach

One highly effective strategy is to post more general open positions, inviting candidates to express their interest even if there’s no specific role available. This broadens the pool and keeps potential candidates engaged. Proactive outreach is also key—building relationships with candidates before jobs are posted helps create a robust talent pipeline. Engaging through conversations, check-ins, and keeping them updated with company news maintains their interest.

Recruiting is similar to sales; you need to expand the top of the funnel and keep candidates warm. Regular communication and updates ensure candidates feel valued, even if there isn’t an immediate fit. This approach not only keeps candidates engaged but also positions your company as a preferred employer, ensuring a steady stream of interested candidates and improving overall hiring quality.

Vivian Chen, Founder & CEO, Rise

Maximize Employee Referral Programs

In my experience, leveraging employee referrals is the most effective strategy for sourcing candidates at scale for enterprise organizations. Employee referrals allow you to tap into the networks of your own staff to surface qualified, interested candidates who already have an insider connection to your company. This results in higher-quality candidates that are more engaged in the process and likely to accept offers if extended. The key is incentivizing employees to make referrals through referral bonuses or rewards programs. This encourages them to proactively reach out to their contacts and share roles.

To scale this, it’s important to make the referral process as seamless as possible through an internal referral portal and automated workflows. Overall, employee referrals are my go-to for quality, high-volume hiring because you can mobilize your entire workforce to source their networks on your behalf. The personal touch of an employee introduction also gives referred candidates a positive first impression.

Gauri Manglik, CEO and Co-Founder, Instrumentl

Form Partnerships with Universities and Organizations

At Parachute, we’ve succeeded by establishing long-term relationships with local universities and professional organizations. Partnering with educational institutions allows us to access a steady stream of new graduates who are eager to start their careers in IT and cybersecurity. Offering internships and cooperative education programs allows us to evaluate potential candidates in a real-world environment before making a full-time hiring decision.

Another effective strategy is implementing an employee referral program. Our team members understand the company culture and the skills required for various roles, making their referrals particularly valuable. Incentivizing referrals ensures employees are motivated to recommend highly qualified candidates from their professional networks.

Additionally, we focus on posting vacancies through job boards and social media platforms. Posting detailed job descriptions on popular job boards and actively engaging with potential candidates on LinkedIn helps us reach a wider audience. We also use targeted ads to attract specific skill sets required for our roles.

Elmo Taddeo, CEO, Parachute

Tap Into Professional Networks and Agencies

I’ve found that tapping into professional networks has been highly effective for sourcing candidates at scale for enterprise-level organizations. As a former Senior CPA, I built strong connections with professionals across various industries. These relationships have been invaluable for identifying skilled candidates quickly. Referrals from trusted colleagues and industry contacts often lead to top-tier talent who fit the role and company culture well.

Another successful strategy has been collaborating with specialized recruitment agencies. During my time as CEO, we’ve partnered with agencies that understand our industry and specific needs. These agencies have a broad reach and access to a large pool of candidates. They handle initial screenings and present us with qualified candidates, saving us time and ensuring we get the right people for the job.

Investing in comprehensive onboarding and continuous development programs has also been beneficial. At Tech Advisors, we prioritize training and professional growth for new hires. This not only attracts top talent but also ensures they are well-prepared for their roles. Well-structured onboarding programs help new employees integrate smoothly into the team, increasing retention rates and reducing the need for frequent recruitment.

Konrad Martin, CEO, Tech Advisors

Employ Programmatic Job Advertising

Sourcing candidates at scale is quite different from more common sourcing efforts. When you’re hiring at scale, you’re likely to be engaged in high-volume hiring, where you’re looking to hire dozens, hundreds, or even thousands into the same or similar roles. Efficiency becomes far more important than when you’re looking to hire one person, and the efficiency needed typically involves a fair amount of automation.

Many employers regard programmatic job advertising—where the software decides where a job should run and from what start to what end dates—as being all about cost savings. Why? Because programmatic is often used in conjunction with cost-per-click (CPC) or cost-per-application (CPA) pricing models, although you can use programmatic software in conjunction with traditional, duration-based pricing, and you can use performance-based pricing such as CPC or CPA without programmatically posting jobs.

But programmatic’s biggest benefits are seen by employers who are hiring at scale because it makes it far easier for the job posting ads to generate the far greater volumes of applications that are needed when you’re hiring dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of employees. If you’re hiring 25 people into a role, you’re going to need about 25 times as many applications, which means you need to get that ad in front of about 25 times as many candidates. To manually post the same job to 25 different job boards is a monumental undertaking, but quite easy when you do so programmatically.

Steven Rothberg, Founder and Chief Visionary Officer, College Recruiter

Conduct Boolean and Google X-Ray Searches

For me, the most effective methods for sourcing passive candidates have been Boolean searches and Google X-Ray searches.

In my experience, Boolean searches have become a crucial tool in my recruiting arsenal, allowing for highly precise and specific candidate sourcing. By expertly connecting keywords and operators, I can fine-tune search queries to locate candidates who possess exactly the right abilities and qualifications, or pinpoint those who might be lacking in specific areas. Mastering the rules of Boolean logic has equipped me to sift through vast databases and uncover hidden talent that could be missed by traditional searches. Strategic use of Boolean searches not only saves time but significantly improves my chances of finding the ideal candidate for a role.

I also utilize Google X-Ray searches. This method involves using search engines to delve into specific websites for candidate details. This technique is invaluable when I need to find candidates who might not be actively seeking jobs but have the necessary skills. Using search engines like Google and Bing with targeted site operators allows me to find candidate profiles on personal blogs, forums, and niche communities. X-Ray searches grant me deeper insights into a candidate’s online presence, helping me understand their professional contributions and interests.

Alan Muther, Founder, Ardoz Digital

Attract and Retain Veteran Leadership

The recruitment and retention of veterans is going to be critical for companies to address the complex employment challenges in 2024 and beyond.

Here are the creative ways that companies need to attract and retain veterans with unique skills for their organizations, drawn from both experience and various published sources:

Companies need to find a way to advertise or broadcast their desire to hire veterans for these leadership positions.

Don’t recruit veterans because it’s a good PR move and makes your company “look good.” Veterans qualified for leadership positions can sense a company that does that a mile away.

Reach out to Veteran Service Organizations and military non-profit groups to assist your company with your veteran leadership hiring program. And, most importantly, build military cultural competency into your company, so that you understand the basics of the military, and how military skills can add value to your products or services. There are a number of consulting firms and online training programs available to assist you with that effort. The PsychArmor Institute is one such organization to assist your company with an understanding of military culture and customs.

Also, make certain that your Employee Assistance Program (EAP), if your company has one, includes any assistance that veteran leaders might need.

You can also create veteran affinity groups at your company, comprised not only of veterans but also of any of your employees who are currently military reservists, spouses of veterans, and other employees who are simply interested in veteran issues.

And, for veteran leaders currently working at companies—mentor newly hired veterans to ensure their success at your company.

And, finally, veterans employed by a company can use their exceptional skills and leadership talents—and sense of mission and purpose—to contribute to non-profit organizations in the community, most of which are in dire need of the exceptional qualities that veterans can bring to any organization. This would, likewise, greatly benefit the companies that employ them.

Dr. Paul Dillon, Adjunct Instructor at Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy, President and CEO, Dillon Consulting Services LLC