Online Recruiting

Online Recruiting is the Dominant Human Resources Trend

New statistics and a 5/25/99 report on the staffing industry from investment giant Merrill Lynch confirm that Internet recruiting is on its way to becoming the future's dominant hiring and job-finding tool.

The American Management Association reports that in 1998, 70 percent of large and mid-sized companies in the U.S. actively used the Internet to advertise jobs and recruit employees, up from 51 percent in 1997.

Also interesting is the fact that job seekers are increasingly turning to the Internet as their primary source for finding a job.

According to a study conducted by J. Walter Thompson's Specialized Communications Group, over 70 percent of active job seekers prefer the Internet to other methods of job seeking (such as reading newspaper classifieds, contacting agencies, or attending job fairs). The study also found that more than half of the general public planned to use the Internet to look for a job sometime in the future.

The Merrill Lynch report estimated that spending on Internet recruiting will grow from $205 million in 1999 to $5.1 billion in 2003. It cited the Net's many advantages in the hiring process - lower cost, global reach, instant communication between employer and job seeker via e-mail, and 24-hour, 7 days a week access.

The Merrill Lynch report also lists NationJob as one of the "leading Internet Recruiting firms that have emerged" since the birth of the relatively new industry.