Talent Solutions
2012 Recruiting Trends – India Snapshot
ORGANIZATION NAME

Methodology All respondents:
 work in a corporate HR/recruiting setting
Surveyed 255 recruiting  represent an even mix of small, midsize
and large enterprises
professionals in India with a  have at least some budget authority
LinkedIn profile.  focus solely or significantly on recruitment
May - July 2012
Nordics: 113
UK: 334 Netherlands: 226
Canada: 299
Germany: 97
France: 224
Spain: 100
Italy: 99
USA: 755
India: 255 Australia: 280
Brazil: 226
2

6 notable trends in India - summary
1. Hiring remains healthy
2. The (competitive) heat is on
3. Passive talent and pipelining remain essential
4. Quality of hire the name of the game
5. Employer branding the hot topic
6. Room to improve data-driven decision making
3

1. Hiring remains healthy

Among those who are hiring, over 50 percent seeing
volume increase in 2012
100% 100%
80%
Hiring more 80% 38%
53% 50%
68%
60% 60%
Hiring same
34%
40% 40%
22% 35%
20% 22% Hiring less 20%
25% 28%
11% 15%
0% 0%
2011 2012 2011 2012
“Considering only full and part-time professional employees, how do you
expect the hiring volume across your organisation to change this year?”
5

Budget growth trending in line with hiring volume
100% 100%
30%
80%
Increase 80% 41%
50%
62%
60% 60%
Same 43%
40% 40%
29% 45%
28% Decrease
20% 20%
21% 27%
11% 14%
0% 0%
2011 2012 2011 2012
“How has your organisation's budget for recruiting solutions changed from last year?”
6

2. The (competitive) heat is on

Top obstacles to attracting top talent in India reflect
highly competitive landscape
Biggest obstacles to attracting top talent
Competition 1 38% 1 41%
Compensation 2 38% 2 39%
Location 3 26% 4 25%
Lack of awareness or interest in our employment brand 4 24% 3 25%
Lack of awareness that we're hiring 5 14% 7 12%
Inability to effectively use data to improve our approach 6 14% 8 9%
Recruiting team too small 7 12% 5 15%
Recruiting team doesn't have the right tools/systems 8 12% 6 13%
Quality of talent currently at our company 9 7% 9 7%
Company performance 10 6% 10 6%
Recruiting team skills 11 4% 11 4%
Other 8% 11%
8

Chief competitive threats
Recruiting leaders in India are most concerned their competitors
will…
 Invest in employer brand
 Improve their referral program
 Invest in new recruiting tools

Similarities between competitive threats and top long-
term trends; using social/professional networks leads
Top long-lasting trends
Utilising social and professional networks 1 35%
Boosting referral programs 2 35%
Upgrading employment branding 3 30%
Finding better ways to source passive candidates 4 26%
Measuring quality of hire more consistently 5 22%
Training recruiters and hiring managers 6 19%
Optimizing your career site 7 17%
Recruiting globally 8 17%
Reducing spend on staffing firms 9 16%
Ensuring jobs posted reach multiple sites 10 13%
Reducing dependence on traditional job boards 11 11%
Using employee blogs for recruiting 12 10%
10

Recruiting through the eyes of Indian talent acquisition
professionals
“Recruiting is…”
11

3. Passive talent and pipelining remain essential

Most believe in the importance of passive talent and
the practice of pipelining talent
Pipelining talent
Passive talent
Engaged in pipelining talent
Passive talent a focus
Not engaged in pipelining talent
Passive talent not a focus
13%
35%
65%
87%
13

4. Quality of hire the name of the game

Quality of hire is the single most important metric; cost
per hire more important in India than elsewhere
Single most important recruiting metric
Quality of hire 1 41% 1 45%
Time to fill 2 26% 3 21%
Cost per hire 3 16% 4 8%
Hiring manager satisfaction 4 16% 2 22%
Other 5 1% 5 3%
15

Fastest-falling source of quality hires is recruitment
agencies; social platforms, job boards up
Biggest YoY
Best sources for key quality hires changes
Employee referral programs 1 57% -4%
Internet job boards 2 46% +5%
Recruitment agencies 3 35% -10%
Internet resume databases 4 29% -3%
Social professional networks (e.g. LinkedIn) 5 25% +4%
College recruiting programs 6 21%
Internal hires 7 15%
Company career website 8 12%
Your ATS/internal candidate database 9 6%
General social media 10 5% +4%
Your CRM system 11 3%
Print newspapers/trade journals 12 3%
16

5. Employer branding is the hot trend

Employer brand seen as critical in hiring great talent
81% 83%
Agree that employer brand has
significant impact on ability
to hire great talent
77% 69%
Agree that employer brand is
a top priority for their
organisation
18

Despite the climate of ‘more with less’, companies
investing in employer branding
Increasing (58%) or
90% maintaining (32%) their
investment in employer
brand in 2012
91%
19

6. Room to improve data-driven decision making

India is ahead of the curve when it comes to regularly
measuring employer brand
Regularly measure the health
50% of employer brand in a
quantifiable way 33%
Regularly survey candidates
45% to understand employer brand
position 32%
21

Indian talent acquisition organisations lead the way in
leveraging data to make hiring decisions
Believe their organisation
62% utilises data well to make
hiring decisions 26%
Believe they are average,
38% or poor at using data to
make hiring decisions 74%
22

6 notable trends in India - summary
1. Hiring remains healthy. Despite global macroeconomic trends, hiring in India is relatively
strong. Over 50 percent say hiring volume is up from 2011; another 22 percent are hiring at
same rate. Budgets appear to be trending in line with hiring volume growth.
2. The (competitive) heat is on. Competition and compensation are cited as the biggest
obstacles to hiring top talent; respondents are most worried their competitors will invest in
employer branding, improve referral programs, and invest in new recruiting tools.
3. Passive talent and pipelining remain popular. 65 percent say passive talent is a focus,
and 87 percent do some form of talent pipelining.
4. Quality of hire the name of the game. 45 percent cite quality of hire as most critical metric;
internet job boards and social platforms including online professional networks are rising as
quality sources.
5. Employer branding the hot topic. 81 percent agree employer brand has a significant
impact on ability to hire great talent; 77 percent say it’s an organisational priority. And 90
percent are either increasing or maintaining employer brand investment.
6. Room to improve data-driven decision making. While India appears ahead of most other
countries, there is still room to improve data-driven decision-making. Half claim to regularly
measure employer brand, and 45 percent survey candidates. Almost 40 percent say they
are average or poor at using data to make hiring decisions. 23

Additional resources
On how to recruit
http://talent.linkedin.com/passivetalent
passive talent
On how to dial up your
recruiting impact on http://talent.linkedin.com
LinkedIn
On best practices in
http://talent.linkedin.com/employer-brand
employer branding
Read our blog http://lnkd.in/talent-blog
See more research http://lnkd.in/hireonlinkedin
Follow us @hireonlinkedin
24

Sampling and methodology
 Survey fielding occurred between late May and late July 2012
 N=255 talent acquisition professionals located in India, who
– work in a corporate HR/Talent Acquisition department
– have at least some authority in determine their company’s recruitment solutions budget
– focus exclusively on recruiting, manage a recruiting team, or are HR generalists who spend
more than 25 percent of their time recruiting
 Comparisons to 2011 data are taken from 2011 Global Hiring Trends research, which
fielded between late April and early June, 2011
– n=269 talent acquisition professionals with identical sampling criteria and methodology to 2012
 Global numbers are reported as un-weighted
averages of corporate recruiter responses from the
following countries:
– Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, India,
Italy, Netherlands, Nordics (Norway, Sweden,
Denmark, Finland), Spain, UK, & US
 Participants are members of LinkedIn who have
opted to participate in research studies. They were
selected based on information in their LinkedIn profile
and were contacted via email.