Builder | Dreamer | Strategist | Founder & CEO @ The Talent Foundation | Executive Director @ Sourcing7+ |
What will Sourcing 3.0 look like? If you think the current ways of sourcing will be around in a couple of years, it's time to wake up. In its current state, software can do 30-50% of the job better than the average sourcer or recruiter: • I've seen search platforms where natural language querying gives better and more targeted results than the best boolean string I can write. Boolean is not dead and will never die, but we'll have a better solution. • Testing shows that messages written by well-trained and prompted AI models outperform reply rates compared to human engagement. No wonder when we can't seem to go beyond "Hello {first_name}, Hope this email finds you well..." • The API costs are cheaper than the entry-level sourcer's salary, and you don't need to pay for benefits. The CFO cares about this. TA and recruiting have always struggled to quantify the value they bring to an organization. We need to learn how to prove our value to the CFOs to become more than a cost center on the balance sheet. I'd also argue that we shouldn't ignore the fact that there are jobs where human involvement was the moat, but despite that, they are now close to extinction. • Financial advisors. In the past, it had to be a human right? A person that you trust, who knows you, and who knows your goals. These days, algorithmic robo-traders outperform humans. • Travel agents. An agent who you went back to year after year, and you trusted them to organize one of the leading personal events for you and your family. These days you only use agents for special excursions. • First-level customer service agents. Companies like Klarna are already replacing 700 human agents with AI bots that perform better on all metrics. I'm really worried about our industry as Talent Acquisition professionals. We think that we're immune to seismical shifts. But just ask the ones who are around and have been doing this for decades. Ask sourcers who started the game in the pre-internet era. When was the last time you reached out to a candidate using snail mail? When was the last time you posted a job in the newspaper? When was the last time you used your paper Rolodex? The conversation about Sourcing 3.0 isn't about whether these changes will affect us, it's about how we will adapt when they do. Things are changing, and we need to take an active part in defining Sourcing 3.0. If not, it'll be determined by others, and we might not have a role to play. Your ability to innovate today dictates your success tomorrow. What do you think Sourcing 3.0 will look like? --------- 💡 Enjoyed this post? Reshare and let your network know! 👀 You want more? Visit my profile, click follow, and hit the 🔔! *** 🎯 When can I help • Seeking sector-specific data insights? • Do you need help with talent acquisition? • Looking to develop your team's sourcing skills? ➡️ If you answered yes to any of the above • Get in touch at hello@talent․foundation, and let's chat!
I think you are right. Factor in to this the exponentiality of this technology (look what AI generated videos looked like one year ago and what Sory can do). Sourcing is "mainly" about identifying data, analysis text data, matching it a need, interacting in a structured way with someone. Nothing that AI will not be able to do, at scale and much better than most sourcers and let's be humble, with exponentiality of tech development, all sourcers. The one thing for the moment is access to data, if you're talking linkedin structured data, this is being kept behind closed doors, for the moment. This doens't mean that the sourcing role will just disappear, as Toby said, the old school will stay as data will be lacking for these populations and then one of the main questions companies will have to answer is "what is a talent?" Who do we need, in terms of skills, to fulfill tasks that might evolve extremely fast. Understanding movement, talent intelligence, "guiding" the AI in a way. This is what I call truffle dog technique, you point your AI into direction but you let it do the digging to find the truffle in the ground. This is my 2cents on this.Great post btw, thanks.
Jim Stroud
3w
Maybe it will be autonomous AI agents that will be primed to individual tastes and specialized search processes so that every search is unique to the individual. Even when two people are looking for the same person, they will get different results, outreach in their own way and results tweaked based on personalized results of repeat usage. Maybe tools will get better but only so much as the individual uses and tweaks it. But that will only be part of the equation. I can see sourcing morph into predictive analytics and content developed for candidate attraction. So, if you are looking for a python engineer with a passion for LLMs, content is generated that would appeal to a specific person. Maybe it will be an ebook or an article behind a firewall. Want to read it? Give me your email address and I will send it, along with a drip campaign that appeals specifically to that individual and not developers in general. Want to see Guido van Rossum debate Joseph Weizenbaum on why your resume makes you the best candidate for job X? Email me and I will send you a SORA powered video doing just that. Maybe Sourcing 3.0 is all about talent attraction at the ultra-personalized level? AI can certainly help with that. Thoughts?
Toby Culshaw
3w
Sourcing 3.0 is two things, one old school one new. Old school is a blast from the past, super niche high touch person, networkers, passive talent accessors that get into the depths of a niche area that standard sourcing doesn't reach. They dive into personal relationships and their little black book.... The second, given the rapidly changing talent ecosystems, is to become far heavier on the data front and pivoting to talent intelligence and becoming highly consultative on market intelligence to the business.
Rob McIntosh
3w
How can I not weigh in on this Adam 😊. Two parts given response limits in LinkedIn. I raised this flag back in 2016 in detail and most people told me my article was TLDR. I published a visual on what I thought it would become by 2025 in 2018. I was wrong. It came true in 2023. My current thoughts on the subject today given what we have seen in advancements in the last few years has been crystalized into the following as it specifically relates to Sourcing. I can provide a broader POV on all recruitment, but since you asked about Sourcing 3.0, I will keep my response to just that. Most roles that need filling do not require sourcing at all. These roles can be filled quite easily with a smart automated inbound strategy of getting candidates to come to you. The roles that do require sourcing, in most cases the target audience you are going after has an online footprint online. Yes, all the breadcrumbs are spread all over the place, but they are online. AI will find those breadcrumbs online, and in the future even behind paid firewalls...........
I think I am looking in the wrong places most AI sourcing tools make me think I have atleast 10 more years till a robot sucessfully replaces me (not saying there won't be unsucessful attempts in the meantime). That being said I think much more focus on evaluation, requirement gathering, profile enrichment and fingers crossed talent intelligence rather than the actual identification work of yesteryear. That and more than likely higher req counts for each sourcer.
Can we please agree for a start that upwards of 80% of all roles being hired for are in the BAU category (1.High in numbers 2. Come up frequently 3. Are mostly uniform in JD or with minimal difference 4. Are on the mid to low complexity level 5. Have a straight forward/uniform assessment, selection and interview structure) As such any kind of sourcing need to be seen in that context, meaning it for the vast majority is really not that difficult or challenging. As for sourcing 3.0 it will be 1/3 old school 2/3 technology and data driven.
Mike Wolford
3w
My short version is that Sourcers become advocates for their candidates and advisors to their hiring partners. Automation of emails, job descriptions,
Danny Murphy
3w
Very interesting post Adam Kovacs, one big challenge I am seeing with AI use cases in recruitment is compliance. With the EU AI Act coming, hiring data comes under a higher level of scrutiny with these search platforms. Which AI search platforms do you think will lead the way?
Sarah Fell
3w
Profound changes in the last 10 years, much more so the last 30 years. All good examples of how we have to innovate to stay relevant. That said, other than picturing a Terminator 2 scenario, I’m having a hard time envisioning the sourcer’s role when the machines take over.
Passionate about talent identification, attraction & acquisition
3wIt’s Thursday morning and I’m sleepy on the train, so excuse the formatting on this: 1) The people ringing the bell and decrying the end days of Boolean are wrong, but I think there’s also a preemptive declaration of the superiority of AI; 2) As Jacob Sten Madsen points out, a lot of roles are largely BAU. Here’s where I would likely be booed and declared a heretic by my learned colleagues - that 80% should fit in a recruiter’s pipeline, not a sourcer when it comes to filling the role. By all means, build pipelines of passive candidates, but I’m not sure sourcers should be spending their time finding more of the same; 3) Where the shift is happening in sourcing is to move into more strategic services. To echo Miguel and Kevin, the last 5 years specifically have been oriented toward things like DE&I analytics, helping provide intelligence and insights to management and C-level. The future will impact agency sourcers more than in-house or consultancy in an immediate sense, but the key is that all learn how to use analytics and data to communicate effectively. 4) The impact of sourcing has never that it makes money - the function saves money and time. Candidate care and communication is again amplified.