Networking works. The numbers prove it.

Posted by Steve

April 30, 2009

Read almost any book, blog, or website about looking for a job and the consensus is unanimous about networking: it's by far the best way to find a job. This makes sense, as people are more likely to hire someone they know rather than someone they don't. And the numbers seems to back up this assertion.

The "CareerXroads 8th Annual Source of Hire Study" found the following:

Internal Transfers and Promotions were 38.8% of ALL the F/T positions a companyfills.
Referrals (employee, alumni, vendor, etc.) make up 27.3% of all external hires and is arguably the number one external source. Employee referrals make up most of this category but Alumni referrals are growing. The efficiency of referrals is one of the single most important characteristics of US hiring practices. More than 17,000 positions were filled from just fewer than 200,000 referrals or 1 hire for every 11.2 referrals!
Hires attributed to Job Boards (not including the company site) represent 12.3% of external hires. We believe this SOH has indeed peaked and predict it will diminish in the future. Within the category, Monster has lost ground to CareerBuilder. The two of them account for half the job board hires but both are losing ground to the “long-tail” of niche sites, social networks and other online search engine marketing capabilities that are expanding their reach.
Hires attributed to the Company Website are a problem for us (we maintain that the company web site is a destination not a source) and essentially represents one of every five external hires.

According to this report, the largest source of hires is internal, that is, derived from the pool of existing employees. This is not very surprising. Current employees have the advantage of already being on the inside - they know the culture, the way things get done, who is who. They've already passed the acid test of getting hired in the first place. They've shown at the very least that they're good enough to work for the organization and survive.

The next largest source of hires is from referrals, from those who have varying degrees of familiarity with the organization. Again, nothing surprising here. Would you trust a movie recommendation more from a friend or a stranger? The same goes for a potential hire.

Together, these two sources - internal and external referrals - lead to two-thirds of all organizational hires. This means that someone has networked themselves into these jobs.

Now, this doesn't mean that they went to those "networking" events attended only by others looking for a job. That is not a networking group - it's a support group. I'm not against support groups at all. In fact, they can be an extremely helpful resource in the discouraging grind that a job search can become. But do not confuse them with networking!

So, what is networking? According to Dictionary.com, it's

"a supportive system of sharing information and services among individuals and groups having a common interest..."

This means that networking is not just about finding a job. It's about "sharing" with others who have a "common interest" with you.

So, networking is about giving and receiving. But really more about the giving. Because if you are only focused on getting something, then people will sense that and you'll wind up alienating the very people you may need to help you find a job.

So, how do you network? that's a subject I'll cover that in future posts. Stay tuned.