A few years ago, Matt Hill, Qualcomm’s director of staffing, needed to recruit research software engineers, as the San Diego-based company was growing quickly. However, San Diego is a place where it’s hard to find research software engineers, so he theorized it might be easier to set up a satellite office elsewhere.
He was right. After doing some in-depth research into talent pools, he found that Sydney, Australia was a place with an abundance of research software engineers. So, the company built an office there, primarily to house – you guessed it – research software engineers.
Today, Qualcomm’s Australia office continues to grow, with the engineers who work there a keystone to the company’s rapid growth from $10.99 billion in revenues in 2010 to $26.49 billion in revenue in 2014.
Decisions like Matt’s are perfect examples of how LinkedIn’s Talent Pool Reports can be used. By giving you detailed information about talent in a particularly area and/or industry, these reports can help you determine where and how to recruit, so your company can keep moving forward.
Wait, so what are talent pool reports?
Talent Pool Reports, as the name suggests, are reports generated by LinkedIn for LinkedIn Recruiter customers about the talent in certain areas and industries. The reports are generated for any talent pool with more than 10,000 LinkedIn members, covering everything from accountants in Africa to welders in Latin America.
Primarily, Talent Pool Reports show you the overarching supply and demand for a particular type of talent in a specific area. Supply is measured by the number of professionals on LinkedIn in that industry and region. Demand is measured by looking at aggregate recruiter activity on LinkedIn -- essentially the more InMails a professional receives, the higher the demand for that professional. .
How I use Talent Pool Reports?
Talent Pool Reports can be used in lots of different ways to help you recruit. Four specific examples are:
1. They can show you how easy it will be to recruit locally
By getting a Talent Pool Report of the area your office is located, you can determine how easy it will be to recruit there, or if you need to look elsewhere.
For example, the Talent Pool Report below is for corporate finance workers in southeastern Asia.
As you can see, Thailand and Kuala Lumpur are two places where the demand exceeds the supply for corporate finance talent, and therefore are places where recruiting that talent is difficult. If you are based in one of those areas, the data suggests you have four options:
- Lower your requirements for workers and be willing to train them more, so you increase the supply of talent.
- Be willing to wait longer to get top talent, as the market is very competitive.
- Increase the salary for your finance positions to increase the demand.
- Expand your recruiting efforts to another location, where talent is less in-demand.
Conversely, if your business is located in Malaysia, Indonesia or the Philippines, you’re in luck. The data shows there is a larger supply of corporate finance talent in those areas then there is demand, and therefore recruiting should be easier.
2. They help you determine the best places to look for top talent outside your main location
Using a similar example as above, let’s say you are a company looking for construction workers in the Gurgaon District in India. Yet looking at the Talent Pool Report for that industry and shows it will be a tough market to recruit construction workers in:
So, you decide to look for talent elsewhere in India. Of course, armed with the report, you see looking for talent in Hyderabad would be challenging as well.
Instead, the data show it is smart to look in New Delhi for construction workers. There, the supply of construction talent exceeds the demand for it, and recruiting should be easier.
3. They help you inform the messaging you use while recruiting
Okay, by using our Talent Pool Reports you’ve determined where you can recruit. The next step is determining how you should recruit, which the reports can also help you with.
Each Talent Pool Report comes with survey data showing what talent in that talent pool is looking for in a job. So, if you are an Australian company looking for finance workers, the report will show you that those professionals care more about money than the other professionals in the region:
This data can really inform your recruiting. Now, when you are talking with Australians in finance, you know that their compensation, your company’s culture and a strong career path matter more to them than it does to others.
4. They show you what universities are best to recruit from
A lot of companies want to set up college recruiting programs at specific universities to create a pipeline of talent. Again, though, it is about knowing what universities are graduating the kind of talent you’re looking for, so your college program provides you with the largest pipeline possible.
The Talent Pool Reports can help you decide that as well by showing you the schools most people in your targeted talent pool graduate from. So, for example, let’s say you are looking for software developers in northern Asia, the Talent Pool Report for that area will show you what colleges developers in that region are graduating from:
As you can see, a great place to recruit would be Shanghai Jiao Tong University or the Chinese University of Hong Kong, because they both produce a lot of software developers.
How do I get a Talent Pool Report?
LinkedIn has released dozens to the public, and LinkedIn Recruiter customers have access to the 10,000 Talent Pool Reports already created. More specific requests for Talent Pool Reports are available upon request from your sales rep on a case-by-case basis.
Final thought
We hear a lot today about “big data” and companies looking to establish data- driven recruiting in their HR organizations. Talent Pool Reports are a big step to accomplishing exactly that, by providing you meaningful, objective information to inform your talent acquisition strategy.
Bottom line, these reports take a lot of the guesswork out of recruiting, and give you an in-depth look at where to recruit and what candidates are looking for. From there, it’s up to you to make it happen, but they certainly are a good place to start.
Topics: Talent analytics
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