Internal Vs External Recruitment

14 Jul 2023

Many employers make a point of advertising vacant jobs internally before they consider opening the floodgates to external candidates. It’s something we would always suggest employers consider before they place an external advert, particularly because:

Existing employees will feel they are being given a serious chance at career progression, and will be grateful for the opportunity, even if it isn’t for them at this time.

It shows you value their skill set and are keen on seeing your staff progress and this can increase employee retention rates. As long as they feel that there is a potential path to future career progression within the company, many employees wouldn’t dream of going anywhere else. Most employees are inherently loyal and it takes something big to drive them away. Most of these factors involve anything that makes them feel like they aren’t valued at the current organisation. Internal recruitment helps to assuage that feeling and to cement the idea that they are all part of the same team, pulling in the same direction.

An external application process is also vastly more expensive to run and involves many areas of outlay, from placing adverts on internet job boards or in local newspapers to hiring a central location for interviews.

There will be times when you can’t restrict a vacancy to an ‘internal only’ advert, for example where you are sure current employees don’t have the right skills, qualifications or experience.

Our only advice when deciding on your approach is to bear in mind the impact your decision will have on the employee relations environment, specifically staff morale. Going straight for an external ad can seriously demotivate those staff who think they are fully qualified for the job, as now they’ll think you have a different opinion altogether. This can then lead to a loss of performance and productivity.

It is crucial to remember that many employees will have been waiting for their opportunity to take the next step on the rungs of the career ladder and they thought that this was finally their chance to do so. If you have talked to them before about career progression, take the time to have a chat and explain the skills that you feel are lacking within the organisation and how recruiting externally should be able to help.

If they are unhappy that they aren’t even being considered for the role, perhaps suggest a course they could do so that they are upskilling themselves and learning the skills that they will need if they are going to be able to apply for similar career progression opportunities whenever the next tranche of vacancies opens up.

We simply suggest that if you’re going external from day one, let your employees know – and confirm to them they have as much right to apply as anyone outside the organisation. This doesn’t take much effort – making sure you publicise a vacancy inside the organisation as well as outside will show your employees they are welcome to put their name in the hat.