Recruiting Trends 2016-17 - Brief 7 - Benchmarking Recruiting Success

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Jacob

“Recruiting Trends 2016-17” presents key findings on employer recruiting practices, delivered as short briefs over six weeks. Brief 7 focuses on benchmarking recruiting success by outlining how organizations measure recruiting effectiveness and how benchmark measures were refined based on prior surveys and feedback. It reports average outcomes for full-time hiring, including conversion and offer acceptance rates, and summarizes how frequently employers assess recruiting programs.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages7

Reading Time18 min

AccessFree to download

Brief 7: Benchmarking Recruiting Success

Meet the Completers

Company Size

Role in College Recruiting

Institutions Where Companies Recruit Talent

Active Recruiting by Region

Key States

Key Economic Sectors

Acknowledgements

Key benchmarks

Recruiting program assessment

RECRUITING TRENDS 2016-17 46th Edition BRIEF 7 Benchmarking Recruiting Success Key findings from 2016-17 arepresented in this research brief. We have broken the release of employer information into a series of short briefs that will be made available over the next six weeks. You can download the briefs from the Collegiate Employment Research Institute. Recruiting Trends 2016—2017 is published by Career Services and the Collegiate Employment Research Institute and copyrighted, © 2016- 2017, by Michigan State University. All rights reserved. This electronic version is for individual use only. No part of this electronic report maybe reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval) without written permission from the Institute. Users are not permitted to mount this file on any network servers or distribute this report by email without written permission from the Institute. Material from this report can be used in classrooms and newsletters with proper citation of Michigan State University and the Collegiate Employment Research Institute. Meet the Completers We generated this convenience sample from employers currently seeking college talent through their interactions with college and university career services offices. Nearly 200 career service centers from around the country invited their employers to participate in this study. Approximately 4,350 employers provided information useful for understanding recruiting trends and practices. We will use information provided by those recruiting talent for full-time positions, internships, and co-ops for these research briefs. Readers can use the following key sample characteristics to determine how applicable our survey results are for their campus employer base. Company Size Very small > 9 employees 9% Fast-growth Small Midsize Large Very large 10-100 employees 101–500 employees 501–3,999 employees 4,000–25,000 employees> 25,000 employees 30% 23% 20% 10% 8% Role in College Recruiting Full-time positions 71% Internship or co-op positions only 12% Short-term hiring 7% Experienced hiring 10% Institutions Where Companies Recruit Talent Two-year public college Four-year public college Four-year private college Two- & four-year for-profit institution Institution with bachelor’s & advanced degree programs Institution with advanced degrees only Historically black college & university Hispanic-serving institution Asian, Asian-Pacific serving institutions 28% 53% 40% 22% 69% 10% 17% 15% 14% Active Recruiting by Region International 5% Entire U.S. 25% Regional recruiting only 69% Key States Massachusetts 10% Michigan 9% Arizona, California, Florida, Ohio & Texas 6% Key Economic Sectors Professional, business & scientific services 22% Manufacturing 13% Educational services 10% Finance & insurance 8% Government 7% Healthcare & social assistance 7% Nonprofits 7% ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Recruiting Trends 2016-17 is made possible by the efforts of many dedicated and generous colleagues, friends of the institute, and corporate sponsors. We thank all the colleges and universities who encouraged local, regional, and national organizations to participate in our survey and for their confidence in our contribution to research on college recruiting. Please visit our web page, Consortium For Student Transition Studies, for a complete list of participants. We also thank our editor, Stephanie Schlick. We extend special appreciation to several people whose special insights contribute to CERI’s research activities: Jeff Beavers (CEO 3sevenPartners), Duncan Ferguson (Managing Director, Vantage Leadership Consulting), and James Spohrer (Director of University Programs Worldwide [and numerous other titles], IBM Almaden Research Center). Brief 7: Benchmarking Organizations use a variety of measures to assess their recrui

FAQs

What is the purpose of Brief 7 on benchmarking recruiting success?

Brief 7 explains how organizations assess recruiting programs and how benchmarks were tested and revised using Recruiting Trends survey results and respondent feedback.

What metrics are reported as key benchmarks for full-time recruiting (July 2015–June 2016)?

The brief reports averages for several outcomes, including the share of professional hires attributable to college recruiting, conversion rates, offer acceptance rates, and offer reneging rates.

How do the results describe employers’ recruiting program assessment behavior?

Respondents indicate that only about 37% regularly assess recruiting programs, compared with 41% the previous year, highlighting variation in evaluation practices.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Jacob