External recruitment
19 Aug 2025
Mareike
External Recruitment: New Talents for Your Company
When a position needs to be filled, a company has two options for finding suitable personnel: either through internal or external recruitment. External recruitment can be helpful in winning competent new employees for the company and expanding the team. In this blog article, we will explain what external recruitment actually is, what its advantages and disadvantages are, and in which cases it is best used.
What is meant by external recruitment?
External recruitment refers to any type of recruiting measure aimed at attracting new employees for the company. It is the counterpart to internal recruitment, where open positions are filled by existing employees. Therefore, there is a conscious search for new workers who are not employed by the company.
Some examples of external recruitment are:
Job advertisements in newspapers (or other analog media)
Social media recruiting
Advertisements on popular job portals
Job fairs and other recruiting events
Acceptance of unsolicited applications
What are the advantages and disadvantages of external recruitment?
External recruitment offers the chance to attract new talents for your company, but it can also have disadvantages. Here are some pros and cons that you should consider:
Advantages | Disadvantages |
Larger pool of candidates | Costs associated with recruiting |
Attracting new perspectives to the company | Higher time investment |
Promotion of diversity through a broader team | Risk of misplacement/lack of integration into the team |
Expansion of skills within the team | Disappointment/dissatisfaction among internal employees who are interested in the position |
More work capacity | Longer onboarding time |
Reduction of training costs |
When should one use external versus internal recruitment?
Depending on the size of the company and the type of position, it is decided which type of recruitment is most sensible. Particularly for small and medium-sized enterprises, the budget plays a role: Can one afford to hire a new person, or should the capacities within the company be shifted instead? Additionally, one must consider what requirements are set for the position and whether the appropriate skills are available within the team or not.
For low-threshold positions or roles that need to be filled as quickly as possible, internal recruitment is more suitable. Especially when the company currently has no large financial capacities, it is advantageous to fill a vacant position with an existing employee.
If the company is in a phase of expansion and wishes to multiply its team, external recruitment should be relied upon. For positions that require special skills or particularly high capacities, it is also advisable to bring in additional employees.
Conclusion
For the expansion of a business, external recruitment can be a decisive advantage. A company that wants to develop benefits from new perspectives and additional skills that fresh employees bring. However, it is not always necessary to hire new employees to fill a position, and especially small companies or those with a limited budget should strive to fill open positions internally. Whether it is worthwhile to fill a position through external recruitment thus depends on the company's situation.