In Conversation with Michael Ang is the CEO and founder of JobElephant
What is the most overlooked metric in recruitment, and why does it matter?
Michael Ang:
The most overlooked metric in recruiting is not time-to-fill or even cost-per-hire. It is source quality and source accuracy. Most organizations still cannot reliably tell you where their best candidates actually came from, and that creates a massive blind spot in hiring strategy and especially spend.
The fact that nearly every application still asks, “How did you hear about this job?” tells you everything you need to know. That question is a relic from the newspaper advertising era, yet it survives because most recruiting systems still struggle with true attribution. Over 50% of the applicants select a source that is not accurate. The result is that HR teams are often making budget decisions using incomplete or inaccurate data.
Clicks are easy to measure. Applications are measurable. But what actually matters is which sources consistently produce qualified applicants who interview well, get hired, perform and stay. Too many organizations optimize for volume because volume is visible, while quality is much harder to track.
The fix is straightforward, but it requires discipline. Treat every source as an investment, not a line item. Measure application starts, completed applications, qualified candidates, interviews and hires by source. Then compare those outcomes against actual spend.
Once organizations start looking at recruiting through that lens, the data becomes very revealing very quickly. Some sources that appear “expensive” produce exceptional hires. Others generate lots of activity but very little value. Without accurate source tracking, companies often continue funding channels that create noise instead of results.
Source of hire is not just another reporting metric. It is one of the foundational inputs for making smarter recruiting, marketing and workforce decisions.
When budgets get cut, recruitment advertising is often the first thing to go. What is wrong with that approach?
Michael Ang:
Cutting recruitment advertising under budget pressure is like turning off the lights to save money and then wondering why no one can find the door. The candidates you need do not disappear just because your budget did.
What many HR leaders miss is that reducing advertising does not reduce reach evenly. It reduces visibility selectively. Active job seekers on the major platforms may still find you. But many of the most valuable candidates, including faculty researchers, public health leaders, specialized engineers and other hard-to-reach professionals, are not spending their days scrolling large generic job boards. They follow niche publications, industry associations and specialized communities tied directly to their profession. The moment an organization cuts those channels, it often disappears from that talent market entirely.
The smarter approach is to audit before you cut. Identify which channels consistently produce qualified applicants, strong interviews and actual hires, then protect those investments first. High-traffic platforms with low conversion rates are often better candidates for reduction than highly targeted niche sources with smaller but far more relevant audiences.
Organizations that treat recruitment advertising as a measurable performance investment instead of overhead make better decisions under pressure. More importantly, they maintain access to the talent pools that matter most while competitors quietly disappear from view.
What do mission-driven organizations consistently get wrong about recruitment advertising?
Michael Ang:
Mission-driven organizations often make the mistake of treating recruitment advertising as an expense instead of an investment, and that mindset changes everything downstream.
These organizations usually have a real advantage because purpose matters. Strong missions attract attention and create emotional connection with candidates. But many HR teams mistakenly assume the mission alone is enough to carry the recruiting effort. They post jobs on a few large general platforms and expect the right people to find them. Then they are surprised when the applicant pool feels shallow, misaligned or lacks the diversity and specialization they hoped to attract.
The mission creates interest. The strategy determines who actually applies.
Every search is its own marketing campaign with a specific audience. A faculty role in marine biology requires a completely different outreach strategy than a nursing position, a public health leader or a public policy director. Different audiences consume information in different places, trust different sources and engage with different communities.
The organizations that consistently outperform are the ones that approach recruiting with precision. They define the target audience, identify the right distribution channels, measure performance and adjust based on outcomes instead of assumptions.
Mission is powerful. But mission without strategy is rarely enough to consistently produce the hiring outcomes organizations expect.
If you could describe the current mood of the workforce in 2026 using just one word, what would it be? Why?
Michael Ang:
“Cautious.”
That word captures what we see in real-time job ad data every single day. Across higher education, nonprofits and public agencies, the sectors we serve, hiring activity has not rebounded the way many predicted. In 2025, roughly one in eight of our clients posted no new roles at all. That is not a pause. That is a freeze. The last time we saw that level of decline was 2009, during the Great Recession.
The signals driving that caution are structural, not emotional. Policy uncertainty slows budget approvals. Grant delays stall research hiring. Tariff swings make workforce planning feel like a moving target. Even employers who want to hire are waiting for clearer signals before they commit. Optimism is healthy, but it has to match the operating environment. Right now, the data points to “wait and see,” not “go.”
We talk a lot about “gut feeling” in hiring. How are you using data to challenge your own biases, or the biases of hiring managers, when it comes to hiring, retaining, or promoting underrepresented talent?
Michael Ang:
Gut feeling is a luxury that underrepresented candidates cannot afford. When hiring managers rely on instinct, they tend to hire people who look and sound like them. Data is the antidote to that pattern.
At JobElephant, we use applicant tracking system integrations to evaluate how targeted, niche job boards perform compared with generic platforms, so hiring decisions rely on reach and results rather than assumptions. Our analysis of 439,599 job postings across 370 publications showed that ads placed in specialized publications generated 4.3 million impressions and 2.8 million clicks in 2024. Those numbers tell you exactly where your message lands and who is paying attention.
The business case for inclusive hiring is equally data-driven. Companies that build inclusive workforces report 19% higher innovation revenues and are 35% more likely to outperform their competitors. That is not a talking point. That is a competitive advantage hiding in plain sight. When hiring managers push back on broadening their candidate reach, the numbers move the conversation forward. Feelings fade. Data sticks.
What is the biggest myth about working in HR that you wish would die?
Michael Ang:
That posting a job means candidates will come. They will not. Not automatically, and not the right ones.
After 25 years of working alongside HR teams, the single most expensive assumption I see is that a job listing on a major platform is a hiring strategy. It is not. It is a starting point at best. The real work is understanding which channels reach the specific talent you need, how your message performs in real time, and what the data shows about where qualified candidates are actually coming from.
HR professionals deal with disconnected technology. Job boards and applicant tracking systems operate in silos, which means critical data falls through gaps. Organizations end up making hiring decisions based on incomplete or unreliable information, and they do not know why the right candidates are not applying. The question “How did you hear about this job?” remains standard in 2026 only because modern systems still cannot reliably track where candidates originate. That is a technology failure masquerading as a process.
The myth that posting equals hiring costs organizations time, money and top talent every day. The sooner HR leaders treat recruitment advertising as a living, data-driven campaign rather than a checkbox, the better their results will be.
What is one task AI will never be able to replace in your people strategy?
Michael Ang:
Trust. AI cannot build it, and it cannot repair it when it breaks.
Every interaction a candidate has with your organization creates an impression, from the first job posting they read to the final offer conversation. AI can optimize the language in that posting, predict which platform delivers the best reach, and score resumes with more consistency than a human reviewer. What it cannot do is make a candidate feel seen, heard and genuinely valued as a person.
The most telling moment in any hiring process is rejection. A candidate who receives a thoughtful, human response after being passed over can still walk away as a brand advocate, a future applicant or a referral source. A candidate who receives an automated form letter walks away with a story to tell. That story lives on Glassdoor, in professional networks and in every conversation they have about your organization going forward. No algorithm manages that outcome.
At JobElephant, we built our technology to handle the analytical heavy lifting, so our people have more time to focus on the relationships that data cannot build. That balance is not a feature. It is the strategy.
Michael Ang is the CEO and founder of JobElephant, a recruitment advertising technology company serving higher education, government, health care and nonprofits. Michael Ang launched JobElephant in 2000 and scaled it nationally by pairing proprietary ad tech with high-touch service. Michael Ang focuses on simplifying hiring through smarter job distribution, predictive recommendations and clear performance reporting, so HR teams can see what works and move budget accordingly. Michael Ang still works directly with accounts to ensure every campaign delivers measurable results.
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