Zappos.com turns to employees’ social networks for hiring help

Zappos.com has selected Jobvite to streamline the company’s hiring process. The shoe e-retailer turned to Jobvite for a recruitment application that will support hiring, promote the company’s culture and use social recruitment techniques.

The Zappos.com staffing team reaches out to candidates through free popular social networks including Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace and Twitter, and will use Jobvite to channel the resulting candidate applications. Jobvite’s software-as-a-service application will enable employees to get involved in the hiring process by sending Jobvites, that is, information about available jobs,invitations to their own social networks. Jobvite will integrate the results of these social recruitment efforts and help Zappos.com build an organized stream of strong candidates to fill jobs quickly.

“We’re looking for a special kind of talent at Zappos,” says Christa Foley, recruiting manager. “Jobvite will help us embrace social recruitment to build a pipeline of qualified applicants and foster better decision-making in the hiring process. We’re confident we will be able to hire great team members in a way that’s efficient and cost-effective for Zappos.”

Zappos.com has created some unusual hiring practices. One, dubbed “The Offer,” enables the company to test the enthusiasm and commitment of new hires by offering a $2,000 bonus to quit.