I recently attended a networking event held at the Halifax Club and I ran into a few new and old friends, and the most common question that I got asked was, “Why would a company hire a recruiting firm when they could do it themselves?”

Since the question came up, I am compelled to share my experience as to why companies decide to hire professional Recruiters.

Some of the reasons may surprise you:

Lack of time.

Many people think that LinkedIn (a business-oriented social networking site) is only useful for those searching for jobs. And yes, you would be right, it can be used for searching jobs, but it offers so much more! As a recruiter, there are the obvious benefits why I choose to use LinkedIn on a daily basis, which includes sourcing candidates and conducting research. As a LinkedIn member, I potentially have access to over 90 million contacts with a new user signing up almost every second.