Which Type of Sourcer are You?

Sourcing gets talked about in terms of "best practices" and "best tools," but there is no single right way to find candidates — only approaches that fit different situations. A framework built around three measurable dimensions of sourcing work replaces old labels like "spray and pray" and "sniper" with more honest, less judgmental names for eight distinct styles.

The three dimensions that define a sourcing approach are:

• Market size availability — how large or narrow the pool of reachable candidates is, ranging from an open job posting (anyone with internet access) to a closed ATS search (limited to existing data).
• Candidate interactions — how many individual responses, questions, and touchpoints a method generates, not just how many messages go out.
• Digital reliance — how dependent the method is on modern sourcing technology versus techniques that predate it.

Mapped across these three axes, eight sourcing archetypes emerge:

• Speed sourcing — high volume, low customization, built for reaching a huge market fast.
• Research sourcing — digging into niche communities, meetups, and conferences rather than relying on Boolean strings alone.
• Batch sourcing — segmenting a market into smaller, more targeted groups without full personalization.
• Tailored sourcing — highly customized, one-to-one outreach for a narrow set of candidates.
• Database sourcing — pulling from an existing network or contact list rather than an open market.
• Phone sourcing — networking and calling, a skill set that predates digital sourcing tools entirely.
• Inbound sourcing — attracting candidates to come to you rather than reaching out first.
• Event sourcing — meeting candidates face to face at conferences or campus fairs, effective for hiring pipelines like new graduates or niche technical communities.

None of these approaches is superior to another — a truck driver search and a niche engineering search call for completely different methods, and judging sourcers by raw outreach numbers instead of response quality misses the point entirely. The goal is recognizing which archetype fits a given role, and knowing how to shift between them as the search demands.