The impact of company-dependent and company-independent information sources on organizational attractiveness perceptions

Purpose – Grounded in the extended technology acceptance model and dual-process theory, the purpose of this paper is to develop a research model to examine the impact of company-dependent (e.g. recruitment web sites) and company-independent (e.g. social influences) information sources on job seeker perceptions of organizational attractiveness. Design/methodology/approach – Utilizing data collected from 193 participants in Taiwan, various relationships in the research model are tested using the partial least squares approach. Findings – The results indicated that job seeker beliefs (perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use) of recruitment web sites and social influence factors (informational and normative social influences) are important antecedents of organizational attractiveness. Furthermore, system quality affects perceived ease of use, while information quality and service quality influence both perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness of recruitment web sites. Practical implications – Organizations need to put time and effort into ensuring that job seekers are satisfied with the information and service quality of recruitment web sites, since these two service-oriented web site features can enhance job seeker perceptions of organizational attractiveness. Additionally, perhaps the recruitment web sites can add links designed specifically for the social influencers such as parents, significant others, or teachers. Originality/value – The empirical approach is novel to the recruitment literature, and this study demonstrates its viability in providing a more comprehensive examination of the role of recruitment-related information sources for organizational attractiveness perceptions. These contributions also have practical implications for organizations: understanding how various recruitment-related information sources are likely to affect job seeker attraction and application decisions may improve organizational recruitment effectiveness by building a well-designed recruitment web site and positive word of mouth from existing employees.