Early recruitment practices in Indian B-school campuses and application intentions: role of word-of-mouth endorsements

In an environment of war for talent, attracting the best talent to an organisation is vital to derive a competitive advantage. This paper seeks to investigate the role of word-of-mouth endorsements, and thus social networks, in the relationship between early recruitment practices and the application intentions of business school students who are at the beginning of their professional careers. Analysis of data collected from 124 students of five premier business schools in India reveals that media presence/publicity is the most important recruitment activity that affects the students' intentions to apply and it is mediated by word-of-mouth endorsements. Recruitment advertisements, whether general or detailed, are not significant in predicting students' application intentions.