Data Sources
Every number in THE DON is powered by three best-in-class labor market intelligence providers. Here's exactly what feeds each metric and how the data is processed.
Revelio Public Labor Statistics
RPLSRevelio Labs aggregates and standardizes workforce data from hundreds of millions of public employee profiles, job postings, and career transitions. Their Public Labor Statistics dataset provides normalized, real-time signals on workforce flows — hiring rates, attrition, skill migration, and role-level supply pipeline depth.
- Labor Pressure Index (supply-side signals)
- Skill availability scores and YoY demand growth
- Talent supply pipeline depth by profession
- Career transition patterns (who is moving into/out of roles)
Lightcast Labor Market Data
LIGHTCASTLightcast (formerly Emsi Burning Glass) is the leading provider of labor market analytics derived from real-time job posting data. Their dataset covers billions of job postings scraped from 40,000+ sources — company career pages, job boards, and staffing firm listings — normalized and classified against a proprietary taxonomy of 32,000+ occupations and 32,000+ skills.
- Demand Score (active job requisition counts)
- Time-to-fill benchmarks by role and geography
- Skill investment trends (what employers are hiring for)
- Metro-level job req counts and regional demand signals
Randstad Digital Intelligence
RNDSTRandstad Digital contributes anonymized, aggregated placement data from Randstad's global staffing operations — one of the world's largest staffing firms with $25B+ in annual revenue and operations in 39 countries. This dataset provides ground-truth benchmark data on actual placement outcomes: time-to-hire, bill rates, pay rates, and fill rates across technology and professional roles.
- Buyer's Benchmark time-to-hire comparisons
- Pay rate and bill rate market benchmarks
- Actual placement velocity by profession and geography
- Peer benchmark pool (200+ contributing staffing firms)
Data Methodology
How THE DON combines these sources into a single market intelligence layer
Data Normalization
Raw data from each source is normalized against a unified profession taxonomy — 20 tracked roles mapped to O*NET occupation codes and Lightcast's ONET-SOC crosswalk — ensuring apples-to-apples comparison across sources.
LPI Calculation
The Labor Pressure Index is a composite score: demand signals from Lightcast job postings (weighted 50%) combined with supply pipeline depth from Revelio RPLS (weighted 50%), normalized to a 0–100 scale and smoothed with a 30-day rolling average.
Update Cadence
LPI and demand scores refresh daily from Lightcast. Supply signals refresh weekly from Revelio. Benchmark data refreshes monthly from Randstad Digital. The platform-level ticker reflects the most recent available composite.
Privacy & Anonymization
All firm-level data contributed to the Buyer's Benchmark is anonymized before aggregation. Individual employer data is never exposed. Minimum cohort sizes of 10+ firms are required before any benchmark segment is surfaced.
Data partnership disclosure. THE DON operates under data licensing agreements with Revelio Labs, Lightcast, and Randstad Digital. All data is used in accordance with each provider's terms of service and applicable labor market data regulations. Individual employer and candidate data is never stored, re-identified, or shared. Benchmark contributions are fully anonymized prior to aggregation.