I work at a not for profit community mental health center in Illinois.  When a position comes open we post the opening internally.  If we have not advertised the position outside of the agency can we accept and consider outside applications that have been submitted?

Also, what if we advertise for a position and hire someone who quits within a short period of time, say two months.  After posting the position internally again, can we consider the applications that we recieved upon hiring the first time or would we have to advertise outside of the agency again? 

 We tell applicants that we will keep their applications/resume on file for one year.  Does that mean we can hire from those applications after an internal posting but without advertising?

I handle the benefits for our agency not recruiting, as you can probably see. 

Do you receive any federal funding, possibly funnelled to you through a state agency?  If so, you will have an AAP on file somewhere that will outline what you are doing to get a wide array of applicants.  Posting exclusively internally may not be in line with what you say you do in your AAP if you have one, so I would definitely check that out.  In general, I think it's better to post internally and externally because if you post internally and hire nobody and then post externally, people often feel more rejected than if they were considered in a large applicant pool to begin with including both internal and external job seekers.

Outside of the aspects tied to your Company's status as a non-profit, which brings in a lot of federal burdens if you have an AAP (which you do if you accept federal funding), the law doesn't really address where you get your applicants from.  Internal applicants, external applicants, calling up applicants from the past, and unsolicited resumes/applications given to you are all perfectly legal.

You can hire from your previous apllicant pool. When you hold the resumer for one year, it's a requirement from legal point of view, but you can also tap into that pool, specially, when the new hire for that position didn't work out.

Regarding hiring outside applicant without posting a job, you could do it, but to protect yourself and your organization from any legal actions, I would advertise the opening outside the agency.

We do not received federal funds so the AAP does not apply.  Thanks for your help.