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Attracting and hiring the best – strategies for how we work now

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Your employees are your greatest asset. That’s why it’s essential to attract, develop, and retain the very best talent. By doing so, you can create a positive company culture and set your organisation up for unparalleled growth and success.

No matter what your current recruitment strategy is, there’s a good chance you can make some changes that are sure to reduce inefficiencies and enhance the overall candidate experience . Let’s dive deeper into 13 of the top recruitment strategies for hiring the ideal employees for your unique company.

1. Establish an Employee Referral Program

The goal of an employee referral program is to encourage current employees to refer qualified candidates for internal positions and reward them for doing so. Employee referrals often reduce hiring times and costs and improve retention rates. They also make it easier to find candidates for hard to fill positions.

To implement an effective employee referral program, follow these tips:

  • Offer Incentives. Most employees won’t refer candidates unless they receive a reward in return. It’s your job to offer incentives such as cash bonuses, gift cards, or additional paid time off to get them interested.
  • Prioritise positions. Figure out which positions you need help filling. If you want to focus your referral program on roles in a certain department or those with very specific requirements, emphasise that to employees and adjust your incentives accordingly.
  • Design a referral policy. Write out a clear referral policy so that employees are well aware of what it is and how it works. Include positions that are eligible for referral incentives, details on the incentives available, and directions on how to submit referrals.

2. Automate the Process with Recruitment Tools

A manual recruitment process can be tedious and time-consuming, so automate it with quality recruitment tools. Streamlining the entire process from start to finish improves the candidate experience, leading to greater satisfaction among new employees and significantly boosting retention.

There are plenty of recruitment tools on the market, but not all of them are created equal. Look for an intuitive platform that’s easy to use for you and other members of your HR and recruiting team. The solution should work well on both desktop and mobile devices so candidates can apply to vacant positions from their computers, tablets, or phones without the hassle. It should also integrate with multiple job boards and offer strong reporting and analytics capabilities that allow you to make smarter hiring decisions.

3. Set Recruitment Goals

If your organization doesn’t know what it wants to achieve with its recruiting program, you’re on the road to failure. Set concrete recruitment goals that are tailored to your company’s needs. Here are a few examples of goals you may want to consider:

  • Increase the application completion rate by 25%. Your application completion rate is the number of people who complete an application after they begin it. It can give you a good idea of the effectiveness of your application process.
  • Reduce the time to fill rate by 50%. The faster you can fill positions with qualified candidates, the more time and money you’ll save. Your time to fill rate is one way to measure this, as it looks at the time elapsed from when the job was posted to when it was filled.
  • Boost diversity by 30%. A diverse workforce brings your organization a variety of unique perspectives, increasing creativity and productivity. By measuring diversity metrics like candidate ethnicity and race, language, gender, and sexual orientation, you can figure out if your workforce is becoming more or less diverse.

To nail down your recruitment goals, it’s a good idea to meet with your leadership team and discuss your current challenges. Remember that your goals will be specific to your organization and its values.

4. Build Your Employer Brand

Your employer brand is your reputation among the workforce. Put simply, it’s what job seekers and employees think about working for you. When it comes to attracting talent, a positive employer brand is vital. After all, 95% of candidates state that a company’s reputation is a key consideration when they look for new jobs opportunities.

Fortunately, you do have some control over your brand. These steps can help you build and improve it:

  • Analyse your company culture. If you’d like candidates to believe your company is a great place to work, you must ensure that it actually is. Send out a survey to your current employees to figure out your strengths, weaknesses, and what you can do to improve your company culture for the better. You can then make the appropriate changes to build a culture everyone can buy into.
  • Convey your strengths. Once you identify your company’s strengths, make sure they are well known. Promote them on your career page, job descriptions, and social media.
  • Measure your brand. To find out if your employer brand benefits your organization and recruitment efforts, measure it via reviews and ratings on websites like Glassdoor and by conducting employee surveys.

5. Leverage Social Media

Social media is an invaluable recruiting resource. There’s no shortage of ways you can use Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn to meet or even exceed your recruiting goals. Here are several ideas to get you started:

  • Post jobs. Believe it or not, 79% of job applicants use social media in their job search. If you’re not advertising vacant positions on various outlets, you’re likely missing out on qualified candidates.
  • Engage with potential candidates. Incorporating social media in your recruiting strategy gives potential candidates the chance to ask you questions and engage with your company in ways that they otherwise couldn’t.
  • Encourage employee advocates. Ask your employees to review your company on various social media sites. They can also document your culture through pictures and images. Employee advocates can do wonders for your employer brand.

6. Take Advantage of HR Analytics

HR analytics — also known as talent analytics — can help you make informed decisions that lead to stronger hires, an improved recruitment process, happier candidates, and less inefficiencies. It’s wise to consider recruitment KPIs such as:

  • Time to hire, as the amount of time that passes between initial contact and when an employee accepts an offer indicates how efficient your process is.
  • First year turnover rate, which, if unusually high, may indicate you’ve recruited candidates that were a bad fit for your organization. You may also have advertised an unrealistic company culture or job expectations.
  • Cost per hire, which can help you determine if you need to cut costs without sacrificing the quality of your hires.
  • Diversity metrics like those discussed above can help you determine if you’re successfully finding and hiring more diverse candidates. Diversity metrics are especially key if you’re a larger organization or government agency.

7. Look to Past Candidates and Employees

When you hire for open positions, there may be some impressive candidates that you don’t select because of timing or other factors that are outside of your control. The next time you recruit for similar positions, revisit these candidates. You may also want to consider previous employees who left on good terms.

These individuals are already aware of your organization and may have even expanded their experience and skills since the last time you were in touch. Chances are you’ll spend less time onboarding them than those who are completely new.

If you do decide to contact past candidates and employees, send them a personalized message that explains what the position is and why you believe they’d be a good fit for it. State that you know it’s been a while since you last spoke but feel confident that a re-engagement could benefit you both. Find out whether they’d be interested in learning more or setting up an interview.

8. Focus on the Interview Experience

Your interview experience shapes how candidates think of your company. It can make the difference between closing the deal with your preferred choice and seeing them move elsewhere. Follow these evergreen best practices to keep your interview process on track:
  • Prepare for interviews. Interviews are not the time to “wing it.” Whether you’re interviewing a candidate via phone, video conference, or face to face, review their resume beforehand, have it in front of you during the interview, and prepare a list of questions you’d like to ask them specifically.
  • Follow up with candidates promptly. Do your best to keep candidates informed of where you are in the process. If you know you’re not going to hire someone else, let them know as soon as possible. On the contrary, if a candidate piques your interest, make sure you get a hold of them right away, before they move on in their search.
  • Invest in new tools and technologies. Make life easier for you and your candidates with HR tools that let you track exactly where everyone is in the recruiting process and ensure that no one slips through the cracks as they move from one stage to the next.

9. Use an Applicant Tracking System

Three-quarters of modern recruiters use an Applicant Tracking System (ATS), so if you don’t have one, you’re missing out. An ATS is software that organizes and tracks job applicants. Without an ATS, you’ll have to publish your job descriptions and send follow up emails one by one. An ATS automates these manual tasks, saving you time and money. It also reduces the risk of human error and bias and may help your organization stay compliant with related rules and regulations.

10. Organise and Attend Meetups

Meetups are gatherings that feature a lecture or presentation designed to open up dialogue and promote idea sharing. Let’s say you’re a healthcare company. You could host a meetup with a prominent doctor who has developed a new technology or procedure. You may invite your employees, recent college grads, and anyone else in healthcare with an interest in the presentation.

If you don’t have the time and resources to organize your own meetups, encourage your employees to attend those that already exist. Regardless of whether the meetup is planned by you or someone else, it can serve as a great place to meet potential candidates and advertise your company. Just make sure that the meetups you focus on are directly related to your organization’s offerings.

11. Ensure Your Job Descriptions Match Your Company

Don’t overlook the importance of an accurate, appealing job description. These tips can help you take ordinary job descriptions and transform them into something potential candidates will find memorable and captivating:

  • Begin with an engaging overview. The first few sentences of each description should be a compelling overview of what the job is and why it’s important to your organization. Think of this as your elevator pitch to sell the position.
  • Be task specific. Once someone reads a description, they should have a good idea of what a typical workday would look like if they get hired. The more specific you are, the easier it will be to weed out poor candidates and attract qualified ones.
  • Incorporate culture. Highlight the benefits of the position and what makes your company a great place to work. Mention benefits and perks that will pique a job seeker’s interest.
  • End with a call to action. At the end of the description, encourage the candidate to apply. Create a sense of urgency so they take action sooner rather than later.

12. Recruit from Universities Directly

Many university students are looking for more than just a job. They’re in search of a career that can allow them to use their knowledge to make a positive difference in an organization. If you’re often on the lookout for entry-level candidates, university recruiting may be well worth your time and effort. With a strong mentorship and training program, you’ll retain university recruits for the long haul and turn them into experienced, key members of your company. University students also bring fresh ideas and have up-to-date knowledge that you may not find with someone who graduated years ago.

If you’d like to pursue university recruiting, select universities with degree programs that align with the types of positions you need to fill. Then connect with their career services departments and attend virtual and in-person job fairs. You may also offer to conduct on-site interviews, critique resumes, or hire graduates. Prove that your organization is valuable to university students, and they’ll prove themselves valuable to you in turn.

13. Connect with Passive Candidates

Passive candidates are qualified individuals who may not be actively looking for a job but might consider a change for the right opportunity. You may be surprised to learn that they make up 70% of the global workforce. Passive candidates can be especially valuable if you have hard to fill positions or senior level roles that require a great deal of experience and skills.

When you contact passive candidates that you find through social media, referrals, and networking groups or events, explain what your organization may offer them that they aren’t currently receiving. This may be a more flexible work schedule or higher compensation.

You should keep emails and phone calls short, sweet, and to the point. If a passive candidate shows interest, take action immediately, or you may lose them. Try to interview them as soon as you can.

Attract the Talent You Need

If you’d like to take your recruiting efforts to the next level, you can’t go wrong with HireRoad. HireRoad is a holistic recruitment solution created to help you source, select, and hire top talent quickly and efficiently. With HireRoad you can automate many of your day-to-day recruiting tasks, freeing HR to focus on other key initiatives. No matter what your recruitment process looks like, HireRoad can be tailored to match with support for unique workflows. And you’ll always know whether you’re meeting your recruitment goals thanks to its easy-to-use reporting and analytics features.

Interested in seeing how HireRoad can make the difference at your organization? Request a demo today.