Having a proper and thought-out hiring process is the best way to attract and retain high-quality employees. Deciding upon hiring someone can have a long-term impact on your business, so it’s essential to have a sound procedure set up from the start.
What’s great is that there are multiple ways on how to improve your hiring procedure. You can either do this by organizing your HR department in a meaningful way or using technological advancements to your advantage.
In this article, we take a look at the best tips for hiring that should serve you well when recruiting employees. But first, let’s take a look at the main steps any HR professional should consider in their hiring process.
What are the essential steps of the hiring process?
While each HR department has its own way of approaching the hiring process, below are some steps that should be included every time you are making a new hire:
- Write an effective job description.
- Advertise the position on job boards and social media.
- Screen candidate resumes and cover letters.
- Run a background check and check references.
- Do an initial phonecall screening of the candidates.
- Conduct interviews either in person or through video-conferencing.
- Assess the applicants’ capabilities.
- Make a hiring decision.
- Hire and onboard the new employee.
While this seems simple enough, following these steps will rarely be sufficient to cover every nook and cranny in the hiring process. In addition to the aforementioned basics, here are some essential tips for hiring that should improve the process immensely.
Tips on how to render your hiring process more effective
Once you have a hiring process in place, there is a good chance it can be enhanced to better serve your business needs. Below are some of the best ways to do achieve this.
Build a strong employer brand
Making a good first impression to potential candidates is invaluable. More than 75% of professionals are passive candidates, looking for an opportunity to switch jobs. Furthermore, talented candidates also screen the companies they are applying to, and are always looking for employers that have a good reputation on the job market.
Actively managing your employer brand by responding to reviews, updating the company’s profile, and sharing updates on the company’s culture and work environment is essential.
This way, you won’t have to do as much active recruiting, as you will already be a sought-after brand for potential candidates.
Be thorough when selecting your hiring team
Hiring teams are a pivotal point in your hiring process. For instance, an effective team should include the direct supervisor of the position you are filling, as well as someone who has a thorough understanding of the position and the duties involved.
In addition, including employees from the company sector where the new recruit will be working is essential to ensure a good fit in the team. As we mentioned earlier, interviews work both ways, a candidate should get a feel for the people they will be working with.
Embrace social media as a recruitment tool
Most people want to work for companies that keep up with the latest tech trends. Part of embracing the digital age means using public social media profiles for candidate research and posting job offers.
Conducting background checks is standard procedure before hiring someone. However, social media profiles can provide invaluable details about the individual as a person and an employee.
Improve Your Candidate Pool
Selecting candidates only from those who answer a job advertisement ad would often result in missing out on the best ones available. These are usually working for another company and may not even be actively looking for a new position.
One of the most effective means of growing your candidate pool is to implement an employee referral program. Employee referrals have a much better success rate in recruiting as the applicant-to-hire ratio for employee referrals is 10 to 1, whereas it takes 72 applicants from traditional sources to make one hire.
Additionally, invest time in developing relationships with university offices and recruiters to find young and talented workers that could fit your company.
Enhance your interviews
A flawed interview process is often the cause of bad hires or failures to sign new workers. Often, interviewers focus on making sure new hires are technically competent. However, important factors such as trainability, emotional intelligence, temperament, and motivation are constantly overlooked.
Streamlining the entire interview process and considering how candidates fit into your company culture should be an essential step in your hiring process.
Use automatic recruitment platforms
One of the most optimal tips for hiring the best possible candidate is to use an automatic recruitment platform such as RecruitMe. These platforms can help you cut down on your screening time thanks to AI-powered resume-screening technologies.
In addition to shortening the costs and length of the screening process, you will be effectively increasing your candidate’s experience. This will ensure to stay above the competition and keep you as their top choice when considering a new job.
Furthermore, RecruitMe can help you track the hiring process every step of the way, alerting you when you are spending too much time in one part of the recruitment funnel.
Act quickly
One of the main reasons why so many HR managers fail at recruiting the best candidates is their inability to act quickly. Studies show that a top candidate stays on the job market for no more than 10 days.
It’s important to act quickly, especially when you know you’re interested in a specific applicant. Respond to any questions right away to keep them updated throughout the process. Follow up often with details on the position and the hiring process, to make sure you remain on their radar – even if you haven’t made a hiring decision yet.
Conclusion
The tips for hiring we illustrated in this article should give you a good starting point if you are looking to optimize your hiring process. Applying these ideas should help your organization succeed and grow and create a workplace that meets both your and your employees’ needs.