Editor’s Note: Here at Dispatches, we are always looking for ways to help our readers do things. For some of our readers, that means helping navigate the working world, for others, it means assisting in the ever challenging question, “what’s for dinner?” For still others, it means figuring out how to balance family life with everything else. In an effort to aid in all of these endeavors, we have collaborated on this article written specifically for our readers.
Your business cannot thrive without the very best people positioned in the right roles. Of course, that means you need to create a recruitment process that is as effective as every other part of your business, something that many companies could do better.
The Devil In The Detail
Job descriptions are vital to the recruitment process, and a poorly written one will certainly not help you achieve your aims in this area. That is why it’s essential to invest some time and effort into getting these right.
What that means is checking through for spelling and grammar mistakes, which at worst will put people off entirely, and at best make your company look less than professional.
Also, you need to walk the fine line between having enough detail for the potential candidate to understand what is required from them in the role, and so much detail that the description becomes inaccessible. With that in mind clarity and bullet point formatting can help a great deal.
Last of all, when it comes to the detail of the post, do not forget to include a salary range for the role you are advertising. After all, applicants will want to know that they will be rewarded with a wage commensurable to the position they are applying for, and not proving this info makes it much more likely that good candidates will just skip your add and move onto another company’s instead.
Data Counts
I bet that if someone asked you about your sales data you would be easily able to give them a breakdown of conversions, drops offs, and even the time it takes to make most sales. After all, this day is what will be driving your approach, as well as allowing to check your levels of success.
Sadly, most businesses forget that a similar approach can be applied to the recruitment process as well, to make it not only more responsive but more effective as well. To that end, using software that allows recruitment metrics optimization is a smart move. The reason being that you will be able to see instantly which areas are letting the process down and need to be tweaked to improve it.
Take Control
Tempting as it may be to hand off your recruitment process by outsourcing it to an agency, this may not be the best approach for your business’s long-term success. This is because that while recruitment professionals often work on a commission basis, which means they are much more interested with filling the vacancy with someone from their recruitment pool than actually finding the perfect person for the role.
With that in mind, it’s hugely important to take the time to get involved in the recruitment process yourself. Especially if you are looking to fill a single vacancy rather than fulfilling a massive rolling influx of people like a warehouse or call center situation.
In fact, by taking control of your business’s own recruitment process you can include trials, and interviews in the style that will best allow your business to see who is the better match. Something that is crucial if you want your company to succeed over the long term.
Talent Pooling
Also, when it comes to recruitment, many businesses fail because they aren’t making the most of the resources that they already have. What this means is that investing in training and development of current employees who can create a talent pool of which you can draw from when a vacancy becomes available, is a smart idea. Why go through the whole costly and time-consuming process again if you already know where to find good people?
Similarly, when interviewing candidates, keep the contact data of those that are the best, even if you choose someone else above them for the particular post you are currently looking to fill. Then you will have a good pool of talent on which to draw from and invite into the interview for other roles in your business, without having to go through the entire process again. Something that can save time and resources, and still allow you to get an employee that fits your business.
Improve Inductions
Last, of all, don’t forget that inducting new employees into the business is also a crucial aspect of the recruitment process. In fact, if you don’t do this well, you could end up losing those that you have put so much time and effort into because they don’t feel integrated into your business’s culture.
Therefore, if you want a holistically successful recruitment process, spending time inducting and training new employees, as well as the improvement points mentioned above need to be high on your priority list.