Employers in most industries are experiencing difficulty recruiting and hiring the workers that they need. Here are a few tips to help you enjoy more successful hiring.
Communicate Your Employee Value Proposition (EVP)
Determine and clearly communicate the reasons that a highly qualified or uniquely talented person would want to work for your organization. In the same manner that customers have choices when it comes to where they spend their money, employees and candidates have choices regarding where they expend their energy and talent. Every employer should have an honest, clear, and compelling reason as to why their workplace is a place worthy of an employee’s commitment. Once you understand and can articulate those reasons, share them with candidates and employees alike at every appropriate opportunity.
Manage Your Social Media Presence
Be sure that your company has a strong presence on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and other social media. Do not just monitor your Glassdoor profile, but instead, become active. Respond to posts about your organization in a manner that reflects your culture. You want to be aware of the message others are sending about your organization and take corrective action as necessary. Does your social media presence reflect your EVP?
Create a Sourcing Strategy
A sourcing strategy is a plan to make certain you have a steady flow of talent for your recruitment process. Based on your overall business goals, identify the talent requirements of your business. What type of talent are you seeking to attract? What are the skill levels you need? Determine whether the needs are immediate or future focused. Once you are clear about the talent that you need, identify where the talent is now and predict where it will be in the future.
Fine Tune Your Recruiting Process
There are many elements to fine-tuning the process, but it all begins with defining roles in a practical manner. Many companies are defining job requirements within the context of skills and abilities rather than degrees and years of experience. In economies where there are more people looking for work than available jobs, employers have been known to raise job requirements to help narrow the number of candidates they must consider. Distinguish between the skills that an individual must have in order to succeed versus those that would be nice to have.
When you write your posting, start with a heading that sends the message you want to convey about your organization and the position itself. The heading is the most important part of your posting and it should say something compelling! Be clear about who the ideal candidate might be and why they will want the position. Then speak to that person with your posting, rather than simply cutting and pasting the job description. Make the posting personal by saying something like, “You will be expected to…” rather than “the ideal candidate will…”. Finally, make sure that the tone of your posting reflects the culture of your organization.
Select the Right People
Develop a selection process that is thorough and timely. Selection processes that are overly burdensome or time consuming often serve to weed out good, solid candidates. Make sure your process provides both the candidates amd your organization with the necessary information from which to make the right decision. The process should give candidates a realistic view of the organization, the job, and the supervising manager’s expectations. Even if the candidate is not right for the position, a positive experience may make that person a great advocate for your organization.