79% of recruiters believe it’s a candidate’s market right now. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, all signs point to the economy roaring back to life. Approximately 200,000 new jobs were added to the economy in August 2015 and unemployment is expected to dip below 5% nationally for the first time in years. As more employers struggle to find good candidates, one thing is becoming increasingly clear: candidates are running the show. In order to appeal to candidates, employers are beginning to make some important changes. They’ve started to listen to candidate complaints and are starting to improve the candidate experience. Find out what changes are necessary for your recruiting team to take back control of the process in a candidate’s market.
Recruiting Team: Heal Thyself
In an employer’s market, recruiters could take their sweet time to sift through banks of resumes. They could afford to toss out good candidates because someone exceptional had walked through the door at a cheaper price. They didn’t have to worry about the process because candidates were desperate to obtain and hold onto a job. Not anymore. Now, employees who had stayed put at employers for years are marching back out onto the job market. Some employers are struggling to keep up and struggling to embrace the change in conditions. It’s time to take a good hard look at the recruiting process. Try these tips to repair your recruiting process and compete for talent again:
- Design a thoughtful process. When it’s an employer’s market, recruiting teams don’t have to think about how the entire process works for candidates because it’s working for the employer. But now, recruiters have to be strategic. How will the process work from entry point to final offer letter or close out rejection letter? How long will recruiters let a candidate languish without communication? What’s the process of interviewing? These all need to be determined thoughtfully in order to attract qualified candidates in a candidate’s market. Communication points are critical in a candidate’s market because candidates expect to be kept informed about their candidacy. If you take too long, you could lose them. If you go quiet, you could lose them. It’s time to start thinking about making your recruiting process more transparent and offering more, not less, communication.
- Streamline the application process. Applying for an open job shouldn’t ideally take you hours of the day. Yet some companies have very convoluted application processes. My personal preference when faced with one of these systems is to hit the back button and look for something that won’t waste hours of my life to retype every word on my uploaded resume. Many candidates feel the same. 23% of candidates who are faced with these overly complicated applications just don’t apply. And 25% are thought to never purchase that company’s products again because of their experience during the application process. If you’re not a consumer manufacturer, that last part may not worry you. But who might you be missing out on in that 23% of applicants that bounce out of your system?
- Don’t make candidates wait. Some employers don’t understand how quickly talent stays on the market. I chuckle every time I get emails from recruiters I spoke to months before accepting a new job offer. They usually try to swoop in with a quick close on an interview and my reply is always sorry, I wasn’t available for long. The reality is most candidates are only on the job market for a month. If your recruiting process takes months to churn through, you’re not in a position to capture active job seekers. You may be in a position to look for passive talent, but you’ve got months of lead nurturing in your future just to get their attention. Don’t make candidates wait. Commit to the recruiting process and get hiring managers on board with a fast turnaround.
- Schedule more flexible interviews. These days, people are on the go. Candidates and hiring managers alike are often traveling for work. And many have such crowded schedules that connecting can draw out longer than desired. Try video interviews. Oneway on demand interviews are great tools for initial screening and live video interviews are a great way to schedule an interview from anywhere. Embrace the flexible interview to reduce time to hire.
- Involve employees in the recruiting process. Want to show your best face to candidates in this market? Offer the ability to reach out to existing teams of employees. This can help employers score big with candidates seeking transparency and offer exciting points of communication along the recruiting process. Additionally, your recruiting team can revamp your career website with great visuals of the team at work. Pictures and videos are compelling elements that communicate a strong employer brand. Suddenly, candidates are better able to see themselves at your organization.
The old saying is that you have to innovate and grow or die. It’s clear in the recruiting process, that employers seeking the best in talent are going to have to step their game up and innovate their recruiting process. If you’re not having much luck at attracting candidates to your open positions, try the tips we’ve included here. Let us know how well they’re working for you!
This article was syndicated from Business 2 Community: Drive the Bus in the Candidate Driven Market
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