How to make your recruitment cycle more efficient
27th June 2011
By Bill Paris, Executive Search – HR.
In the current economic climate, many employers and candidates are understandably cautious about recruitment – companies need to make sure if they’re hiring someone, they’re hiring the best possible candidate.
We are often asked after delivering a quality short-list: “Is there anybody else? Maybe someone who may have slightly more relevant experience or is a slightly better fit with the culture?”. Is this caution, or is it not having a clear view of what skills and personal traits are really needed for the role. In addition, because of the nature of the highly matrixed organisation, multiple stakeholders can be involved in the recruitment process, all of whom may have a slightly different interpretation of what is needed.
Recruitment timescales can also become drawn out when multiple stakeholders are involved in the process and their different priorities and schedules have to be juggled. It is not uncommon for interview schedules to be changed at short notice to accommodate the ever changing priorities of the business with little thought to the current commitments of candidates. And this causes issues for candidates, particularly if they are still in employment as their availability can be extremely limited also. Sometimes it can call into question the commitment of the hiring organisation, if there are other priorities that slow down the process and makes interview scheduling a constant challenge.
While it can take time to find the best talent, a long recruitment cycle is risky and may mean your company actually misses out on the best talent – the best candidates, once they are active in the market, will often be pursuing multiple opportunities.
So what can we do to make recruitment more effective and increase the odds of achieving a successful outcome:
- Clearly define and agree the exact requirements of a new role with all stakeholders before initiating the recruitment process.
- Agree a project plan with deadlines for all involved and get dates in diaries to reduce the logistical challenges of effective recruitment.
- Set and manage expectations with candidates from the outset
The very best talent may not be actively looking for a new role and will need to be tempted by a really interesting proposition. An effective recruitment process can sometimes be a deciding factor for a candidate when it comes to making a career decision, as disorganised chaos in the recruitment process may well reflect the underlying culture of the company. Working with a specialist search company can make the recruitment cycle more efficient because they should have a strong network of potential candidates in place already, who can also act as referrals for other suitable candidates.
In the Archer Mathieson HR practice, many of the HR professionals we know are not actively looking but can be tempted by the right opportunity. Because we spend our life talking to and meeting people only in this community, we have a strong knowledge of the HR function and can differentiate the best from the rest thus saving time and maximising the chances of an effective recruitment outcome.
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