E-commerce giant Amazon has laid off 27,000 employees this year.
Last year, Netflix laid off approximately 3% of its workforce.
Even though a large number of companies are laying off employees, the process of hiring the right talent goes on simultaneously.
While laying off and hiring employees sound contradictory, there’s nothing more crucial to your business’s fortunes than having the right people on board.
Post-pandemic, the hiring process, and strategies have undergone a sea of change.
Now, both job seekers and recruiters have a larger pool of options to choose from.
While recruiters are proactively screening candidates’ profiles from various parts of the globe on various job portals, job seekers are looking for job roles that offer flexible work models – remote work and hybrid work.
Now, hiring the right talent is not a walk in the park in today’s dynamic (and unstable) work environment.
It’s way more than a conference room interview, a pristine resume, and the standard questions.
This article covers all essential aspects of hiring the right talent – importance, trending recruitment methods, and strategies.
Why hiring the right talent is important for businesses?
Every organization wants to have the best people in their team. Hiring the right talent has various benefits for businesses, but making the wrong recruitment decision is likely to cost you more.
Just look at this situation like that one in a reputable college in your state. While smart, academically strong, and multi-talented students draw top honors for the college, poor performers fail to add any value and might even dent the college’s reputation.
So, let’s have a look at the various benefits that the best employees bring to any organization.
Maximize productivity
Hiring the best people boosts your organization’s productivity in different ways.
To begin with, when you’ve hired the right candidate, you can now dedicate your time to other tasks that are equally important for your organization. Also, constantly seeking inputs from non-HR personnel about the next hire drains their time and energy as well. After hiring, they save a lot of time and continue working on their tasks without any disruption.
Hiring a well-qualified candidate can contribute to the overall growth and productivity of your business even though they might take some time to get used to new job roles and responsibilities.
Save the company’s resources
Turnover costs can put a big dent in the company’s pocket, especially if you’re operating small or medium-sized businesses. A recent study has shown that the cost of replacing an individual employee can range from one-half to two times the employee’s salary.
Investing your organization’s time and money into an employee only to see them walk out due to different reasons can be frustrating. That’s why, having the right talent is important as they offer stability and consistency to your company while contributing to its overall success.
Foster business growth
Your employees are the primary driver of your business growth. Hiring the best people is akin to laying a strong foundation for the bright future of your company as it reduces the need to recruit the number of people you’ll need in the future.
Efficient, responsible employees take ownership of their work and also motivate others around them to deliver the best results. In fact, the right talent adds much more than delivering quality work; they bring experience, skills, and a wealth of knowledge that enriches your work environment.
Reduces employee burnout
Employee burnout is a major challenge for organizations as 52% of all employees are feeling burned out. Layoffs are leaving many companies understaffed, and there’s incessant pressure to meet deadlines, which is making people work for longer hours at the cost of their overall well-being.
One of the main benefits of hiring the right talent is that it eliminates the dreaded employee burnout. Having the right talent onboard alleviates the workload of your current workforce as they stick to scheduled working hours. As your new hire shares the workload, others get adequate rest and are likely to stay in their current job role.
Preserves the company’s image
Would you like to work for a company with a high employee turnover rate?
No. Of course. Similarly, the right talent will only show interest in joining your business if it is known to ‘keep’ employees. Now, employees’ exit can be due to multiple reasons and not entirely due to the loophole in your hiring process, but it does have an effect on your company’s reputation in the marketplace.
Investing in better job candidates who see a great opportunity to grow professionally with your company will enhance your business’s reputation, which in turn, can help you attract more talented individuals.
Restricts access to confidential information
Every business has a lot of confidential information in the form of trade secrets, processes, operations, client information, employee records, proprietary products, licenses, and so on. Obviously, some of your employees will have access to confidential information, but who knows what they’ll do with this information once they leave?
Choosing the best people means they have more credibility and are trustworthy. You can give them access to confidential information without fearing misuse or worse, a potential legal fallout.
It’s clear that recruiting the best people is one of the most critical factors in an organization’s growth, but how to go about it?
The most effective way to start your hiring process is by asking the right internal questions to determine if the candidate has the attributes you’re looking for.
Here are some questions you need to ask.
How to hire the right talent?
Hiring the right talent begins with creating a list of questions that you need to answer.
And the reply to each of these questions should be an affirmative “yes”.
If you are in doubt even for a single question, it means that the candidate is found wanting in that particular area.
Question#1. Is the candidate highly adaptive?
In the current dynamic work environment, you want people who are quick to adapt to changes in work processes. You can ask candidates to give you an example of how they were able to evolve to changes in their last company. Embracing new techniques and adaptability to take on new challenges are critical skills to look for in this volatile business environment.
Question#2. Are they curious and ask questions?
During the interview, are you the only one asking questions? Do they display voracious curiosity and ask questions related to the open job position, the company’s values, and mission, the work environment, etc? Relevant questions from the candidate tell you a lot about how curious and excited they are about your organization and its work processes.
Question#3. Are they team players?
Today’s competitive business environment demands superb collaborators who are highly cooperative. The right talent not only believes in producing great results but also in helping others to be more productive and efficient at work. You should refrain from hiring highly talented individuals who are brilliant in what they do, but think only about themselves and have difficulty collaborating with others.
Question#4. Do they admit to mistakes?
Some people have a tough time admitting to their mistakes, fearing they will dent their reputation in the workplace. However, you can’t progress without making mistakes and learning from them. Good learners are those who learn from the mistakes they made and make further improvements. Ask candidates about their personal experience of how mistakes helped them to grow both professionally and personally.
Question#5. Do they fit your company culture?
You’re hiring a person, not a robot. You’re hiring an individual with unique character traits, not their skills because no candidate is perfectly qualified for the job. Are you sure the person you’re interviewing will seamlessly blend into your company culture? Do they have habits and values that will enrich your work environment? It’s important for you to be confident about the candidate’s ability to prove themselves as a valuable asset to your organization.
You can add more questions to this list, but these are five “essential” questions that you must ask yourself before making a final decision.
Next up, we’ll find the most effective hiring strategies that can help you hire a great candidate.
Best Hiring strategies to help you choose great employees
Recruiting top talent is not easy these days. Organizations are hunting for top talent with an intensity never witnessed before. So, you need to have a well-planned recruitment strategy in place that will help you quickly identify ideal candidates while saving time and money in the process.
Here are some hiring strategies that will help you connect with the right talent.
Check how committed a candidate is
Hiring a committed candidate for your organization is important because you don’t want people who hop jobs at the drop of a hat. Rather, you want people who can work for you for the long term.
The hiring process is time-consuming and employees leaving after months not only hampers your organizational productivity but also makes you start a whole new hiring process again.
Loyal employees are rare. Look at the candidate’s work experience and what’s their frequency of switching jobs. Candidates switching often might not be the right fit to meet your requirements.
Use social media
If you want to have a sneak into the candidate’s personal lifestyle, you should utilize social media platforms to great effect. Asking personal questions could be uncomfortable for both parties and might even turn them off to an extent that they don’t want to join your company.
Instead, you should be analyzing their social media profiles across various platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram. More than 90 percent of companies prefer to recruit through social media platforms as it gives them useful insights into their personal lives and lifestyle.
Also, sharing job postings across various platforms helps you quickly connect with job seekers.
Define the job
Given the widespread use of various online job portals, your potential candidates are likely to view your job description first. So, write a detailed, accurate job description that compliments your requirements. including details such as job requirements, responsibilities, and expectations.
Add important details, like job role and responsibilities, your core values, and company culture so you can find the right cultural fit. You can also mention the salary range in the job description, so you don’t end up recruiting under or over-qualified people.
Assign different types of tests to candidates
You should put your candidates through different tests to analyze their analytical and learning skills. The candidate’s resume should not be the sole criteria to determine their eligibility for the vacant position. While their efficiency for the job role and high confidence makes them great potential, putting them through different tests only strengthens their ability to do the job.
In other words, to hire the right talent, you should combine their work experience, educational qualification, and skills. That said, tests should be framed considering the skills required for the job.
Keep improving your hiring process
The hiring process is an ongoing thing. Employees join and employees leave, which means you’ll be recruiting new joiners, hence it should be designed strategically. Recruiting teams should remember that the hiring process must be updated regularly to identify and recruit the best talent for your organization.
Top Trending recruitment methods you need to know about
Change is constant in an ever-changing work environment today. Recruitment processes and methods have undergone a significant change with time.
In an era when an increasing number of people are working remotely or inclined towards this flexible work model, recruitment professionals will inevitably leverage virtual support.
In 2023, innovative recruitment trends are likely to play a major role in helping organizations hire the best talent.
- Remote interviewing: Remote work has become a new normal and it looks set to continue into 2023. As an increasing number of HR professionals recruit people remotely, remote interviewing has become an integral component of the virtual hiring process. Video conferencing tools like Zoom, Google Meet, HireVue, etc, are some popular tools that facilitate collaborative hiring as people from other departments can also participate in the hiring process.
- Artificial Intelligence (AI): 66% of recruiters already use AI in the process of recruitment. The use of AI in recruitment will continue to grow in the recruitment process as many states impose laws for using this technology. AI is known to eliminate bias in candidate identification, selection, and hiring of the right talent.
- Diversity, equity, and inclusion. Diversity, equity, and inclusion is a growing recruitment trend that promises to go beyond 2023. These areas have become the focus of HR professionals and can strongly influence the candidate’s perception of a particular brand and their decision to consider or ignore the job openings with that company.
- Employer branding. Employer branding is an emerging recruitment trend that every organization should focus on. As job applicants become increasingly aware of a company’s reputation during their job search, employers are recognizing the importance of creating, developing, and maintaining their brand image to attract the best talent.
- Data-centric recruiting. Recruitment decisions are likely to be influenced by heaps of insightful information and data. Though the use of data is not a new concept, tactical metrics (candidates per hire, offer acceptance rate, time to hire, etc.) will continue to play a vital role to make hiring decisions more precise.
- Employee well-being and mental health checks. Post Covid-19, the focus on the overall well-being of employees has increased, which has led to the implementation of health and wellness policies by organizations across the globe. In 2023, we are likely to witness a rise in more and more businesses embracing employees’ mental and physical health programs.
- Flexible schedules and payroll. Post Covid-19, an increasing number of employees prefer flexible work schedules and there are strong chances of on-demand payments becoming a new normal. We might see weekly payments replacing conventional monthly payments.
The Final Thought
The Great Resignation led to a shortage of workforce, which resulted in a hike in salaries. Now, layoffs are making companies get more out of the limited staff they have left with. It’s important to note that a steep hike in salaries can be the catalyst for later layoffs.
That said, today, employees prefer companies that practice empathic leadership and help them achieve and maintain a fine work-life balance. Companies that implement regular L&D initiatives (learning and development) register improved employee retention, as do companies that prioritize employee well-being.
As a recruiter, you should concentrate on these areas and hire people who display great zeal and passion for success with your organization.
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