Since recruitment is an essential function of the human resources department, it’s important to have a strategic process in place. A recruitment process is a list of steps that gets you from the job description to the offer letter and ultimately, onboarding the new hire. It’s essentially a step-by-step approach to bringing in talented individuals who will help the company grow. The recruitment process not only helps attract the right kind of candidates, but it reflects the company’s values. Being able to understand how to optimize the job recruitment process can shorten the hiring cycle by 60% while also improving the quality of your hires. Continue reading to learn about the steps in the recruiting process.
Step 1: Identify Your Needs
Define exactly what you’re looking for in a candidate for each position. It’s essential to sit down with your team to determine the specific hiring needs for your open job positions. Make sure these requirements are precise, specific, and realistic. You may think it’s quite simple to replace a role for someone who just left. However, this step in the recruitment process tends to get more difficult when you’re starting from scratch for a position you’ve never had or you’re changing the responsibilities of a role.
Step 2: Prepare The Job Description
Once you determine the candidate’s persona, write down a detailed job description. Creating a compelling and unique description will help you attract the most qualified candidates for your job. The job description summarizes the essential responsibilities, skills, and qualifications for the role. This is a very important step in the recruiting process. Your job description should include:
- A clearly defined job title
- The job overview
- Company overview
- Benefits
- A list of responsibilities
- Required skills
- Salary for the position
There are millions of job postings on the internet. Ensure you create a job description that will stand out from the rest. This is the beginning of marketing your company and your job to your future hire.
Step 3: Create A Recruitment Plan
After writing a detailed job description, sit down with your team to determine what the next best steps are. A recruitment plan will provide your team with an outline of the steps your company will take when filling the position. These strategies help businesses focus their efforts and resources on specific hiring strategies that will provide them with excellent candidates. Create a timeline for each step moving forward so you know exactly what you have to do to reach your end goal, an offer. On average, a new position takes 27 days to fill. Determine when and where you will conduct interviews. Have a deadline in place for when you need the position filled.
Step 4: Start Searching
When you start searching for candidates to fill the roles, it will be the most time-consuming step in the recruitment process. It takes time and patience to find the right candidate who is depicted in the first and second steps of the recruitment process. Utilize recruitment tools to cut down on search time. Below are ways in which you can best utilize your search efforts:
- Create targeted ads (use social media platforms including LinkedIn, Indeed, and Glassdoor)
- Engage with candidates who have applied in the past
- Attend career fairs within the area
- Employee referrals
- Networking events
Step 5: Recruit Top-tier Talent
All companies want top talent to be a part of their team. However, these candidates most likely have many options. Your team must be strategic when recruiting these types of individuals. Especially in today’s tough labor market, attracting top talent is more competitive than ever. Companies need to be proactive so they can ensure that they attract the best talent and ultimately, keep them long-term. Below is a list of important factors to consider when looking for top-tier talent:
- Create a positive workplace culture
- Treat current employees well
- Know your best sources for talent
- Plan your interviews based on the quality of talent
- Be sure you verify candidates' credentials
- Make an offer fast
- Keep in touch with quality candidates
You need to ensure you make an offer fast to top-tier talent as they are most likely receiving a handful of other offers from other companies. Top candidates are only available for 10 days before being hired elsewhere. If they decline your offer and decide to go elsewhere, continue to stay in touch with them. It shows the candidate that you had a high interest in them, and you may find another position with your company that might be a better fit in the future.
Step 6: Conduct A Phone Screen
Once your team has found a handful of qualified candidates, it’s time to start interviewing. Prior to bringing the candidates in for a formal interview, conduct a phone screening to confirm they will be a good fit for the position. The phone interview step gives you the opportunity to ask preliminary questions and determine which applicants have met the necessary job requirements to move on to the next step, an in-person interview. This allows your team to narrow down the selection process and make sure you want to take the time to interview the candidate in person. Job candidates are interviewing your company the same way you’re interviewing them. Be sure you have a list of the top interview questions to ask before you begin this step. Questions to ask in a phone screen interview:
- Tell me about yourself
- Can you tell me about your background?
- Why are you leaving your current employer?
- What do you know about our company?
- What are your salary expectations?
- How soon would you be able to start?
- Do you have any questions?
Step 7: Interview In Person
Following the phone screening interview and determining qualified candidates, it’s time to bring them in for an interview. These interviews should be conducted quickly after the phone screen interview. This step in the recruiting process should be unique and show the candidate what your company is all about. The cost of a bad hire adds up with the salary, training costs, hiring a replacement, etc. On average, companies lose $14,900 on every bad hire. Consider asking these questions to get the most out of your interview:
- What type of impact did you make at your most recent job?
- Tell me about a time you failed to reach a goal or complete a project. What happened, and why were you unsuccessful?
- How would your colleagues describe you?
- Name a work accomplishment that makes you proud.
- What motivates you?
- Do you like working with a team or working alone?
- When conflict arises at work, how do you handle it?
- Where do you see yourself in the next five years?
Be sure you are communicating with the candidate about where you are in the process and what the next steps are. Be sure to lay out the timeline so they know exactly what to expect.
Step 8: Offer
You’ve made it to the final steps where you see all your hard work pay off. You have determined a candidate that possesses the qualities you’re looking for. This is the most important step of the recruitment process. Make sure you present a desirable offer to the candidate that they won’t pass up. You first need to make a verbal job offer. Let the candidate know right away that you’re extending an official offer of employment. Be sure to provide details regarding the position, start date, compensation, bonus structure (if applicable), pay frequency, and when they need to accept or decline the offer.
After you offer the candidate a verbal offer over the phone, it’s time to move on to the written offer. Provide all the information mentioned in the verbal offer along with their future manager’s contact information, and any steps they might have to take so they can come in ready to go for their first day of work. Make sure you get the written offer letter over to the candidate as soon as possible, via email. Provide a deadline for them to get the offer letter back to you to keep the momentum going. Once you’ve sent the offer over email, follow up via phone or email to ensure they received the offer letter. Anticipate this step to take slightly longer and be ready to negotiate salary and benefits.
If they accept the offer, ensure you are following up with them once a week between the acceptance date and their first day. If not, you could run into the chance of the candidate backing out.
Step 9: Onboarding
Onboarding the new hire is your final step in the recruitment process and lends a hand to their success within their new role. Although there will be a plethora of forms during the onboarding process, it’s also important to include processes and resources that will help them transition into your company successfully. Consider having one-on-one meetings with them weekly or bi-weekly to check in with the new employee.
The Benefits Of Outsourcing HR
As you’ve noticed, it takes a lot of time and money to implement a recruitment process successfully. From creating a job ad to finding the right candidate to providing opportunities for employee development, the cost of hiring and training adds up. Professional employer organizations (PEOs) like GMS provide guidance on hiring and training as well as manage the administrative burdens associated with all aspects of the employee life cycle.
Melanie Bahr, Recruitment Specialist Manager at GMS, provides her insights on hiring. “In this ever-changing and challenging hiring environment, finding the right candidate can feel like finding a needle in a haystack. Below are three important issues to consider in making a better hiring decision:
- Experience versus potential: experience is the most important and valued factor when evaluating a candidate. It’s important to remember experience is not everything, do not prioritize it over everything else. You may interview people who seem promising but don’t have much of a track record. While these candidates have not proven themselves at work yet, they have obvious potential.
- Skill set: determine what the must-have skills are and look at which skills you can train the candidate in. Many soft skills can make a candidate a great option and with little training, could be the right fit.
- Culture fit: consider thinking about how a candidate will fit in with your company’s culture. When employees are a good fit culturally, they will be happier at work allowing for enhanced productivity and reduced turnover.
As a premier human resources company, we give our clients access to state-of-the-art HR software and other resources necessary to grow their business. GMS can help strengthen your business through our employee training and recruitment services. Contact us today to learn more.