Attraction, Qualification, Retention
Successful recruitment is about more than just reading CVs and picking the candidate you like best based on instinct. Recruitment takes time and costs money, so there is real benefit in getting it right first time, and this includes retaining your new employees once they have started work. Knowing where to start can be challenging, so here are just a few tips on how to attract, qualify and retain new employees.
How to attract the best candidates
You can only hire the ideal candidate, if the ideal candidate applies, and this will only happen if you give them a reason to. Competition can be high nowadays and good candidates may have a few job options. So, build a good reputation and become a company that is known to be good to work for. If you treat your employees and clients well this will happen automatically, but you can help the process by blogging and advertising rewards, benefits and working life on social media.
The first thing your potential candidates will see is the job advert, and it needs to appeal; write a bad job description and it may attract the wrong kind of candidate. Knowing exactly who you are looking to employ will help with this – what skills and experience do they need, what personality traits would be beneficial and what are they looking for? For example, if career progression is what they are after, put that in the advert. But, if flexi-time is more of a draw, focus on that instead. Being detailed and listing essential and desirable skills will enable potential candidates to assess the role, but be realistic. If you simplify it too much, your role may not come across as worth applying for, but over complicate and you may find that candidates think they are under-qualified when they actually aren’t, and vice versa. Lastly, make sure your salary is competitive – great employees won’t work for nothing.
A job advert can easily be posted in many places at once, but is that necessarily a good thing? Placing your job advert strategically, for example on job or industry specific boards or in forums, means it is more likely to reach the right people, which will save you time in the next stage; attracting the wrong people gives you more unsuitable applications to sieve through.
How to select the best candidates
With the rise of Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) recruitment is no longer paper based. But, even with everything stored in one place online, working your way through candidate applications can be tedious. e‑Talent, however, makes the process simple and painless. All candidates fill in an application form – so no more CVs – which includes not only skills and experience, but also psychometric personality and behavioural testing. Having the application customised to look for your ideal candidate, means the system automatically recognises who meets your essential criteria and who doesn’t. Those that don’t can be sent a rejection email with just a touch of a button – which saves you time but also earns you a good reputation among job hunters who rarely receive replies. Those that may be suitable for your role are ranked by e-Talent based on how good of a fit they are for your organisation, and the best candidates are listed right at the top. You therefore instantly know who has potential and who doesn’t. Selecting candidates like this removes bias and stops you selecting candidates based purely on instinct.
How to retain your candidates
If your recruitment strategy worked, you should have ended up with an employee you want to keep. But, people move around a lot, so how can you ensure they stay?
Firstly, get to know your new employee – what motivates them, what are their goals and what are they trying to achieve. If you know what they want and where they are in comparison to where they want to be, you have a much better chance of being the one to help them get there. If they like new challenges and want to progress up the career ladder, perhaps consider training or discuss possible promotions. That way, they won’t feel like they are stuck and look for better opportunities elsewhere. Making employees feel appreciated and important will increase their sense of worth and make them feel like they are contributing to your company. And, likewise setting goals and targets will give them something to work towards. However, one of the most important things to do to keep your employees happy is to create a good working environment; if your employees feel relaxed and comfortable at work they are more likely to hang around, and also to raise questions and discuss problems with you rather than just look for a job elsewhere.
