Home » How to Improve Your Hiring Process for 2021
Friday, January 15th, 2021
Does your company have a hiring plan for 2021? Or are you hoping to create a simple job ad and hope it does the magic? Let’s face it, 2020 was a difficult year for hiring, and 2021 is held with high expectations to make up for all the hard times. When it comes to hiring, having an efficient and forceful process lessens the struggle of finding the right candidates and gets your business running smoother. Without establishing a strategic hiring process that wins at scoring skillful talent, you could have a challenging time fulfilling an unexpected job opening that arises.
Your business and hiring team can avoid many issues that can occur and improve productivity by implementing a well-developed hiring process. Without a strategic hiring plan, you could find yourself struggling to fill job openings that arise unexpectedly. At VIVAHR, we know that there can be a lot of unplanned hiring that can happen in every business, and we are here to help create a hiring process that is successfully robust from the beginning to the end. We provide amazing resources from optimized job description templates to a top-rated applicant tracking system, proven to enhance every business hiring approach and hire the best possible candidates.
VIVAHR’s purpose is to be your solution for everything involved in hiring but, more importantly, everything related to improving your hiring process for 2021 and years to come. If you seek to revamp or create new techniques for an outstanding hiring plan for your business, we have got you covered. Within this information, we will walk you through the crucial aspects you will want to include in your hiring process for 2021.
What is a Hiring Process?
A hiring process involves searching, recognizing, and recruiting the top qualified candidates for an available employment position. Yet, other aspects can improve a hiring process that includes proper job attraction, talent management, effective job advertising, practical interviews, and an equipped onboarding system.
Many businesses take for granted the effect of a well-organized and compelling hiring process can have on a business’s brand and overall company culture. Every step that a business takes in its hiring process reveals many characteristics of a company that influences the type of candidates that will apply. If your company has not spent a great deal of time realizing how your hiring process shapes your business operations, then you are starting in the right place to make some valuable improvements.
Review Your Current Hiring Process
If you have hired previously, but you continue to discover you are not receiving applications from the candidates with the skills you are hoping they will have, then you should review your current hiring process and determine what you may be doing wrong. Here are some areas of the hiring process that you may need to include in your business hiring strategies.
- Candidate outline – Before you begin hiring a new employee, you should create an outline or blueprint of the type of candidate you want to hire. Not only will this step help you know exactly the type of skills, education, and experience your business needs for your available position, the outline will also help you create the best job description attracting the right candidate.
- Great Job Descriptions – Every job description you create is your sales pitch to your potential candidate. Like the sales pitch you create for your customers to select your product or service over the competition, you want your ideal candidate to apply for your position over the other available positions. A job description is your valuable ticket to receiving the best candidates.
- Adapt Hiring technology – If you do not use an online system to receive and track your applications, you are left in the dark ages. Getting applications through emails can be extremely unorganized, which may lead to missing out on qualified candidates. Using hiring software will improve your hiring process for the better. Not only can hiring solutions make your hiring process more organized, but you can also enhance your potential candidate experience with your brand.
- The Right Job Posting Sites– Getting your job ad on job posting sites is crucial in every hiring process. However, if you are in a specific industry that normally experiences a low rate of qualified candidates, you must use the best job posting sites that reach your target candidate market.
How to Improve Your Hiring Process for 2021
Regardless if you have a hiring process is established or not, with the new year and upcoming changes, it is always wise to review and revamp your process whenever possible to guarantee an effective and practical hiring approach for your business. Here are some hiring concepts to consider implementing in your company’s hiring process for 2021.
Hire As Soon As Possible
Just as with anything good, if you don’t act fast, you will miss out on a good opportunity. It is the same with finding and hiring the best talent. Great candidates tend to be hired fast if they are in the job market. If you are not in gear to post an alluring job description and act fast on promising applicants, you will get the short end of the skilled candidate stick. Even if you have a great number of exceptional applications, it is important to reach out and follow up with those candidates that seem promising as you move through your process. Follow up with those candidates and let them know you are still interested and discuss more position details or status if possible. Letting them know they are still on your radar helps further strengthen your hiring brand while creating a solid relationship for future hires if they don’t make the cut.
Have Excellent Job Titles and Descriptions
We can’t stress enough how important it is to have relevant job titles and captivating descriptions for every position your company posts to hire a new employee. There is so much more than listing off the job responsibilities and requirements. The job seeker of 2021 is looking to be employed by the “Google” company of any industry. Job seekers are looking for companies that are more than just a place to receive an income. They want to be part of a business that treats their employees amazingly and be involved in the growth of an incredible company. It is essential to have great to amazing job descriptions that essentially captivate the attention of the exact candidate you are looking to hire. Additionally, you must ensure that your job titles meet the search query of your potential job seeker. Having job titles similar to what is seen on a LinkedIn profile or business card helps reach the type of candidate searching for your position. Avoid added title words like Ninja, Rockstar, Awesome in your job ad since these words are not being types in the job board’s search bar.
Emphasize on Offered Perks
There is no denying that 2020 was a rough year for employees and employers. Hiring and getting hired was no easy situation. One clear effect of 2020 is that the workplace has changed, and certain accommodations are now required. If your business has made some changes to meet the new normal such as flexible work hours, remote work, extra PT, free PPE, and any other perks related to the pandemic, provide this information within your job postings. Besides the recent changes for additional perks, if you offer other pleasing perks and benefits like a free cell phone, gym membership, free lunches, company car, and any other great incentives, make sure to include these perks as well.
Finding and Selecting Candidates
Have you thought about where you will find your potential candidates? Will you use job posting sites? How many job postings sites will you need to use? What about referrals from current employees or reaching out to your customer base? How will you narrow down the number of applications you will receive? Should you create a questionnaire to help find the best candidates? You and your hiring team must answer many questions to ensure that your hiring process is producing the best results for the ideal candidate selection. If you haven’t accessed these questions and perhaps more, this can help build a plan to find your ideal candidates and have an easier approach to selecting them.
The Right Fit with Candidate Personality
While a suitable skill set can be the most beneficial factor to determine if a candidate is the right fit, the reality is that skills can be taught, but personalities cannot. As you and your hiring team go through the selection process, reflect on how a candidate’s personal attributes align with the daily job responsibilities. For example, competitiveness would be a perfect trait for a salesperson than for a computer programmer. Certain personality traits that a candidate clearly obtains may fit the role, whether they have the skills or experience you are looking for to fill the position. With specific attributes, you most likely have the ability to mold the ideal employee by teaching them the skills needed to be successful for your company and themselves. Don’t disregard your company’s ability to train and teach a candidate with incredible soft skills that are perfect to have for your position.
Optimize Your Company Career Site
Your company’s website is one of the most used aspects that potential candidates interact with within the job-seeking process. If they like your band, there is a good chance they are interested to see if you’re hiring. As hiring increases in 2021, it is valuable to optimizing your career site to help candidates find available positions, and it’s simple to apply. It is crucial to make sure your site is easy for candidates to set up a profile, find job opportunities, and apply quickly. Remember that your potential candidates are just like your customers using your site. If they can’t get what they need easily and quickly, they will go somewhere else. You don’t want to lose out on getting great candidates because your career site is not an efficient process. Furthermore, your career site should use search engine optimization (SEO) to increase the likelihood of search engines directing potential job seekers to your site. Having your career site optimized can support your need to getting a great source of highly qualified candidates.
Making things easier for your career page can be done using a career site or hiring marketing software. VIVAHR is an excellent hiring solution that includes career site capabilities. Plus, the VIVAHR applicant tracking system allows your company to set up a company profile page that allows your candidates to interact with your brand and create a connection. You have the ability to upload images, videos, and links to your social media pages to give your potential applicants more insight into your company.
Administer an Applicant Tracking System
As stated in the above text, alongside your career site, you should utilize an applicant tracking system, also known as an ATS, to improve your hiring process for 2021. Using an ATS like VIVAHR is an effective way to revamp your current hiring process and make it streamlined. You can easily manage candidates’ resumes, quickly create and publish job postings, reach more potential job seekers, and have it all in one convenient and innovative dashboard. Plus, you can create custom tags to easily sort through your reviewed applicants and build a hiring pipeline to move prospective candidates through your hiring process. Implementing an applicant tracking system is a helpful tool to push your hiring process for the better in 2021.
Improve the Interview Process
As many companies have had to adopt remote interviewing, the 2021 interview process is still being worked out for many employers. Many companies are finding they prefer a certain video conferencing software over others. They have been able to access a candidate’s personality and body language through a computer screen and have been able to establish a backup plan when technical difficulties arise. Even though this new interview process has become more normal in the workforce, it is still wise to review your interview process for this kind of interaction. Ensure you have scheduled the adequate time to review with your candidate the position responsibilities, discuss the company’s mission, and have in-depth and thoughtful interview questions. Also, allow your candidate to interview you as well. Allowing the opportunity for your candidate to ask questions to help them gain a better perception of the position and the company while making significant diffidence in their experience with your brand. Be aware that these video conference calls are still new for some candidates and are just as nerve-wracking as a face to face interview. Establishing a thorough interview process can support your search of finding the ideal candidate while creating a good candidate experience for your potential employees.
Candidate Experience and Reviews
One of the valuable concepts that your company should embrace as part of improving your hiring process for 2021 is creating an outstanding candidate experience. This can be accomplished throughout the entire process your applicants go through to be considered for your open positions. The candidate experience can occur from when they find your job posting and read the information that describes what it is like being employed at your company. Also, from the moment they apply, you can send them a thank you response, questionnaire, or assessment test. Or when you reach out to them to schedule an interview or kindly send them a notice of them not being considered and encourage them to keep applying. Throughout the entire hiring process, if you can engage with qualified and unqualified candidates, you are essentially building a strong hire brand for your company. When you can perform more than the standard hiring interactions, you avoid the chances of your company receiving bad reviews on job posting sites. It’s important to keep an eye on these job board reviews as these ratings and comments will affect your chances of receiving applications from the candidates you want to hire.
New Employee Onboarding Process
Once you have found your ideal candidate, you are ready to bring them on and start working. In this process of getting your new hire squared away, you must have an onboarding process that supports retaining that employee for the long term. A new employee onboarding process involves integrating your new hire with your company’s culture, training, and any other vital procedures that helps them become a productive and successful member of your team. An outstanding onboarding process is essentially a longer period of time than 30 or 90 days of employment. How you handle the first few days or months of your new hire experience into your operations is crucial to ensuring higher retention of that employee.
Hire Better in 2021
Having a strategic hiring plan that aligns with the 2021 workforce will make a difference in having a great year for your company. When every step of your process is thought out and planned to the fullest, you can guarantee less of a hassle and a sure way to hire the right people for your company.
