Implementing the right strategies and adjustments now can help your hiring team to refocus their efforts and adapt to better support the changing needs of the business and make processes more efficient.
Sarah Beck, Talent Acquisition Director at SEEK shares her tips for how you can make the most of your resources in these unchartered times.
Refocus your recruitment effort
The Talent Acquisition team at SEEK has adopted an “infinite mindset” to adapt to the changing environment. Due to some slowing down in hiring volumes, the team has shifted their portfolio resourcing model to one focused on supporting specific business units, which helps to accommodate the changing needs of the business. This means they are learning about new business areas, building relationships with new leaders and recruiting in areas they haven’t necessarily recruited before.
“This collective effort has seen us make the most of our ‘hiring hiatus’ so we are well prepared, and in a better position to service the business when we come out the other side,” Beck says.
Utilise your in-house talent
Leverage the talent you already have by assessing the skills and capabilities of your existing staff. Consider deploying them into new roles, teams or functions to provide them with opportunities for growth and career advancement.
Beck likens internal hiring to “a team sport” and says, “having consultants with specialist skills within an organisation can build recruiting expertise within the team and help to deliver quality hiring outcomes faster.”
Build your pipelines for team success
As Beck says, “there’s no need to start from scratch every time a new role comes up. Effective talent pipelining ensures you always have strong candidates at your fingertips.” It’s beneficial because it reduces time-to-hire, makes better use of online advertising campaigns and databases, and improves the quality of hire.
She lists time, focus and discipline as the key components of building pipelines for specialised roles. She also says that using proactive sourcing tools such as Premium Talent Search is increasingly important, especially for high-value talent and business critical roles. “This type of talent is in high demand, so hirers who build an effective engagement plan with talent identified through proactive sourcing increase their chances of making a successful placement, not by just relying on a job ad.”
Leverage technology for efficient and quality shortlisting
Screening with intention has never been more important as in many industries, there’s a much higher volume of applicants per role. This is why Beck says, “it is important to leverage tech tools to help with effective screening and maintaining a strong candidate experience.”
Beck says that a sophisticated Applicant Tracking System is the absolute starting point for setting a team up for success. “Without it, teams spend more time on manual processes, slowing down the hiring process, especially at the shortlisting stage.” The Top Candidate badge offered by SEEK is another helpful tool to make your shortlisting process more efficient.
According to Beck, technologies act as the one source of truth required for capturing information that enables:
- A great candidate and hiring manager experience
- Decisions driven by data and insights
- Hiring practices which scale; and
- Building capacity for hiring teams to unlock time to deliver great hiring outcomes.
For many hiring teams, new challenges are emerging each day in this environment. But by focusing on ways your team can adapt, refocus and leverage technology, you’ll be better placed to support the changing needs of your business through COVID-19 and beyond.
