By now, we hope your Rolodex is collecting dust in a box somewhere.
Old and new school recruiters may be at a constant battle over cold-calling, social recruiting, video interviewing, and mass messaging, but there are timeless sourcing practices keeping all talent pros from finding and hiring their ideal candidates.
Avoid these five hiring flubs to expand the pool of people fit for your company.
Sticking to a hiring manager’s requirements for a candidate
Misaligned communication between recruiters and hiring managers has been long cited as one of the reasons for the talent gap – be it difficulty finding talent for an open role, screening practices that filter in unqualified people, or candidates who drop out of the interviewing process. Sourcers and recruiters who don’t push back on hiring managers’ candidate criteria can easily get stuck searching for someone who’s exceptionally skilled and uncommon, or already employed. Work with hiring managers to adjust a role’s specifications based on how sourcers are (or aren’t) finding candidates.
Using past job titles as a starting point for screening candidates
Searching for candidates based on those who’ve previously held the same or similar job titles narrows your talent pool to a select group of people who’s skills and experience rely on an essentially arbitrary description. Job titles are like grab bags – the tasks, abilities, and experiences they entail change from company to company. Take a look at projects candidates have worked on to get a more tangible idea of what they’re capable of and how they can contribute to the open role (and beyond) at your company.
Disqualifying job hoppers
The linear job path doesn't exist anymore – 91% of Millennials alone are expected to have anywhere between 15 and 20 jobs throughout the course of their working lives. Job hoppers are no longer considered the black sheep of the talent pool. Get an understanding for why candidates left their previous companies and are interested in a job at your company. Reasons for candidates going from job to job, especially those early in their career, can range anywhere from a company not being able to keep all employees on board after an acquisition, or the candidate may have felt a sense of buyer’s remorse after their first days on the job. What you’re looking for is a clear understanding of the question, “Why us?”
Limiting active recruiting to more popular, well-known networks
An abundance of qualified candidates live on sites outside of the big four, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+. As these networks become saturated with recruiters vying for the same people, more companies are adding lesser-known, niche sites to the mix of highly populated and familiar networks. Think Quora, Dribbble, GitHub, AngelList, Meetup. A general rule of thumb to apply is to think of sites that, in general, bring together users under similar interests or skills as potential sources to find new talent pools – not all recruiting networks are created equal nor directly serve the purpose of recruiting, but can easily be “hacked” to work for you.
Deciding on a candidate after the first interview
A candidate who looks good on paper and interviews well doesn’t translate into someone who’d be a fit of the role. Did you know 58% of employers in this CareerBuilder survey caught an applicant lying on their resume? Avoid making bad hires by checking in with references, evaluating projects they worked on at previous companies, and running candidates through an interview process involving employees from throughout the hierarchy – coworkers, hiring managers, and, if possible, someone from the C-suite. How do their impressions and evaluations line up? Is there a unanimous vote to hire this candidate?
Building out a talent funnel to work for your hiring goals and the expectations and behaviors of today’s candidates means adjusting the team’s approach to sourcing, outreach, and interviewing. Try out some practices the company doesn’t usually apply to find out what works, what doesn’t, and how to create a more effective hiring process.
Got a tip you want to share with us for better evaluating candidates? Share them with us in the comments or tweet us @Entelo. We want to hear from you!
