An effective recruitment process is essential to keeping your company supplied with a consistent source of valuable human capital. Effective recruitment draws in the best talent while raising your reputation in your industry. Spend your recruitment resources wisely using this guide.
What Is the Recruitment and Selection Process?
Put simply, recruitment is any activity designed to solicit applications, while selection is the process of choosing a candidate to fill a vacancy.
Recruitment Process Steps
- Make a recruitment plan.
- Carry out a talent search.
- Screen and shortlist applicants.
- Conduct interviews.
- Evaluate candidates and extend offers.
The recruitment process in HR has both active and passive phases. Active recruitment includes activities like reaching out to qualified talent, posting job advertisements, and attending job fairs. Passive recruitment includes raising your company’s profile and reputation, keeping current employees engaged, and making connections within your industry.
Selection begins once applications start to arrive. Candidates may participate in screening activities or assessments, and a limited number of applicants are then invited to interview. After interviews are complete, the selection team evaluates the most promising candidates and decides to either extend an offer or continue the talent search.
Repeated rounds of applications and interviews are resource-intensive, not to mention demoralizing. A solid recruitment process ensures you get the best candidates in the door, giving you the highest chance of making a quick hire and getting back to business. This can be handled by a dedicated HR department, as is often the case at larger companies, or by a recruiting agency. Effective recruitment processes can be implemented at companies of any size.
Example of An Effective Recruitment Process
Having a recruitment end-to-end process in place has numerous benefits for companies of all sizes, in all industries. Follow the same steps each time you have a vacancy to fill. It will streamline your hiring process, reduce the amount of time spent on recruitment and selection, and give you confidence in your hiring decisions.
Put together a search committee.
Identify key stakeholders and decision-makers to serve on the committee. The recruitment process is time-intensive and may take employees away from their regular duties. Smaller companies without dedicated HR departments should consider recruitment process outsourcing.
Define your needs.
Envision the ideal candidate for this role. What functions must they absolutely fulfill? Where can you compromise? Think back through previous employees and look for trends. What qualities or experience do your most successful employees have? Are there technology or skill gaps you need to fill?
Define your offer.
What are you able to offer the candidate? Why should they choose to contribute to your company’s success? What do people like about working for you? The salary range is important to identify, but top-quality candidates are attracted by more than just the paycheck.
Identify talent pools.
Casting a wide net often brings in the best candidates. Don’t be afraid to consider other industries. Think about what your ideal candidate is likely to be doing right now. Where can you find them? Job fairs and job listing aggregation sites are primary recruitment tools for many companies, but you can also use social media or employee referral programs to bring in candidates.
Craft a job description.
Using the information you gathered in steps two and three, write a clear, concise description of your ideal candidate. Describe what you are able to offer qualified candidates. Make sure your expectations and commitments are realistic and accurate.
Advertise the position.
When deciding where to advertise the position, consider your recruitment budget and targeted talent pools, as well as your ability to process the applications. When you’re flooded with applications from multiple sources, it’s easy to get overwhelmed and miss a great candidate. If you don’t have a dedicated recruitment team, a recruitment agency can take over the tedious work of posting the position and filtering out spam.
Take feedback.
If the applicants reaching out to you are significantly different from your ideal candidate, you might need to go back to the drawing board. Make sure the salary range matches the job description and experience level.
Screen and prioritize candidates.
Sort candidates into three piles; those who are definitely qualified, those who are definitely not qualified, and those whose qualification can’t be determined. You may choose to interview only definitely qualified candidates, or you may wish to seek more information about candidate abilities. Assessments and evaluations can be used at this part of the process.
Conduct interviews.
By the time you invite a candidate to interview, you should be reasonably assured that they are capable of performing the job as described. While it is important to ensure competency, the bulk of the interview should be devoted to checking for culture and fit. Devise a standard set of questions to ask all applicants. Leave room for them to ask questions. Communicate your decision-making timeline to the candidate.
Evaluate the candidates.
The members of the search committee should meet to review the data collected during the series of interviews. Review each candidate to ensure recency bias doesn’t affect your decision-making process. If you don’t have sufficient candidates, you may need to widen your search.
Extend an offer and participate in negotiations.
Before you begin negotiations, have a clear idea of the ways you could potentially sweeten the pot. Be open to ideas generated by the candidate. Negotiating a mutually beneficial agreement forms the foundation of a long and profitable relationship.
Reject unsuccessful candidates respectfully.
It’s easy to get caught up in the excitement of onboarding a new hire and forget about the candidates you didn’t choose. Consider your reputation and future recruitment needs, and send a courteous message letting unsuccessful applicants know they are no longer under consideration. If you were impressed with their resume, say so, and invite them to apply for future opportunities.
Analyze your data.
Through the recruitment process, you’ve collected many individual data points. Put them together to see the big picture. How many applications did you receive, and how relevant were they? What recruitment source attracted the highest quality candidates? How helpful was the interview process? What would you do the same way again, and what would you do differently? Constant quality improvement applies to all areas of business, including your recruitment process.
