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Posts tagged “Candidate engagement”

 
 
In the ever-evolving landscape of recruitment, the search for top talent goes beyond merely attracting candidates—it's about keeping them engaged and invested for the long haul. The modern workforce is seeking more than just a paycheck; they want to align themselves with organisations that resonate with their values and aspirations. We want to help you understand the 10 things that candidates want to know about you as their future employer. 
 
Attracting the best candidates for your job role all begins with writing the finest job advert to promote your vacancy. 
 
You need to consider the following key points. 
• What you want as a company from the job advert. 
• What candidates require from the job advert. 
• How to make your advert stand out from the others. 
 
 
 
 
 
2022 saw a lack of suitable candidates applying for each role and on top of this the withdrawal rate was higher than ever before for a lot of roles being recruited for. How do you deal with this whilst recruiting? 
Competition for candidates is currently high. There are lots of job opportunities for great candidates currently. How can you persuade the right candidate to take your role over the others that they will be interviewing for? It also starts with your first impressions… 
 
Why should you send out a candidate pack? 
 
This information is sent out at the start of the recruitment process. Ideally, when you are confirming the first stage interviews. This is an often-missed opportunity to start to sell your company to your candidates and will also reduce the length of time spent at interview telling them about the organisation. It means that you get more time to spend; asking the candidates about themselves and their suitability for the role. 
 
What company information should you include? 
Recent data shows that 33% of the workforce leave their job before they have crossed the half-year mark. Whilst this can be an opportunity to capture key talent in the marketplace it is also a challenge for employers who want to retain their existing workforce. Retention starts at day 1 of the onboarding process (if not before), so how can you maximise your recruitment investment, reduce the impact of staff turnover and benefit from the existing talent that ultimately owns your customer experience CX? 
 
Our guest blog by Charlotte Green, Founder at Specific Learning & Coaching Ltd, a specialist learning agency that use The Specific Method, which is a blend of insight, training, coaching and mentoring to develop leaders explains what you can do to improve your retention levels and become known as a ‘great place to work’ through implementing a successful employee onboarding process. 
 
Make sure you effectively introduce new employees to the Company Purpose, Mission, Vision and Values 
 
Implementing standardised operational checklists and templated documents as simple as it sounds, enables key people to follow a process through the cross-functional areas of your business and offers important support and a step-by-step approach that is clear and easy to understand. Imagine the overload of information within the 3 6 and 12 week period. 
In the current market, Candidates are King. They have the choice of positions and as an employer, you need to woo them. In the past recruitment has been very much a formal structured process, often without character and personality. 
 
60% of UK companies use an assessment centre process as part of their recruitment. It gives you a more objective view of candidates and can include more work-based assessments to give a better indication as to which candidate will be the best for the role. Assessment centres are accepted as being fairer than a standard interview process as more information is collected on each candidate. 
 
If you are using assessment centres, how can you use them to convey your values and the culture of the company to effectively sell your job opportunity over other roles that they may be applying for? 
 
 
Being at the forefront of recruitment and active in the current market we are seeing some interesting and surprising candidate behaviours. None more so than the activity that we are seeing from candidates en masse currently. 
For many, it will seem surprising that rather than seeing a large active candidate pool, it is the opposite. Applications per job are down and the number of quality candidates is also lower than expected. So, if you are recruiting – what can you expect to see? 
 
1. Indecisive candidates 
Quality candidates will be holding job offers from more than one employer, and in a change to previous behaviours, more candidates are accepting more than one offer and then taking time over their decision as to which one they will finally take. To help them decide to take your role, make sure that you are keeping close to them and helping them with any outstanding questions that they need answering to help them with the decision-making process. It’s not about rubbishing any other offers they may have but about showing them how you will support them and offer them stability as they are forming their first impressions – values that have come to the forefront for many candidates during this time. 
 
 
As we are moving away from lockdown and through the pandemic, we are aware that the number of jobs is increasing, but surprisingly the number of candidates is not. If you find that you are recruiting now, what can you do to ensure that your preferred candidate takes your role? 
1. Increase your candidate engagement 
Over the last 18 months, there have been some significant shifts in recruitment to manage the need for new staff. We are all aware that recruitment has become even more remote with interviews being carried out remotely either using TEAMs, Zoom or specialist recruitment platforms. However, this can lead to your candidates being less engaged with your processes and therefore your company, which can lead to rejections by candidates at the offer stage. If you are running full remote recruitment processes make sure that you offer the opportunity for candidates to engage differently. Maybe send them a pack pre virtual meeting containing a coffee or tea bag and a biscuit or cake so that after the formal interview you can invite them for a quick coffee to answer any questions that the process may have thrown up for them? Give them your mobile so that if anything comes up during the process, they can speak to you directly rather than having to go through the recruitment agency. If you build these relationships now you will be more successful in attracting and offering to the right candidates for your business. 
 
 

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