The Need For Speed – Why Even Top Companies Are Losing Out

Over the past six months, we have seen the recruitment industry picking up as businesses look to capitalise on market growth and stay ahead of the competitors – the competition is fierce. 

As you will know from our previous posts, even though there are plenty of job seekers out there, the number of exceptional candidates has not increased and companies are fighting hard to keep hold of their core talent so the hunt for passive candidates has got harder too. 

So, how can you make sure your hiring process is helping rather than hindering you find the right people?

Well, although a good package, flexible working options, and good company culture can go a long way… these will not help you if you are losing the best candidates before an offer is ever made.

Research from Glassdoor.com featured in Forbes estimates that 

“the average interview process has doubled in five years, from 12.6 days to 22.9 days. Meanwhile, the best candidates are on the market an average of just 10 days.”

Part of the reason for this slowing down of the recruitment process is the increasing demand from employers for candidates to undergo more tests and interview stages. 

Screening methods such as group presentations, IQ tests, and the need for sign-off from various directors and departments all extend the hiring timeline. We have even recently seen 6-7 stage interviews and interview process timelines running into eight weeks or more.

An extreme example perhaps? But unfortunately, it is far too common and there is no evidence to suggest that lengthy recruiting times improves the quality of those who you hire and, in our experience, the most talented candidates simply won’t wait around as they will almost certainly have other offers on the go, especially in today’s market.

Not only can this affect your chances of getting the right person for the role but it can have multiple knock-on effects:

• A long recruitment process can be costly and highly inefficient when it comes to the time used by your current staff – taking the focus away from core business needs. This is further compounded if the role is already vacant as your existing employees are overworked while they compensate for the demands and responsibilities of the vacant position in the team and in itself can lead to current staff looking elsewhere for a less stressful opportunity. 
• Many businesses in the tech industry and wider label themselves as “Agile” –Gaining a reputation for being slow decision-makers will not only lose many top prospects, it will also damage the corporate reputation as a whole, making subsequent recruitment harder and if you don’t want to take our word for it, we recommend you have to read some candidate reviews on Glassdoor to see the damage occurring from long recruitment processes.
• Lastly and arguably most important is that consumers will inevitably feel the effects of staff shortages and delays in the launching of new products or the efficiency of the consumer experience which we all know can have a dramatic detriment to the bottom line.

Having spent the last year consulting with enterprise-level businesses and helping them refine their processes, we have a few tips that can help you ensure your process is as streamlined as possible while still maintaining a high level of consistency in your hiring:

• Ensure you create a clear job specification – remove any ambiguous wording, be as specific as possible on skills and experience required – this cuts out a lot of the filtering process and ensures you only receive applications from candidates with a suitable skill set.
• Include a job start date at the earliest stages and stick to it – even if your process is slightly longer than is optimal, giving potential candidates a definitive start date.
• Decide who is actually crucial to the interview process and if possible have them interview the candidate together – Do you really need three different department heads and two team members conducting individual interviews with a candidate? – this will go a long way to paring down the stages required.
• Commit to an interview schedule with everyone concerned in advance before advertising the role – of course commitments and dairies change (We all know that recruitment sign off is rarely the top of anyone’s agenda), but ensuring you have a schedule to work to will help keep the process on track and accountable.
• Only check references for candidates you’re planning to hire.
• When you see a great fit then move in on them quickly.
• Make an on offer quickly and don’t low ball the candidate – this is exceptionally important; it sets a president for how they think you value your staff and anyone worth their salt 
• Have your contracts already in place ready to go out.
• Use a specialist Agile Recruitment Consultant who can help you further adapt your processes and help you manage the candidate experience.

We hope this helps and gives you some useful insights to improve your recruitment process, if you would like some more information or advice on how to optimise your recruitment process and ensure that you are engaging with the right candidates Contact Us.