Following on from Liam’s blog last week focusing on adverts, this week we focus on pace.
As we are now in peak holiday season, the ‘Out of Office’ replies are coming through thick and fast, as we find ourselves waiting until hiring managers are back in the office to resume their recruitment process. However, can we expect the candidates to wait around too? Moving quickly in order to secure the top talent is vey important, and it is something RP Analytics cannot stress enough. Everybody needs a holiday, as Brian Gordon-Stables mentioned in RP Finance’ blog last week, however, ensuring that process can continue in your absence is critical.
I will wait for you, maybe.
The time frame from registering on a job board to signing a contract can be a matter of days, weeks or months. It is all down to the pace of the recruitment process. Moving quickly means you will secure top talent, and even have first pickings of that top tier.
Are you still interested?
Keeping candidates interested is crucial when hiring. If they lose interest in the process, they will lose interest in the role, simple. If you take a long time to recruit, it does not present your brand in a good way. The recruitment process sets out an initial impression for the company and gives insight into other processes. Therefore, if recruitment is taking an age, will everything else take just as long?
Commitment is a two-way street.
How can you ask a candidate to commit to the process if you cannot? That isn’t how things work. Moving quickly show’s that you are committed to the hire and want to secure that top tier of talent. This will therefore mean the candidate trusts you and will keep their side of the commitment. Moving quickly reduces interview dropouts and therefore shows the commitment of candidates.
Do you accept the job offer?
Acceptance, the holy grail and the end goal. Application, Interview, Offer, Acceptance, that is how it works isn’t it? Well, it should! However, if the recruitment process is prolonged, candidates apply elsewhere and therefore participate in other processes. This means that upon offer, they may wait to see the outcome of other processes and then make an informed decision. If you move quickly, there will not be time for this to happen. Candidates will not have the opportunity to engage in other processes due to the speed of the hire and therefore the probability of acceptance increases.
So just remember, urgency is absolutely key when hiring in competitive markets!