When it comes to recruiting a new employee, time and quality are two pivotal factors.
According to The Recruitment & Employment Confederation, UK businesses are failing to hire the right person for 40% of roles.
To put this into context, hiring the wrong person for a mid-manager level position with a salary of £42,000 can cost a business more than £132,000! (Shocking, right?)
The same article also revealed that 85% of HR decision-makers have admitted to their business making a bad hire in the past.
So how can you quickly (but accurately) find the right candidate for the role?
1. Choose the right job board
Finding the right job board for your advert is essential for finding the best candidates quickly.
While big sites like Monster may bring in the masses, they might not bring in the quality or relevance that you are looking for.
Niche sites like Simply Sales Jobs or Community Care Jobs are perfect examples to attract candidates with a more specific skill set and level of experience.
What's important is that you measure the results of all of these job sites, so you can learn which ones work best for your company, industry and roles.
You can find out more about this by reading our previous blog: 6 Recruitment Metrics to Help You Measure Post-Hire Success.
Just remember to evaluate the success against the costs, because some of these job boards can cost over £400 for one advert.
2. Create a brilliant job advert
An obvious thing to say, but still extremely important.
Lengthy content and a lack of keywords can really hinder your chances of sourcing the right candidates.
Keep it succinct, on point and focused on the job itself.
After all, nobody wants to read an endless essay about how great your business is!
If you need some more advice on writing a great job advert, read this blog: Write Great Job Adverts and Attract World-Class Employees
3. Optimise your advert for mobile
According to Recruitment International, 62% of jobseekers are using mobile devices for their job search, so it’s important that your job advert looks great on a mobile and tablet device as well.
Although many job boards have responsive websites, it’s still worth investing some time into the formatting of the content.
Bullet points are a great way to keep the job advert succinct and easy to digest on a mobile device, while reams of content could put a top candidate off.
4. Get social
Social media is not only free, but has millions of potential candidates just a click away.
In fact, 93% of recruiters (including us) use it to source candidates.
On LinkedIn, building an audience within your field and using keywords in your job ad can instantly attract candidates and get them liking the post.
Utilising these channels is also a perfect way to headhunt passive candidates – those who aren’t currently looking for a job.
If you are successful in employing them, the chances are you’ll have a relevant and highly-qualified individual who is perfect for your business.
Recruiter pro tip: Ask your current employees to share your job advert across their social media accounts. In exchange, you could offer an incentive if the employee comes from their network of friends or followers. This idea is particularly useful if your employees are very well connected and active on social media.
5. Internal recruiting
Never forget to offer the position internally as well.
By doing this, you’ll save money on hiring costs, reduce the risk as you already trust this employee, make the transition relatively simple, and improve morale as people will think there are more opportunities to progress.
It’s a win, win really!
You might have someone with real potential looking for a different career path.
6. Be more ruthless
Arranging and carrying out interviews takes time.
Firstly, decide how many candidates you are willing to interview.
Once you’ve established this, you can start to look for a dream number of candidates.
It’ll give you focus and enable you to make a decisive decision.
When it comes to looking at CVs, the key is not to get bogged down on the crux of every one.
Instead, write down certain attributes or keywords and look for them in the content.
Or if you have the budget, using artificial intelligence can help you do this very quickly.
7. Be more flexible with interviews
Responsibilities can restrict the time of your potential employees.
So, why not give them a little more freedom with the interview?
Could you meet on a Saturday or later in the evening? Or perhaps you could travel to them or meet them half-way?
Being more flexible with interviews should mean you can employ the right person quicker instead of waiting a week until you can even meet the person face-to-face.
8. Try telephone/Skype interviews
If the position you’re hiring for is highly competitive, a telephone or Skype interview can narrow down your search quickly.
This should also cut out any pointless chit-chat when it comes to face-to-face interviews too.
For more tips, take a look at our recent blog: 7 Essential Questions to Ask Candidates During a Phone Interview.
9. Group interviews
Similarly to a phone or Skype interview, conducting group ones will give you an opportunity to whittle down the pretenders from the contenders.
An assessment-based group interview will enable you to see the candidates complete certain tasks, tests and activities to see who has the type of knowledge and personality your business desires.
You’ll find more ideas like these in our previous blog: The 6 Different Types of Interview.
10. Make the offer quick and be negotiable
Once you’ve found the perfect recruit, don’t stall. The longer you leave it, the more likely the candidate will go off your business and potentially get snapped up by someone else.
According to Spark Hire, a top candidate will wait roughly two weeks before giving up on you. However, I’d recommend doing it in half that time at least.
Even if you can’t produce the contracts quick enough, you should at least consider giving them a verbal offer just to put their mind at ease.
Once you’ve done this, they might feel comfortable enough to hand in their notice at their current job.
You’ll also notice that some managers won’t want the departing employee around for a long period of time, unless they are integral to the day-to-day running of the business.
So it’s worth asking the new employee if they think their current manager would consider reducing their notice period.
If you don’t ask, you’ll never know!
11. Hire a professional
Bringing in a top recruitment agency can take all the effort out of the process.
They’ll advertise, source and manage the process from start to finish.
It’s an easier way of recruiting if you simply don’t have the time, knowledge or resource to do so.
For more on why you should consider a recruitment agency click here.
Key points to remember
While speed is the key to recruitment, you must not compromise the quality of the candidate.
If you’re struggling to find the perfect one, consider hiring a freelancer or offering a temporary contract to another candidate.
This way, you can test the water with them and actively continue to look for the ideal employee.
Just remember, hiring the wrong person quickly will make it more time-consuming and costly in the long run.
Looking ahead, you should consider creating a pipeline of potential candidates over the next 12 months using social media, networking events and digital communications.
This way, when you do need a role filling quickly, you might only be a phone call away from finding the right man or woman for the job.
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