Planning and targeting will save you time and help build a strong team
Now you know the kind of person and skills you’re looking for and you’ve captured that in a job description – how do you find them and attract them to your business?
Before you start to spread the word about the role – think two things: #planning and #targeting
Planning
Like any task in your business, recruitment will take time. Things to plan in advance:
- how will you manage the recruitment process?
- who will draft and place the ad (if you plan to advertise)?
- who’s going to answer questions from potential candidates?
- how do you want people to apply?
If you’re recruiting, especially for any position where you expect to get a lot of responses, you need to allocate someone who can commit the time to handling initial enquiries and reading applications to get down to a shortlist. In a recruitment process we ran recently for a client, they received over 140 applications and over 10 telephone enquiries – that can mean a fair chunk of someone’s time being taken up answering and screening enquiries.
On this basis, for every role you advertise, plan to invest at least a day of your time before you decide who to interview.
Targeting
Whether you’re advertising online, promoting the role through your professional and social networks, or advertising the role in your shop window, make sure you’re specific about what you’re looking for so you only get enquiries from qualified candidates. Less “help wanted”, more “quick thinking person with experience in handling customer enquiries online and on the ‘phone who can work on evenings and weekends wanted”!
Also, think about where your ideal candidate is likely to be looking for a job. Will they be looking on Linkedin, or in the local paper?
One way to deflect applications from people that aren’t serious about working with you is to require applicants to answer a couple of targeted questions as part of the application process.
You can also ask applicants to complete a task related to the job being advertised as part of the process.
This can be a great way to minimise the number of poorly formatted resumes you have to read or where you don’t have the time to wade through numerous applications.
Recruiting a new team member can seem like a big investment of time when you start to consider these initial factors. But the time invested in this stage of the process will pay off down the line.
RAW Human Resources can provide cost-effective support at every stage of the recruitment process – from handling the whole process, to just creating and posting adverts. Get in touch for a free 15 minute call if you want to chat about your options.
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