Hiring is expensive even when you get it right the first time…
The cost of hiring is high, and it’s critical to hire the very best talent for the business. Hiring the right people at the right time is one of the most important HR activities for the success of the business.
1. Implement an Employee Referral Scheme
Research demonstrates that employees usually refer friends they know will be good hires. However, this does rely on the current engagement of your staff. If you are thinking of introducing a referral scheme, keep it simple, ensure the process is written clearly, and you take some time to consider the best reward for your organisation. Cash is King or duvet days! You may also want to consider a way of recognising the successful referrer via the company newsletter or magazine. This will promote the scheme within the business too.
2. Advertise Internally
It’s no good implementing an Employee Referral Scheme if you don’t let your employees know of every single vacancy. Make sure this is distributed across the different branches and don’t forget the remote staff, home workers and employees on maternity or paternity leave or simply out in the field! Better still, implement a system to record details on your existing talent (skills, knowledge, types of experience and language capability) and manage and transfer your key resources as and when they are most required.
3. Company Website
Use the company website to advertise and attract external applicants. Lots of organisations already use their website and have been doing so for many years – it’s not a new idea. However, it’s still surprising the amount of smaller organisations that don’t use their own website or don’t keep it up to date or properly present opportunities – this is a great opportunity to communicate to an engaged audience!
4. Use Social Media
Consider what channel is most appropriate for your organisation and the industry: LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter. If your company policy allows, your staff can use social media to let their friends know there are open vacancies and direct candidates to your website. LinkedIn in particular is a fantastic database of candidates, and if you know how to use it properly, you can attract and contact candidates for free.
5. Newspaper Adverts
Local newspaper adverts are much cheaper than you think. Despite living and working in the digital age, newspaper adverts still work better in some sectors and industries. It’s worth considering a range of different places to source candidates. This will increase and widen the types of candidate pool and increase diversity within the business.
If you go through an advertising agency you’ll benefit from their purchasing power rather than going direct. They can also write good copy for you. If you decide to hire an advertising agency, do your research and remember to negotiate. Some advertising agencies also offer a CV screening service, and you’ll want to work out the cost savings of outsourcing.
6. Online Job Boards
As above, be aware you could be spending more time screening out than screening in – so weigh up the savings with the amount of time spent reading CVs. In my experience as an in-house recruiter I’ve used Personnel Today, The Lawyer on-line and eFinancial Careers and many more with good results. Just advertising on The Lawyer and making two placements saved the organisation £40k.
7. Use your Speculative Applications
These are candidates that want to work for the organisation. They have been pre-sold! The downside with speculative applications is the timing. However, this is still an underutilised and usually poorly managed candidate pool. If your organisation doesn’t have an automated vacancy and candidate management system, encourage candidates to take responsibility for their job search and regularly visit the website for new vacancies.
8. Jobcentre Plus
All you need is a couple of strong candidates that match your criteria to take to interview, and you only need one successful candidate. It’s free to post, so why not take advantage of this national website and the opportunity to advertise to a wide audience.
9. Partner with Local Businesses
It’s good to work in collaboration in your local community. The Joint Venture approach, particularly among small to medium businesses, has been steadily growing over the past few years and is increasing their competitive edge in the marketplace. Those who are partnering have realised the value they can offer to their existing clients increases dramatically, creates more opportunities and more revenue. Think about sharing the cost of open events or job fairs, etc. It’s good to network with your competition!
10. Contact Local Companies
Contact companies that are making redundancies and ask their HR department if you can help redeploy staff. Give them your JDs and adverts to post internally and distribute – I’ve always received a good response when offering to help. Making roles redundant is not one of the most enjoyable tasks in HR – so most professional HR personnel will welcome opportunities to increase the number of options to redeploy staff – this demonstrates professional integrity and an ethnic approach which will protect the reputation of the organisation.
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