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Because of the pandemic, the shape of the modern workforce is changing. Thousands of companies have been forced to transition to some manner of work from home, partial or total, and many of them will not come back. Many other businesses already used remote or distributed teams for some or all of their business. What is remote work? What are distributed teams? What are the differences of distributed teams vs. remote teams? I answer all of these questions in this blog post.  While these terms are often used interchangeably, they have different definitions, and it’s useful to understand the distinction when building your team. What is a Distributed Team? A distributed team is generally a hybrid team. Some of your employees work in a central office or a coworking space , while others work from home or other locations. They might be local to you and come into the HQ as necessary, or they might be as far away as another country. Distributed models are increasingly common throughout all manner of businesses today. They may hire remote workers for specific categories of tasks, like data entry, virtual assistance, or tier 1 support. There is a lot of overlap between this kind of distributed team and companies that outsource those same tasks to contractors or service providers. What are the Benefits of a Distributed Team? What makes a distributed team a practical choice for a business? It comes with a variety of benefits. ✅ Some employees treat working from home as a benefit. This can be a selling point for hiring workers who would otherwise want to negotiate a higher salary, have you expense their move, or reimburse them the cost of a commute. According to Sarah White on Monster.com , working from home has numerous benefits, including health benefits for the employee. Remote work is also becoming more and more common in many roles and industries. Even without the influence of the pandemic, remote work was on the rise. Companies are increasingly discovering that many roles no longer need to be directly supervised. Many employees are more motivated, happier, and more productive when given the flexibility to work from home. ✅ A distributed team reduces office needs. A larger team in a traditional workplace means large space requirements. Everyone needs a cubicle or office; everyone needs computer hardware and tools; everyone needs access to restrooms and facilities. Your location needs adequate parking, adequate climate control, and adequate IT infrastructure . With a distributed team, these needs drop considerably. What would formerly require a full floor of an office building might only require a couple of rooms with a suitably distributed team. Many modern businesses with dozens of employees run out of the equivalent of a two-bedroom apartment. ✅ Distributed teams promote the use of cloud applications, reducing IT costs. With the increasing prevalence of cloud services and software, IT costs drop . You’re no longer required to maintain on-premises infrastructure for your team. An MSP can provide hardware support for your company, while cloud services can provide everything from storage to accounting to development environments.  Overall, it’s frequently cheaper to operate a distributed team than an entirely on-premises team. What are the Drawbacks of a Distributed Team? Distributed teams do still have a few drawbacks stemming from their nature as a hybrid solution. 🟥 Many distributed teams still need to maintain a central office. Depending on your company, you may not be able to move to a fully remote structure. Shipping and fulfillment, manufacturing, hands-on testing; these tasks cannot be performed remotely in most situations. If you have to maintain a headquarters, you still have the expenses associated with it. In a way, you end up with the worst of both worlds. 🟥 Distributed workers may feel left out of company culture. Whenever there’s a clear divide between two groups of people in the workplace, care must be taken to ensure both are treated equally. Igloo Software’s State of the Digital Workplace survey from last year reports that 80% of remote workers feel left out of the workplace. Be aware of common issues that occur in hybrid workplaces. Employees who have to commute may be jealous of those who don’t. Workers who work remotely may feel left out of company events they can’t attend. The onus of inconvenience can all-too-often fall entirely on the shoulders of the remote workers, whose schedules get ignored. These issues foster differences and disagreements between parts of the team, which leads to a disgruntled workforce. 🟥 You lose access to regular in-person meetings. There are quite a few benefits to having everyone in the office. Among them is the ability to call an impromptu meeting when an issue comes up. It’s a lot less convenient to call up a dozen Zoom participants or set up a conference call for a similar purpose. There are other perks to in-person work as well. Don’t underestimate the power of small talk in the break room or around the water cooler as a source of social connections within the team. We covered some remote team building exercises to alleviate these issues in another post. What is a Remote Team? The term remote team is often used interchangeably with distributed teams, or as a general term for all styles of partial and completely remote teams. A partially remote team would be partially not remote, so, exactly like a distributed team. A fully remote team, meanwhile, has no centralized headquarters. Everyone, from the owner to the intern, works from home. In our definition, a remote team is a business that operates entirely from home offices. There is no centralized headquarters, just a registration address for business purposes. One example of a successful business operating as a remote team is Buffer. According to CEO Joel Gascoigne, it has worked out well. “I am happy to report that I am in love with the choice we made to be distributed all across the world.” Buffer has operated as a fully remote team since its early days in 2012, with almost 100 people working for the company in nearly every time zone around the world. What are the Benefits of a Remote Team? Fully remote teams have a variety of benefits, as espoused by companies like Buffer. ✅ You do not need a home headquarters and all of the costs associated with it. Rent, heating and cooling, power, dedicated internet, maintenance; all of these costs are eliminated when you don’t have a headquarters. AJ Agrawal, CEO of Alumnify, writes: “No matter where you happen to be in the US, you are going to lose thousands of dollars every month by having an office. For many entrepreneurs and startups, this is unacceptable and risks bringing down the fragile success they have achieved.” ✅ Employees can work from anywhere, giving them the freedom to travel. There’s a sort of life cycle to the successful remote worker. Initially, they feel stifled and stuck at home all the time, and their work-life balance suffers. Eventually, they realize they have the freedom to travel, so long as they can access their tools and get their work done. This opens up a whole new world of possibilities and is where many remote workers genuinely shine. ✅ There’s no divide between office and remote, so there are no social or cultural differences to worry about. As mentioned above, one of the most significant risks of a partially remote workforce is the divide between the office workers and the remote workers. When everyone is remote, everyone is on equal footing. No one feels left out, and it’s easier to share the burden of scheduling and communication when everyone is in the same situation. ✅ Remote teams can hire from anywhere in the world, putting talent and experience above location or mobility. Timely, a Norway-based company, writes: “When you need to hire employees from a set location, you limit your talent pool . In contrast, remote work lets you access the very best talent across the globe – especially when the flexibility remote working brings is becoming expected by employees.” Not only is remote work a selling point, but it also broadens the candidate pool you can use to find new hires. A global reach also helps fill positions for which there is a shortage of local candidates. Many extremely skilled workers in STEM fields are located outside of the US, but that poses no problem when you can simply hire them to work remotely. ✅ Remote teams have people everywhere and are thus very responsive around the clock. Joel Gascoigne cites it as one of his primary benefits in bringing Buffer together as a fully remote team. “A key part of our vision is to set the bar for customer support. We obsessively track the happiness of our customers and our speed to respond to them. We have more than a million users and we reply to 80% of emails within 1 hour. We couldn’t achieve this level of service without being spread across multiple timezones.” While this is most prominent in customer-facing roles, such as support, it’s beneficial for most companies. What are the Drawbacks of a Remote Team? Fully remote teams have a few drawbacks. Some of them shared with distributed teams, and some unique to them. 🟥 Some otherwise excellent employees can’t cut it as remote workers. Make no mistake; working remotely is difficult. The atmosphere of being stuck at home, particularly during a pandemic, is stifling. Time management and self-motivation are vital in remote workers. The research director for 451 Research, Chris Marsh, says this . “An outcome of what’s happened over the past couple of months, and this massive shift towards mass remote working, is just a huge loss of context around work. That context would otherwise have been captured by employees through meetings, through attending events, through water cooler moments.” Fully remote workplaces can simulate some of this by maintaining casual “off-topic” communications channels, like Slack. Buffer, and many other remote companies, also host annual all-hands get-togethers for face to face time, which helps knit the team together. 🟥 Distributed schedules can make communication more challenging and leave some people feeling excluded. A common issue with remote teams is focusing schedules around the majority, which leaves people in distant timezones bearing the burden of getting up early or staying up late for a meeting. Additionally, different groups of employees may have different communication preferences. Some are used to picking up the phone, others rely on email, and yet others take to Slack or another IM program as their first choice. Unifying communications channels, workflows, and processes throughout your whole workforce is a significant hurdle for many businesses making the transition. 🟥 Remote teams are usually dependent on reliable internet access and are at the mercy of their ISP. When you have a central office, you can pay for high-end business internet service with uptime guarantees. With a remote workforce, you can rarely extend that same luxury to your team. Standford reports : “Many Americans also lack the facilities or sufficient internet capacity to work effectively from home. More than half of those surveyed who are now working from home are doing so either in shared rooms or their bedrooms. And only 65 percent of Americans reported having fast enough internet capacity to support workable video calls. The remaining 35 percent have such poor internet at home – or no internet – that it prevents effective telecommuting.” Remote workers are forced to use what they have, and with millions of Americans operating with sub-par internet service, it can become a problem for businesses that need certain team members online at specific times. A Wrench in the Gears Before we wrap up the debate of distributed teams vs. remote teams, there’s one thing that throws a wrench into the works. It’s simple: many companies have contradicting definitions for these terms. Nadia Hlebowitsh at Tecla concurs with our usage, defining distributed teams as hybrids and remote teams as fully remote. Remo disagrees, calling distributed teams fully remote and remote teams a flexible hybrid term. Other people, such as John O’Duinn , add in terms like “teleworker” and “virtual worker” to the mix. The fact is, the definitions we’ve used above are sometimes used interchangeably, but few people use the term “distributed team” these days. Instead, the distinction is more between fully remote and partially remote teams. Conclusion  No matter what terminology you decide to use, the benefits and drawbacks are still the same. It doesn’t matter what you call a fully remote team, so long as everyone involved understands that everyone is remote. Indeed, the only thing that matters is that your company has communications channels, procedures, and tools in place to facilitate whatever organizational structure you settle on. As you navigate the future of work in your organization, remember that the right strategy is less about the label you use and more about how well you adapt to the evolving needs of your team and business. Embrace the change, leverage the benefits, and mitigate the drawbacks to build a resilient, productive, and satisfied workforce. Ready to take the next step in optimizing your team’s structure and productivity? Contact us to learn more about our tailored solutions and services, designed to help you thrive in a world where work knows no boundaries.  Whether you’re just starting on your journey or looking to refine your existing remote or distributed team strategy, we’re here to guide you to success. Get in touch today and transform the way you work!

There are many business apps, processes, and services out there to help businesses of all sizes grow. Unfortunately, there’s a persistent myth that small businesses can’t use or access these benefits. Sure, some of them are priced prohibitively to limit their customer base to high-end enterprises, but that’s a minority. Small businesses can, and should, make use of any possible advantage they can get. Among these advantages is the RPO. A Recruitment Process Outsourcing firm is a company that offers recruitment and hiring services to other businesses. This can range from recruitment referrals to a full, opening-to-hire process. They can provide their own staff, or work with your staff and existing processes to recruit the best candidates for any given role you need to be filled. What are the benefits of using an RPO? Speaking entirely in terms of a small business looking to grow, here are the benefits you may enjoy. Learn About Our Modern Approach To RPO 1. RPOs Scale In fact, an RPO can scale up and down with the whims of the market and the ebb and flow of business. If your business is booming, investors are interested, and revenues are going up, an RPO can scale up to help you fill new roles quickly and smoothly. If your business dips during the off-season, a recession, or a loss of interest, an RPO can dial back without consequence. Compare this to an in-house team, which draws a salary regardless of the status of your business, it is much harder to scale without going through the hiring process for your HR team before hiring the people you need to grow. The RPO has an undeniable advantage. 2. RPOs Have Defined Processes Building your own hiring team means hiring people to handle recruitment, but it also means developing an entire hiring process.  You can adapt guides you find online, make use of the workflows present in whatever applicant tracking system you use, and leverage the expertise of the people you hire, but you still need to build your entire process and refine it. An RPO has already done all of this. They have an established, defined process ready to go. All you need to do is enlist their help and they can either work with you or take over your hiring process entirely, with their own proven and effective techniques. That’s a ton of work done for you right out of the gate. 3. RPOs Reduce Time to Hire The longer your hiring process takes, the more problems you’re going to have with it. Good candidates accept other offers before you even make yours. The building, filtering, and refining of your candidate pool grows more expensive while the most skilled candidates lose interest or are recruited elsewhere. The overall quality of candidates drops, so the people you hire aren’t as talented as they could be, and they may be less satisfied and more prone to leaving. Increased turnover means an increased need for hiring, starting the whole process anew. An RPO helps with all of this in two ways. First, they have their own processes in place for speedy hiring. More importantly, though, they generally have candidate pools for various industries and roles already built. They don’t have to start from scratch when you contract them; they can start feeling out talented candidates immediately. 4. RPOs Have Access to Better Tools While sure, a lot of business apps and tools are available to small businesses, there are some undeniable advantages given to larger businesses. An RPO is likely larger than your small business and can afford to pay for better tools. You could buy the same tools they use, but it could potentially cost you thousands of dollars. After all, the RPO has many different clients paying them, so they can split the cost of their tools amongst all of their clients. Those costs are harder to justify for a small business in the short term. Top-end RPOs may also develop their own in-house tools to better fit their own processes. A custom solution can be more effective than a boxed solution that doesn’t consider specific needs in a given niche or role. 5. RPOs Maintain Compliance Do you have a lawyer on retainer? Many small businesses do not. Yet the world is constantly changing, with new hiring practices, new trends, and more importantly, new laws and regulations that apply to hiring practices . Whether these are diversity initiatives or equal opportunity regulations, an RPO makes it their job to keep on top of these changes. By contracting a capable RPO, you help make sure you’re taking advantage of initiatives and promotions that put otherwise difficult to find candidates at your fingertips, while also insulating yourself against making a mistake due to not knowing a new law or regulation in your area. 6. RPOs Often Specialize Some RPOs will specialize in specific areas with their own regulations or requirements, like healthcare and law. Rather than requiring your own hiring team to become experts on employment law, you offload the burden to an RPO and take advantage of their expertise. Hiring skilled employees requires being able to evaluate those skills, which can be extremely difficult if you don’t have a team capable of accurately testing and judging those skills. An RPO will know what to look for, what warning signs to avoid, what certifications and training are most important, and even which institutions provide a better education. It’s all part of getting the best candidates into the right roles for them and for you. 7. RPOs Reach a Broader Talent Pool Small businesses have a limited amount of resources available to be spent on hiring. Whether it’s the fees associated with job listings, paid advertising to build your brand or the costs of bringing in candidates for interviews, it can all add up. When you lack the resources to fully fund these processes, your talent pool might not be as broad or as far-reaching as would be ideal. An RPO, meanwhile, can focus their efforts on building their candidate pools as much as possible, since it’s the core of their business. They can reach communities and locations you otherwise could not. They can contact candidates who might otherwise never know you existed. They can even leverage resources like referrals much more easily than your business can. All of this results in a larger talent pool, which in turn means a larger number of high-quality candidates for any given role. 8. RPOs Can Improve Diversity Workplace diversity is interesting. When it’s considered normative, it’s hugely beneficial to a company, according to research from Harvard . When your organization or your hiring team views it as a burden or a quota to be filled, however, merely hiring diverse candidates isn’t enough: In numerous studies, research has shown that employees in pro-diversity regions, like the U.S. and Western Europe, prefer diverse work environments. In a survey of 1,000 respondents… 67% of job seekers overall look at workforce diversity when evaluating an offer. An RPO will generally have diversity initiatives and considerations built into their processes. They can provide diverse candidates to fill your open positions without making a big deal out of it, which helps normalize workplace diversity and thus improve business performance across the board. 9. RPOs Handle Brand Advertising A big part of successful recruiting is building an employer brand , which often involves a lot of outreach, a lot of marketing, and a lot of investment. Worse, the return on that investment is often invisible or difficult to quantify, since it’s reflected in the size and quality of your candidate pool more than anything else. Contracting an RPO generally means that RPO is going to be performing all of that outreach for you. More importantly, they’re doing it under your name, not under theirs, so you reap the benefits of the branding and outreach without having to put in the legwork yourself. 10. RPOs Keep Their Candidate Pools Active When a small business has a role to fill, you have to build a pool and find a candidate to fill it. If you don’t have open positions, or you have to go into a hiring freeze, or you otherwise don’t need that pool, it can be difficult or impossible to keep it active. Then, the next time you need to hire, those leads have gone cold. An RPO keeps their candidate pools full of fresh talent, and keep the people who don’t land jobs active and engaged to keep them ready for when a position opens. They build pools for roles and industries and have them available when your open position needs someone in that industry and role. 11. RPOs Are Consistent One of the best benefits of contracting with an RPO is that they’re consistent whenever you need them. With a small business, your hiring needs may be variable and inconsistent. Rather than having to stop and start your own hiring processes as necessary, you can keep the RPO available to hire on an as-needed basis. They don’t have to scale their own efforts up and down, because their array of clients means they always keep active. They’re ready to offer you some interested candidates, virtually as soon as you need them. 12. RPOs Can Take Time to Analyze a Candidate Since an RPO is actively recruiting for roles similar to the ones your business has open, they can spend their time developing and issuing skills assessments, personality analysis, and histories for experience and education for each candidate they engage. This is all stuff that your hiring team would need to do to fill a role properly, but it takes enough time that it often falls by the wayside in the rush to fill an open role as soon as possible. By contracting with the RPO, you streamline this screening process down to a few specifics of your company and role, rather than starting from the ground up. 13. RPOs Are Flexible to Work With A talented RPO has a variety of levels of offering available for businesses with different needs. If you want to offload every aspect of your hiring process, they can oblige, and all you need to do is provide a job opening and requirements list, and accept the candidates that come in. Conversely, if you want to maintain most of your control while offloading the legwork to the RPO, you can do that too. Working with and RPO is a matter of combining your needs with their services, putting together a defined SLA, and getting results. 14. RPOs Provide Analytics and Data Part of making sure your hiring process is as smooth and effective as possible is harvesting data about every step of the process. However, harvesting this data from disparate sources such as career portals and applicant tracking software can be a full-time job just to set up, not to mention analyzing it properly. It’s not enough simply to track the data; you need to know how to interpret it and how to put that information to use. RPOs have two benefits here. First, they have teams dedicated to doing this data analysis, which your small business might not be able to afford if you were putting it together on your own. Second, they have likely analyzed their data – from a much wider data source set than you would have on your own – and used that information to optimize their processes before you even hire them. They’re starting from a more advanced position than you would spend months or years reaching. 15. RPOs Are Generally Cheaper Virtually all of the benefits listed above will impact the cost of hiring. Any time a process fails, a candidate reaches the interview stage and falters, a skills assessment is failed, or a potential hire drops out, it costs you time and money. Worse, time is money when it comes to hiring, so your costs keep ramping up the less effective your hiring process is. RPOs do everything they can to streamline your process, making it faster and more effective while pulling in the best-qualified candidates most likely to be satisfied in a given role. Sure, contracting an RPO means paying an ongoing fee, but that fee is almost always going to be lower than the cost of doing it all yourself .

Hiring and onboarding take time and cost money, but they are crucial steps to building a productive workforce. They are two important processes that impact employee engagement , retention, and your employer brand . A high-quality hiring process enhances your employer brand and improves your recruiting process by attracting candidates to your organization, as well as better enables you to hire the right people when you need them. For a process that’s so important to workforce development and business success, onboarding quality doesn’t always get the care and attention required for a great candidate experience. You may think the work of recruiting and hiring is over when an offer is accepted, but that is just the middle part of a process that begins long before the candidate even comes in to interview. With so many steps in the recruitment process, and often a limit to recruiting resources, it can be easy for hiring managers to just breathe a sigh of relief when a new person is hired. But that’s when it’s most important to pay attention to how the candidate comes into the company and how they experience your hiring process. To really understand your onboarding process from the candidate’s point of view to be able to improve it, you need to conduct onboarding surveys. There are some very good reasons that you should care about how candidates experience onboarding when they are hired. Hiring Doesn’t End with the Offer The hiring process isn’t over when the candidate signs the offer letter. It doesn’t end until the employee is functioning at full capacity in the new position, often weeks or months after the first day at work. Your new hire process should have a way to evaluate onboarding and give new employees a way to give valid feedback about their own onboarding experience and make suggestions for improvements. This highlights problems or gaps in the process that can guide you to changes and improvements that will positively affect retention and engagement. You may find, as revealed in a recent BambooHR survey of employees who quit after six months, that there are parts of your onboarding that frustrate employees. Bamboo’s survey revealed that employees want more training and mentorship in the onboarding process when they start a new job. Gain Insight Into Candidate Expectations Conducting onboarding surveys gives you the opportunity to understand what the candidates’ expected of their hiring and onboarding experience with your company. Given the opportunity, new employees can let you see what makes them feel comfortable or uncomfortable, what makes them feel welcome and involved or the opposite, and where the process may have failed with inappropriate or boring content or activities. This information is important in improvement efforts and has the added benefit of making new employees feel you are listening to and valuing them. Expert Recommendations for Onboarding Improvement Include Surveys Business performance research firm The Aberdeen Group recommends new hire engagement surveys as part of a comprehensive extended onboarding process. Their 2014 data shows that companies focus on compliance and paperwork during onboarding but need to be demonstrating more care and commitment toward new employees. Aberdeen recommends that companies provide hiring managers the resources to engage new employees, integrate training and coaching/mentoring into onboarding, and emphasize the company’s core values and missions for onboarding success that values and retains employees. When new hires feel valued and able to contribute right away, they are more highly engaged and less likely to leave within the first year. How do you want your new employees to feel about the way they were brought onboard? The way to find out is with onboarding surveys.

1. Passive Sourcing and Geo-tracking 2. Candidate Campaigns 3. LinkedIn Recruiter for Direct Outreach 4. Texting for Enhanced Engagement 5. Recruitment Marketing Need Recruiting Help? While LinkedIn remains the go-to platform for many recruiters, it’s important to remember it’s not the only tool available. Facebook, with its vast user base, offers a variety of features that can be beneficial for candidate sourcing.  Moreover, in the evolving recruitment landscape, strategies like passive sourcing, geo-tracking, and recruitment marketing have emerged as game-changers. Here’s a deeper dive into the best Modern Recruiting Techniques:  1. Passive Sourcing and Geo-tracking Modern recruitment is no longer just about candidates who apply for jobs. Passive candidates , those who aren’t actively job-hunting but could be interested in the right opportunity, make up a significant portion of the talent pool. Advanced tools enable recruiters to pinpoint these candidates based on their online footprints, from articles they publish to forums they participate in.  Additionally, geo-tracking enhances this by allowing recruiters to focus on candidates in specific geographical areas. The combination of passive sourcing and geo-tracking means you can find the right candidate in the right location, even if they’re not actively looking. 2. Candidate Campaigns Once you’ve identified potential passive candidates , the next step is engagement. Candidate campaigns are tailor-made sequences designed to stir interest and present opportunities in a compelling way.  With tools supporting multi-channel outreach, from personalized emails to LinkedIn messages, it’s now easier than ever to maintain continuous and engaging touchpoints. Especially with the prominence of mobile devices, text messages can offer immediate and direct communication, ensuring your opportunity is noticed. 3. LinkedIn Recruiter for Direct Outreach LinkedIn Recruiter has revolutionized the way recruiters connect with potential candidates. While LinkedIn has a myriad of users, what sets its Recruiter tool apart is the ability to directly reach out to any user.  This bypasses the traditional connection request route, offering a more direct line to potential candidates. It’s particularly effective when engaging with individuals who’ve indicated they’re “open to work,” as they’re likely more receptive to new opportunities. 4. Texting for Enhanced Engagement In an era of instant communication, texting provides an immediacy that few other channels offer. But it’s not just for casual chats.  Texting is becoming a pivotal recruitment tool, facilitating quick check-ins, interview reminders, or even initial outreach. Its directness ensures that messages don’t get lost in crowded email inboxes, and its informality can help foster a more genuine connection with candidates. 5. Recruitment Marketing Recruitment has blurred lines with marketing, and for a good reason. It’s not merely about listing job requirements anymore; it’s about selling the company’s vision, culture, and values.  Central to this is the Employer Value Proposition (EVP). An effective EVP clearly articulates what a company offers its employees and why it’s unique from competitors. More than just salary or benefits, today’s discerning candidates want to know how their potential employer contributes positively to society and where they fit in that narrative. Need Recruiting Help?  Broadening your recruitment tools and strategies beyond LinkedIn can greatly enhance your reach and success rate. With the plethora of methods available, it’s about integrating the best of these to suit your company’s needs. By combining traditional platforms like Facebook with innovative recruiting techniques, you’re setting yourself up for a rich and diverse pool of potential candidates. Looking to boost your recruiting efforts with innovative strategies? Don’t navigate the complex landscape alone. Reach out to our expert team today and let’s discover the best talent together. #candidatesourcingstrategies #Facebook #SocialMediaRecruiting

Are you looking to hire top talent for your company? If so, you’re likely aware that the traditional recruitment process is often slow and costly. That’s why it pays to explore the potential of social media job advertising. With the changing of the guard and an influx of digital natives entering the job market, harnessing social media is essential for employers to find quality talent quickly. Sprout Social outlines this perfectly – leveraging social platforms to reach a larger, more diverse pool allows businesses jump to start their recruitment efforts while ensuring they get critical openings in front of ideal candidates. In this blog post, we’ll cover the basics of social media job advertising, and provide you with tips and strategies to help you maximize your recruiting ROI . Social media job advertising is the process of leveraging social media platforms to promote job openings and attract potential candidates. This type of advertising is especially popular among employers, as it’s a cost-effective way to reach potential candidates and gain exposure for your job postings. Social media job advertising also offers employers a unique opportunity to target potential candidates based on their interests, industry, and location. This makes it easier to find the right candidates for the job and ensures that your job postings are seen by the people who are most likely to apply. Benefits of Social Media Job Advertising Social media job advertising has the potential to offer several benefits to employers. For example, it can help to: Reach a larger, more diverse pool of potential candidates Save time and money on recruitment costs Help employers find the right candidates quickly and efficiently Increase brand awareness and recognition Boost engagement with potential candidates Help employers establish themselves as employers of choice Types of Recruitment Ads When it comes to social media job advertising , there are a variety of types of recruitment ads you can use to get the word out about your job openings. For example, you can create: Paid job postings are ads that are paid for with a budget. These ads are displayed in people’s newsfeeds and can be targeted to a specific audience. Organic job postings are postings that are unpaid and not targeted to a specific audience. These postings are visible to everyone who follows your company’s page. Sponsored job postings are ads that are sponsored by a third-party advertiser. These ads are typically more expensive, but they often reach a larger audience. How to Create Effective Recruitment Ads Creating effective recruitment ads is key to ensuring that your job postings reach the right people and generate the best results. Here are some tips to help you create effective recruitment ads: Include a compelling headline: Your headline should be clear and concise and include keywords that will help potential candidates find your job postings. Use engaging visuals: Visuals such as images and videos can help to make your ads more engaging and memorable. Keep your copy short and to the point: Make sure your copy is easy to read and understand. Try to keep it brief and to the point. Include a call to action: A call to action (CTA) will help to encourage potential candidates to take action. For example, you might include a CTA such as “Apply Now” or “Learn More”. Use the right language: Make sure to use language that resonates with your target audience. This will help to ensure that your recruitment ads are seen by the right people. Strategies for Optimizing Your Recruitment Ads Once you’ve created your recruitment ads, it’s important to optimize them to ensure they’re reaching the right people. Here are some strategies you can use to optimize your recruitment ads: Monitor your performance: Keep an eye on your recruitment ads’ performance to determine which ones are working and which ones need to be adjusted. Test different ad formats: Try testing different ad formats such as images, videos, and carousels to see which ones are generating the best results. Target the right people: Make sure to target your ads to the right people based on their interests, industry, and location. Track your results: Track your results to determine which ads are performing the best and adjust your strategy accordingly. Tips for Choosing the Right Social Media Platform When it comes to social media job advertising, it’s important to choose the right social media platform. Here are some tips to help you choose the right platform: Consider your target audience: Consider who your target audience is and choose a platform that is popular among that group. Research the platform: Make sure to research the platform to find out what type of content performs best on it. Test different platforms: Try testing different platforms to see which ones are generating the best results. Monitor your performance: Monitor your performance to determine which platforms are working and which ones need to be adjusted. How to Measure Your Recruiting ROI Measuring your recruiting ROI is key to ensuring that your recruitment efforts are yielding the desired results. Here are some tips to help you measure your recruiting ROI: Track your results: Track your results to determine which recruitment efforts are performing the best. Monitor your performance: Monitor your performance to measure the effectiveness of your recruitment efforts. Analyze your data: Analyze your data to determine which recruitment efforts are generating the best results. Set goals: Set concrete goals to measure the success of your recruitment efforts. Best Practices for Recruitment Ads When it comes to social media job advertising, it’s important to follow best practices to ensure that your recruitment ads are effective. Here are some best practices to keep in mind: Keep your ads relevant: Make sure to keep your ads relevant to the job openings you’re advertising. Use the right language: Use language that resonates with your target audience to ensure that your ads are seen by the right people. Include a call to action: A call to action will help to encourage potential candidates to take action. Track your performance: Track your performance to determine which recruitment efforts are working and which ones need to be adjusted. Common Mistakes to Avoid When it comes to social media job advertising, there are a few common mistakes to avoid to ensure that your recruitment ads are effective. Here are some common mistakes to avoid: Misusing keywords: Misusing keywords in your recruitment ads can lead to your job postings being seen by the wrong people. Not tracking your performance: Not tracking your performance can lead to your recruitment efforts not yielding the desired results. Not optimizing your ads: Not optimizing your ads can lead to your recruitment ads not reaching the right people. Not targeting the right people: Not targeting the right people can lead to your job postings not being seen by the right people. Conclusion Social media job advertising is a powerful tool for companies looking to attract and hire quality talent quickly and efficiently. It’s an effective way to reach a larger and more diverse pool of potential candidates and get your job openings in front of the right people. Unlock the potential of social media job advertising today and start recruitment that yields maximum returns. With our expert assistance, you can discover powerful tips to ensure your ads are seen by an audience ideal for success in hiring top talent. Let us show you how it’s done; contact us now !

Now is the perfect opportunity for businesses to take a closer look at their talent acquisition strategies. By adopting a strong talent acquisition strategy, your business can ensure a fresh supply of skilled and motivated talent to fuel your growth. So, let’s take a closer look at how you can spring into action and develop a winning talent acquisition strategy! Assess Your Current Talent Acquisition Strategy Before you can improve your talent acquisition strategy, it’s important to assess your current approach. Take a close look at what’s working and what isn’t and identify areas of improvement. Perhaps you need to better define your hiring needs, or maybe you need to leverage multiple recruitment channels to reach a wider pool of candidates. Use data and analytics to measure the effectiveness of your current strategy and identify areas for improvement. Defining Your Hiring Needs This is a great time to define your hiring needs and determine what roles you need to fill. Start by analyzing your current workforce and identifying any skills or experience gaps. Determine what skills and experience are necessary to excel in the roles you need to fill. This will help you create job descriptions that attract the right candidates. Once you have defined your hiring needs, you can focus your recruitment efforts on the most important areas. Be specific about the job requirements and make sure they align with your company’s goals and values. This will help you attract candidates who are a good fit for your organization. Develop a Strong Employer Brand A strong employer brand is a vital part of any successful talent acquisition strategy. The world is full of new growth and potential, so take this opportunity to develop a fresh and exciting employer brand. Highlight your company culture, values, and mission, and make sure your brand is appealing to the type of talent you want to attract. Use social media, your company website, and other marketing channels to promote your employer brand. To develop a strong employer brand, you need to understand what sets your company apart from the competition. What do your employees love about working for your organization? What values and principles guide your business? Use this information to craft a compelling message that resonates with your target audience. You can also use employee testimonials and case studies to showcase your company culture and values. Leverage Multiple Recruitment Channels Your talent acquisition strategy should reach far and wide. Don’t limit yourself to one recruitment channel; instead, use multiple channels to find the best candidates. This could include job boards, social media, employee referrals, and even events like career fairs. To leverage multiple recruitment channels effectively, you need to understand your target audience. What social media platforms do they use? What job boards do they frequent? Use this information to craft a targeted recruitment campaign that reaches the right candidates. You can also use employee referrals to tap into your current employees’ networks and find great candidates. Optimize the Candidate Experience Just like the sense of renewal you get from sleeping, the candidate experience is all about fresh starts and new beginnings . Take the time to create a smooth and positive experience for candidates, from application to interview to onboarding. By optimizing the candidate’s experience, you can attract the best candidates and ensure a positive start to their employment with your company. To optimize the candidate’s experience, you need to think about the entire recruitment process. Make sure your job descriptions are clear and accurate. Use an applicant tracking system to manage resumes and applications efficiently. Respond promptly to candidate inquiries and keep them informed throughout the process. And finally, provide a positive onboarding experience to help new employees get off to a great start with your company. Utilize Data and Analytics Data and analytics are essential tools for any talent acquisition strategy. Use them to measure the effectiveness of your recruitment efforts and identify areas for improvement. By using data and analytics, you can gain valuable insights into your talent acquisition strategy and make informed decisions. Start by collecting data on your current talent acquisition strategy. Measure the effectiveness of your recruitment channels and identify which ones are working best. Analyze your job descriptions and identify which ones are attracting the most qualified candidates . Look at your time-to-hire metrics and identify any bottlenecks in the process. You can also use analytics to monitor the quality of your hires. Track employee performance metrics and identify which hires are performing well and which ones are struggling. This information can help you refine your hiring criteria and improve your recruitment process. Conclusion By adopting a strong talent acquisition strategy now, your business can attract the best and brightest talent to help you achieve your goals. So, take some time to assess your current approach, define your hiring needs, develop a strong employer brand, leverage multiple recruitment channels, optimize the candidate experience, and utilize data and analytics. By following these steps, you can take action and find the perfect candidates for your business. Good luck, and happy hiring! In conclusion, now is the perfect time to reassess your talent acquisition strategy and make improvements. By using a combination of data, analytics, and creative marketing strategies, you can attract the right candidates and fill important roles within your organization. Don’t be afraid to try new things, experiment with different recruitment channels, and create a positive candidate experience that helps you stand out from the competition. With the right approach, you can ensure a fresh supply of talented and motivated employees who will help your business grow and thrive. Talent acquisition is no easy task. Fortunately for you, we are here to help! Simply reach out and we will gladly give you a hand.

Recruiting is a complex and time-consuming process. It requires a deep understanding of the job market, the ability to identify the right candidates, and the ability to attract and retain the best talent. With the ever-evolving job market, it’s essential for businesses to stay ahead of the curve and stay competitive. This is where data comes in. By leveraging data and utilizing data-driven solutions in the recruitment process, businesses can reap the rewards of a successful hiring strategy. The Benefits of Using Data When Recruiting Data-driven recruitment strategies allow businesses to gain insight into the job market, identify the right candidates, and improve their hiring process. Companies that use data-driven recruitment strategies are more likely to find the best-suited candidates for the job and improve their retention rates. The recruitment process can be broken down into a few key components: collecting data, examining trends and spotting patterns, informing retention strategies, measuring success, utilizing automation, leveraging AI, and implementing data-driven solutions. By leveraging data in each step of the recruitment process, businesses can ensure that they are getting the most out of their recruitment efforts. Collecting Data During the Hiring Process Using data during the recruitment process allows businesses to collect valuable information about candidates that can help inform their hiring decision. This data can include things like education, work experience, skills, and other qualifications. By collecting this data, businesses can gain insight into the job market and develop a better understanding of the types of candidates they should be targeting. Moreover, collecting data during the recruitment process can help businesses identify potential areas for improvement. For example, if a business finds that a large portion of their candidates don’t meet the job requirements, they can use this data to adjust their recruitment strategy and target candidates who are more likely to succeed in the role. Examining Trends & Spotting Patterns By collecting data during the recruitment process, businesses can gain insight into trends in the job market and spot patterns that can help inform their hiring decisions. For example, if a business finds that the majority of their candidates have a certain degree or qualification, they can use this data to inform their recruitment strategy and target candidates with similar qualifications. Examining trends and spotting patterns can also help businesses identify areas for improvement in their recruitment process. For example, if a business finds that their candidates are not responding to their recruitment emails, they can use this data to adjust their recruitment strategy and target candidates who are more likely to respond. Informing Retention Strategies Data can also be used to inform retention strategies. By collecting data on the types of candidates that are most likely to stay in the role, businesses can target candidates who are more likely to stay. This can help businesses reduce turnover rates and improve their retention rates. In addition, businesses can use data to identify areas for improvement in their retention strategies. For example, if a business finds that their current retention strategies are not effective, they can use this data to make adjustments and develop more effective retention strategies. Measuring the Success of Your Recruitment Efforts Data can be used to measure the success of a business’s recruitment efforts. By collecting data on the number of applicants, the number of hires, the success rate of hires, and the retention rates of hires, businesses can gain insight into their recruitment process and identify areas for improvement. In addition, data can be used to measure the success of a business’s recruitment marketing efforts. Utilizing Automation to Collect & Analyze Data Utilizing automation in the recruitment process can help businesses collect and analyze data more efficiently. Automation can be used to collect data on the number of applicants, the success rate of applicants, and the cost per hire. Automation can also be used to analyze data and identify patterns and trends in the job market. Using automation can help businesses save time and resources. By automating data collection and analysis, businesses can focus their time and resources on other aspects of the recruitment process. The Impact of AI on Recruitment AI is revolutionizing the recruitment process. AI-driven tools can be used to automate the recruitment process and make it more efficient. AI-driven tools can scan resumes and identify the best-suited candidates for the job, eliminating the need for manual screening and making the recruitment process more efficient. AI-driven tools can also be used to identify patterns and trends in the job market, providing businesses with valuable insights into the job market. Leveraging Data to Improve Your Hiring Process By leveraging data in the recruitment process, businesses can gain valuable insights into the job market, identify the right candidates for the job, and improve their hiring process. Data can be used to target the right candidates for the job . By collecting data on the types of candidates that are most likely to succeed in the role, businesses can target candidates who are more likely to stay in the role. This can help businesses reduce turnover rates and improve their retention rates. Data can also be used to measure the success of a business’s recruitment efforts. By collecting data on the number of applications, the success rate of applications, and the cost per hire, businesses can gain insight into the effectiveness of their recruitment marketing strategies and make adjustments as needed. Implementing Data-Driven Solutions for Recruiting Data-driven solutions can help businesses streamline the recruitment process and make it more efficient. Automation can be used to collect and analyze data, identify patterns and trends in the job market, and identify areas for improvement in the recruitment process. AI-driven tools can be used to automate the recruitment process and make it more efficient. By leveraging data-driven solutions in the recruitment process, businesses can reduce costs, save time, and improve their hiring process. Data-driven solutions can help businesses identify the best-suited candidates for the job, reduce turnover rates, and improve their retention rates. Conclusion Leveraging data in the recruitment process can have a profound impact on a business’s success. By leveraging data, businesses can gain insight into the job market, identify the right candidates, and improve their recruitment process. Data-driven solutions can help businesses automate the recruitment process and make it more efficient. By implementing data-driven solutions in their recruitment process, businesses can reap the rewards of a successful hiring strategy. Data-driven solutions can help businesses identify the best-suited candidates for the job, reduce turnover rates, and improve their retention rates. Start leveraging data today and reap the rewards of a successful recruitment strategy! Ready to start leveraging data in your recruitment process? Click here to learn more about how data-driven solutions can help you achieve success.

Recruitment is a competitive game, and you need to be ahead of the pack to win the war for talent. In today’s modern, technology-driven job market, the best and brightest talent can be hard to come by. To stay ahead of the competition, you need to have a robust recruitment strategy in place. In this blog, we’ll cover the most effective recruitment strategies to help you win the war for talent. We’ll cover everything from analyzing your talent needs to onboarding strategies and tips. So, let’s get started! Introduction to Recruitment Strategies The recruitment process is a critical part of any organization’s success. Businesses need to have a well-defined recruitment strategy to ensure they’re able to attract, hire, and retain the best talent . Without a sound strategy in place, you’ll struggle to find the right people for the job. Creating a recruitment strategy is not a one-size-fits-all approach. It requires a deep understanding of your organizational objectives, industry trends, and the current job market. Additionally, you must understand the needs and preferences of the talent you’re trying to attract. A well-thought-out recruitment strategy should include an analysis of your current talent needs, connecting with potential candidates, crafting the perfect job ad, utilizing technology to streamline the recruitment process, networking and building a pipeline of talent, leveraging social media for talent acquisition, making the right offer, onboarding strategies and tips, and finally, retention strategies for employee success. Analyzing Your Talent Needs The first step in developing a successful recruitment strategy is to analyze your current talent needs. Understanding your current and future talent needs will help you create a targeted recruitment plan. Start by assessing your current team. Identify the skills and experience that are essential for each role and the areas where you need to strengthen your team. This will give you an idea of the type of talent you’re looking for and help you create a more targeted recruitment plan. Additionally, it’s important to consider the skills and experience that you’ll need in the future. For instance, if you’re planning to expand into a new market or launch a new product, you may need to hire people with the appropriate skills and experience. By understanding your future talent needs, you can start building a pipeline of potential candidates. Connecting with Candidates Once you’ve identified your talent needs, it’s time to start connecting with potential candidates. There are a variety of ways to reach out to candidates including job postings, recruiting events, and networking. According to an article from The HR Report “, Social media networks can play a key role in your strategy to build a talent community”. Job postings are one of the most common ways to connect with potential candidates. You can post your job openings on job boards and social media platforms to reach a wider audience. Additionally, you can use recruiting events to meet potential candidates in person. This is an effective way to build relationships and showcase your company culture. Networking is also an effective way to connect with potential candidates. Attend industry events, reach out to people in your network, and join professional associations to meet potential candidates . These relationships can be a great source of talent and help you build a pipeline of potential candidates. Crafting the Perfect Job Ad Once you’ve identified potential candidates, it’s time to create a job ad that will grab their attention. A well-crafted job ad can make a huge difference when it comes to attracting the right candidates . Start by creating a clear job description that outlines the role and responsibilities. Include the qualifications and skills required for the role. Additionally, you should include details about your company and the benefits you offer. This will help potential candidates get a better understanding of the role and your company. It’s also important to use keywords that are relevant to the job and industry. This will help your job ad stand out and make it easier for potential candidates to find your ad. Additionally, use language that will appeal to potential candidates. Utilizing Technology to Streamline the Recruitment Process Technology has revolutionized the recruitment process, making it easier and faster for employers to find the right candidates. There are a variety of recruitment technologies available to help streamline the recruitment process. Applicant tracking systems (ATS) are one of the most popular recruitment technologies . An ATS helps employers manage and track job applications, streamline the screening and interviewing process, and reduce recruitment costs. Additionally, there are a variety of tools and platforms that can help you source, track, and manage candidates. Utilizing technology to streamline the recruitment process can help you save time and find better candidates faster. Additionally, it can help create a more efficient and organized recruitment process. Networking: Building a Pipeline of Talent Networking is one of the most effective ways to build a pipeline of talent. Attend industry events and reach out to people in your network to meet potential candidates. Additionally, join professional associations to connect with potential candidates and build relationships. It’s also important to stay in touch with potential candidates. This will help you build relationships and create a pipeline of talent. Additionally, you can use social media to stay connected with potential candidates. Follow potential candidates on LinkedIn and Twitter and reach out to them to start a conversation. Leveraging Social Media for Talent Acquisition Social media has become an essential tool for talent acquisition. It’s a great way to connect with potential candidates and showcase your company culture. Start by creating a strong presence on social media. Invest in creating engaging content that will attract potential candidates. Additionally, use social media to promote your job postings and engage with potential candidates. Reach out to potential candidates on LinkedIn, Twitter, and other platforms to start a conversation. Additionally, you can use social media for employer branding. This is a great way to showcase your company culture and attract the best talent. Create content that highlights your company’s values and mission to attract potential candidates. Making the Right Offer Once you’ve identified the right candidate, it’s time to make an offer. This is a critical step in the recruitment process, and it’s important to make the right offer. Start by doing your research. Identify the industry standard salary range for the role and make sure your offer is competitive. Additionally, consider offering benefits or other incentives to attract the right candidate. It’s also important to communicate the offer. Make sure to explain the details of the offer and the next steps in the recruitment process. Additionally, make sure to emphasize the benefits of working for your company. This will help make the offer more attractive to potential candidates. Onboarding Strategies and Tips Onboarding is an essential part of the recruitment process. It’s important to have an effective onboarding process in place to ensure that new hires are set up for success. Start by creating an onboarding plan that outlines the steps that need to be taken. This should include tasks such as setting up accounts, orienting new hires to the company, and introducing them to their team. Additionally, create an onboarding schedule to ensure that the onboarding process is completed promptly. It’s also important to make new hires feel welcome. Create an onboarding experience that will make new hires feel comfortable and excited to join your team. Additionally, make sure to provide them with the resources and support they need to be successful. Retention Strategies for Employee Success Retention is just as important as recruitment. It’s important to have strategies in place to ensure that employees are engaged and motivated. Start by creating a culture of recognition and appreciation. Make sure to recognize and reward employees for their hard work and achievements. Additionally, create an environment where employees can grow and develop their skills. Provide training and development opportunities and encourage employees to take on new challenges. It’s also important to create a positive work environment and foster collaboration. Encourage employees to work together and provide them with the tools and resources they need to be successful. Additionally, make sure to listen to employees and address their concerns. Conclusion Recruitment is a competitive game, and having a well-thought-out recruitment strategy is essential for success. To win the war for talent, you need to have a sound strategy in place, and that doesn’t mean poaching employees from competitors . This includes analyzing your talent needs, connecting with potential candidates, crafting the perfect job ad, utilizing technology to streamline the recruitment process, networking and building a pipeline of talent, leveraging social media for talent acquisition, making the right offer, onboarding strategies and tips, and finally, retention strategies for employee success. By following these recruitment strategies, you’ll be able to stay one step ahead of the competition and win the war for talent. Want to learn more about recruitment and stay ahead of the competition? Contact us today to schedule a consultation. Finding the perfect talent for your team is a battle, but one that can be won! Follow our smart strategies to build an unbeatable recruitment approach and put yourself ahead of the pack. Don’t hesitate – contact us today to get a jump-start on creating that top-tier team you’ve been dreaming about!

Most engineers in the U.S. work in the manufacturing industry , particularly in the production of electronic products, machinery, and transportation equipment. However, since engineers help to solve problems through the application of scientific, technological, and mathematical principles, they are highly sought-after across industries. Hiring top-tier, experienced engineers can be challenging because there is more demand than supply in the field. At the same time, engineering positions are often so specialized and technical that it’s essential to find someone highly suited for the role. If you’re trying to recruit engineers, you might be frustrated that there are more job postings for these professionals than individuals to fill them. This means you have to go out of your way to attract the best candidates and convince them that the open position at your organization is the best of all possible options. Let’s talk a bit about the types of engineering and the challenges that companies often face when recruiting engineers before discussing some tips and tricks to help you out during the hiring process . The Different Types of Engineers Engineering can, in broad terms, be separated into four primary groups. While there are countless other interdisciplinary subjects and sub-disciplines that are a part of the engineering field, getting a basic sense of the main categories of engineers can help you zero in on the type of specialist you are searching for. Electrical Electrical engineers can work in various industries, including manufacturing, research, telecommunications, and more. Specializing in the design, testing, and manufacturing of various electrical components, these engineers work in one of the broadest fields in the industry. Some examples of electrical components an electrical engineer might work with include communication systems, motors, power generation systems, and navigation systems. The median salary in 2020 for an electrical engineer was $103,390. The position typically requires at least a Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering. Mechanical Mechanical engineers develop, design, and build mechanical devices such as tools, machines, and engines. Combining mathematics and engineering physics with materials science allows these engineers to design, manufacture, and maintain mechanical systems. The median salary in 2020 for a mechanical engineer was $90,160. The position usually requires the candidate has a Bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering. Chemical The field of study surrounding the design and operation of chemical plants is known as chemical engineering. Through chemical engineering, raw materials are transformed into useful products using efficient commercial processes. It’s common for chemical engineers to work in laboratories or offices to design and troubleshoot production processes for the manufacturing of fuels, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, foods, and more. Chemical engineers had a median salary of $108,540 in 2020. A Bachelor’s degree is generally required for the position. Civil Civil engineers primarily focus on the design, construction, and maintenance of the built environment, including bridges, roads, dams, canals, pipelines, railways, the structural components of buildings, and more. These engineers deal with all things infrastructure and can work in both the private and public sectors. They commonly spend time both in the office and on project sites. The median salary for civil engineers in 2020 was $88,570. The position typically requires a Bachelor’s degree. Engineer Recruitment: Common Challenges If you’ve already begun the process of recruiting engineers to work with your organization, you may have run into some difficulty along the way. Numerous online employment sites have ranked engineering as one of the most challenging jobs to fill. This means that you might have to go above and beyond your regular recruiting practices to attract the right candidate for the job. High Demand, Low Supply One of the most obvious reasons that it is challenging to hire high-quality engineers is that the demand is outpacing the supply . Many of the best engineers are nearing retirement, while not enough engineers graduate from colleges and universities to fill the gap. While there can be benefits to bringing on new graduates, you’ll likely notice that there is a learning curve that equates to a less efficient process overall. Extended Hiring Process The average time it takes to fill an engineering position is fifty-eight days, which is fifteen days longer than the average length of time for all job positions. This is more evidence that recruiters have to work harder to find the right candidate for the position. These jobs can also take longer to fill because there can be so many technical aspects associated with them. This can mean that the hiring process is longer than usual, as more screenings and interviews are required for an organization to feel comfortable committing to a candidate. This can also cause issues, though, because it means that your ideal candidate has more time to negotiate with other organizations while they are interviewing with you. That means you could get three-quarters of the way through the process with the ideal candidate, only to find that they decided to go with another position. Tips For Recruiting Engineers Anyone who has been looking to hire engineers in the current market likely knows just how challenging it can be. Let’s look at some tips to help your recruiting process be more effective and efficient. Creating Your Job Posting It’s essential to clearly communicate the expectations and responsibilities of a position when you’re writing the job posting. The highest quality candidates will only take the time to apply for positions that they believe they are well-suited for, so it’s important for the posting to communicate all the essential functions that they will be required to perform in the role. You’ll also want to include details about whether the position is permanent, full-time or part-time, and what candidates can expect from the company culture. Assess Both Technical Skills and Soft Skills When searching for an engineer, it’s easy to focus only on technical skills. Soft skills are also essential in the workplace, though, along with personal passion. Finding an engineer who is genuinely passionate about their work can make a massive difference in the outcome you receive. An engineer with the necessary soft skills can ensure they fit well as a long-term candidate within your company culture. Every time you create a new job posting, you have the opportunity to collect and analyze data to inform your recruiting team and allow the next round of hiring to be even more seamless. Check out this recent post to learn more about recruitment analytics and how you can use data to improve your quality of hire. Encourage Referrals From Employees Whether you have full-time engineers on staff or you’ve been working with contract engineers, consider creating a referral program to help find the best candidates. There’s a good chance that your existing employees have an expansive network within the engineering field. People that you are already working with will typically have a good idea of what your company is looking for in an engineer and which types of candidates would be best suited for open roles. You can offer incentives to help encourage employee referrals, monetary or otherwise. Consider Using Digital Channels While employee referrals and well-written job postings can go a long way to help you find the right engineer for your organization, there are additional, non-traditional channels you also might consider using. For example, you might find high-quality prospective candidates on engineering Slack channels or other online forums. You can also find digital networking channels supported by tech conferences, which could provide additional opportunities to connect with engineering talent. Create an Internship Program Depending on your engineering needs, you might find that creating an internship program creates a steady stream of future employees. If you can build a successful and attractive internship program, you can reduce the use of company resources in recruiting. Internship programs often attract younger candidates that have recently graduated from college. By starting these individuals in a suitable, beginner-level position, you have the opportunity to cultivate a long and vibrant relationship with a new generation of talent. If you’re considering starting an internship program, consider reaching out to local universities with top-tier engineering programs. It isn’t uncommon for universities to require students to participate in an internship program before graduating, and it’s possible you could partner with local colleges in a way that benefits all parties involved. The structure of your recruiting process can significantly impact how quickly and effectively you can fill open positions at your organization. If your recruiting team has primarily been focusing on passive candidates when a role opens up, you might find that pivoting to an active recruiting strategy could save your company resources in the long term. You can learn more about the difference between proactive and reactive recruiting in this recent post. Advertise Your Culture Since there is more demand for engineers than supply, it’s essential to understand that engineers have their pick of the litter when it comes to jobs. On top of the salary and benefits that come along with a position, engineers will often look at additional factors such as the company culture . To attract top-tier engineers to your organization, advertise the positive aspects of your culture. Include a few bullet points about the culture in your job posting to help prospective candidates see what makes your company stand out from the crowd. Screen Your Candidates Because engineers are in high demand, it can be tempting to take the first marginally qualified person that comes along. However, it’s essential to screen your candidates thoroughly to ensure they will be a good fit for the position for the duration of the job. Otherwise, you could find yourself back at square one in just a few months’ time. Either through email or during an in-person interview , consider asking some screening questions that allow you to filter the candidate pool further. Some questions you might ask during this stage of the process include: How much experience do you have in this field? What are your salary expectations? What are your long-term goals in this field? Including an assessment can help you gauge the practical knowledge and skills of potential candidates. Of course, you’ll also want to perform the necessary background checks to look into the employment history, criminal record, and qualifications of any candidate you are considering hiring. You also might need to verify the licenses or certifications of candidates, depending on the state your business operates in and the industry. Have you been considering shifting to a blind recruitment process at your company? Learn more about how anonymous hiring works in this article. Have a Long-Term Strategy Chances are, this isn’t the last time you’ll be working to recruit an engineer for your organization. For this reason, it’s a good idea to devise a long-term strategy that you can turn to repeatedly as you build your team of engineers. Whether you periodically need to hire a contract engineer or your organization has dozens of engineers on staff, creating a system that helps you recruit and hire the best talent in the field will ensure the process is as efficient and effective as possible. Do you have a position that needs to be filled in a hurry? Be sure to take a look at our complete guide to effectively recruiting during a time crunch . Consider Hiring a Recruiter Finding the right engineer can be a struggle, but it doesn’t have to be when you enlist some help. Recruiters specialize in finding the perfect candidate for open positions and can do so more quickly and with greater ease. This can be particularly useful in a competitive market, as they have highly developed knowledge that they can apply to the recruitment and screening phases of the process. If you need a rock star Emerge Talent Cloud to help grow your workforce, you’ve come to the right place. To learn more about what makes Emerge Talent Cloud different than other agencies, sign up for a free consultation today . Conclusion In the quest to recruit top engineering talent across various specialties—electrical, mechanical, chemical, and more—the challenges faced by organizations are manifold. The highly specialized, technical nature of engineering roles, coupled with a market where demand outstrips supply, necessitates a strategic, multifaceted approach to attract and retain the best in the field.  Crafting clear, detailed job postings, emphasizing both technical and soft skills, and showcasing your company culture are pivotal first steps in drawing in high-caliber candidates. Leveraging digital channels, encouraging employee referrals, and instituting robust internship programs can broaden your talent pool. Additionally, adopting a long-term, proactive recruitment strategy, including the potential engagement of specialized recruiters, can streamline the process, ensuring a consistent influx of skilled engineers.  By navigating these complexities with a comprehensive, well-considered plan, organizations can not only overcome the hurdles of the competitive engineering job market but also secure the innovative, skilled professionals essential for driving success and growth in an increasingly technical world. Ready to elevate your engineering team with top-tier talent? Don’t let the complexities of recruiting in a competitive market slow you down. Reach out to our expert recruitment team today and discover how we can streamline your hiring process, connect you with the industry’s best engineers, and drive your organization forward. Page updated on January 29, 2023.

The people that make up an organization are perhaps the most critical factor in its success. Every day, personnel at a company make countless decisions and actions that help determine whether a business grows or struggles. For this reason, hiring decisions are crucial for businesses to get right. When you select a high-quality candidate for a position, it means that they have the potential to increase the success and effectiveness of the organization as a whole. One of the ways that modern companies are making their hiring process more efficient and effective is with the use of recruitment analytics. What are recruitment analytics, and how can they benefit your recruitment process? How can you use data to improve your quality of hire? What Are Recruitment Analytics? Recruitment analytics is the application of big data analytics to the hiring process. Allowing your recruitment team to measure and adjust its strategy based on collected data, recruitment analytics can help you make better, more efficient hiring decisions. This type of software can help identify patterns that emerge in your recruitment data. For example, your analytic software might discover that new hires commonly leave the organization only after two months. This could point toward issues in the onboarding process, candidate selection, or the job description. As you might imagine, this data analysis can completely revolutionize your hiring process. There are tons of essential questions that can be answered by recruitment analytics, including: What channels are producing the best candidates? What similarities do my best candidates share? What is the total cost of hiring for a new position? At what stage in the recruitment process do most prospective hires drop out? Recruitment analytics can draw data from many different sources. Commonly, customer relationship management (CRM) systems, applicant tracking systems (ATS), and human resources information systems (HRIS) are used as data sources. Additionally, this software can use information from satisfaction surveys, job advertising platform data, and brand data. Another way that hiring teams use technology to improve their recruitment process is through the application of software that helps to facilitate blind recruitment. Also known as anonymous hiring, blind recruitment tools can help avoid unconscious bias and improve efficiency. How Can Data Improve Your Hiring Process? Your hiring efforts can be significantly improved by recruitment analytics. By making data-driven hiring decisions, you can keep your hiring process competitive, make better hiring decisions, and help your organization succeed and grow in the long run. When you utilize recruitment analytics, you track, measure, and analyze data from existing employees and prospective candidates. Let’s take a look at how collecting and scrutinizing this data can improve your hiring process. 1. Improve the Quality of Your Hire Perhaps one of the most compelling reasons an organization might want to use recruitment analytics in their hiring process is that it can improve the quality of your hire. These methods will allow you to better identify the top candidates for any given position, explore the skills and qualities that your best hires share with one another, and gather data to help inform an even better and more efficient decision in the future. This means that when you have open roles in your organization, you will be increasingly able to match the right candidate with the right position. This can help reduce turnover, improve employee morale, boost productivity, and help to create a healthy and positive company culture. 2. Tracking Performance You can also compare your performance against your recruitment KPIs and industry standards. This means that your recruiting team can become increasingly efficient over time as they can optimize their workflow and find areas where improvements can be made. 3. Boosting Efficiency Hiring the right candidate for a position can be extremely time-consuming . That being said, there’s a good chance that inefficiencies and bottlenecks in your hiring process are difficult to see without using recruitment analytics. This doesn’t just mean that you’ll be able to find the right candidate more quickly and with a smoother workflow, but it also means that it will cost less to hire each new employee. 4. Allowing For Future Forecasts If you only start to look for new candidates when an existing employee gives their notice or receives a promotion, it means that you don’t have the same competitive edge as many other more proactive organizations. While it can be challenging to predict the future, you can use recruitment analytics to help anticipate gaps that will emerge in organizational skills and talent. Similarly, this type of data analytics can help you create a plan for the next year or next five years regarding the cost per hire, time to hire, frequency of hire, and overall budget for the recruitment process. 5. Improving Diversity Many HR departments are focused on and committed to improving diversity in their organization. While doing so can present unique challenges to companies, recruitment analytics can help them meet their diversity goals. Gathering and analyzing hiring data can allow recruiting teams to keep track of their diversity initiatives and identify where alterations can be made to create more desirable outcomes. There are numerous ways that analytics can be used to help your team ensure that the organization is adequately diverse. For example, you can examine each stage of the recruitment funnel with a complete demographic report. Increasing generational diversity in the workplace is a significant focus for many hiring teams and HR departments. You can learn more about how to confront age bias in this guide . 6. Optimizing the Cost of Recruiting We all know that the hiring process isn’t cheap, but it’s well worth the cost when you find the perfect hire for an open position. When you’re able to make well-informed recruiting decisions, the candidates you select will be well-suited for the role, will remain with the organization for some time, and will help contribute positively to the company culture. The more effective your recruiting process is, the less you will have to spend overall on your hiring budget. Through data analytics, you’ll also be able to see which channels produce the highest-quality candidates and which haven’t been particularly useful for your organization. As you might imagine, this means you can allocate your resources in the most productive direction for your organization. Your hiring team can work smarter, not harder, when filling open positions at the company, which means you can reduce spending on the hiring process over time. How Can Data Improve Your Quality of Hire? While the quality of hire might sound like a somewhat subjective metric, recruitment analytics can help pinpoint how much value new hires add to your organization. The baseline criteria for a hire to be considered a quality hire is that they create more value while employed at your brand than how much it costs to recruit and hire them. This measure is often used to determine how successful a new hire becomes in their role at the company. However, recruiting teams can also use this metric to look at the overall success of recruitment as well. If you’re only looking at the quality of hire on an individual basis, you are losing out on valuable information that could help improve the hiring process and quality of hire on an organization-wide basis. When you analyze the quality of hiring on a larger scale, you’ll notice that patterns start to emerge that you can use to improve your hiring process further. Through recruitment analytics, you can keep track of how many of your hires become top performers, how long new hires typically stay with the organization, and more. Recruitment analytics can collect historical data regarding your candidates and your recruiting metrics. That doesn’t just mean that you’ll be better able to identify the right candidate when they come to you, but it also means that you’ll be more equipped to transition to a proactive recruiting strategy. A critical aspect of having a proactive recruiting strategy is understanding the difference between active and passive candidates. This article takes a deep dive into what you need to know about these different types of prospective employees. Best Practices For Using Recruitment Analytics Whenever you’re collecting data for your organization, there are practically an infinite number of ways that you can organize and analyze the information. Let’s take a look at some of the best practices for using recruitment analytics. 1. Collect the Right Data Understanding your goals in using recruitment analytics can help you pinpoint the most useful data to collect in the process. Data collection gets more useful the longer the timeframe you’re working from– the more information you have to analyze, the more you’ll be able to identify persistent trends. 2. Select Your Metrics Some of the most tracked recruiting metrics by organizations using recruitment analytics include cost per hire, time to hire, and retention rate. Companies might also choose to track the quality of hire, candidate quality, application completion rate, and more. 3. Visualize It Another built-in challenge with recruitment analytics is making sense of all the data you collect. While it’s great to be tracking the right data and metrics, it can be frankly overwhelming to try and understand what all of these numbers mean for your hiring process. One of the most valuable things you can do at this stage is to use visualization tools to better grasp the information and patterns hidden in your data. Visualization can help you identify easy opportunities to improve your hiring process and also spot trends. 4. Plan For the Future With Your Data Being able to plan for the future can give your organization an edge. If you cannot make predictions grounded in data about the future, you’ll be stuck in the position of always being reactive rather than proactive. With predictive analytics, you can make an educated assessment of how much money you will need to hire a new candidate, how much time it will take to fill a specific role, which sources have historically produced the highest quality candidates, and more. 5. Recognize the Limitations of Recruitment Analytics While recruitment analytics can be a revolutionary tool in your hiring process, it’s essential to recognize that this technology has its limitations. There will always be fewer quantitative factors that impact the job market that you might not be able to pick up on from simply looking at the data. For this reason, it’s important to incorporate data analytics into a larger recruitment process instead of solely relying on this technology as an all-inclusive strategy. 6. Optimize Your Hiring Process Once you have collected enough data to start seeing trends in your hiring process, the next step is to use that data and analysis to optimize your recruitment strategy. For example, your analytics might help you discover that your turnover rate is higher than desired. While recruitment analytics can help you identify this problem, you must take actionable steps to solve the problem. One of the best things about using data in the hiring process is you can use these tools to get quantifiable results regarding whether the steps you’re taking are improving recruitment at your organization. By gathering actionable insights from your recruitment data, you can optimize your hiring efforts by making meaningful changes. 7. Get Some Perspective As you continue to collect and analyze recruitment data over time, it’s essential to zoom out to grasp a larger perspective on your hiring process. It can be easy to have tunnel vision when you’re focusing on filling specific open positions or positions that you anticipate will need to be filled in the near future. Your hiring team can benefit significantly from the longer-term analysis. This means tracking progress both month over month and year over year. You can then use this information to compare your progress against industry standards and your organizational and recruitment goals. Is your organization using recruitment analytics to improve your quality of hire? Did we leave anything out about how data can make the hiring process more effective and efficient? If so, please feel free to leave a comment below, and we’ll get a conversation started! We’d be more than happy to discuss the topic further if need be!

Business ebbs and flows. The vagaries of the overall economy, the seasonality of a niche or an individual business, and even the availability of your marketing budget can create a push and pull on everything related to your business. Hiring is no exception. There are many reasons why you may need to fill an open role during a time crunch. Maybe a critical employee left during a project where they’re most in demand. Maybe an employee encountered unexpected medical issues. Maybe slow attrition has built up such that, combined with increased seasonal demand, you need to fill entry-level seats as quickly as possible. Hiring during a time crunch puts time-based pressure on an already strenuous process. It forces you to adapt to a short timeframe; you don’t have the luxury of a drawn-out process with multiple interviews and intensive skills testing. Instead, you need to make your best judgments as quickly as possible. At the same time, you must avoid using gut feelings or superficial traits to make a decision . How can you recruit effectively during a time crunch? Here are the most important tips to keep in mind. Don’t Skip the Basics The foundation of effective hiring is laying the groundwork to make sure you’re picking the right people for the right roles. It can be very tempting to skip some of this groundwork due to the time it takes, but all you’re doing, if you do so, is minimizing the chances of finding a good, long-term hire. What is the “groundwork” you need to do?  Create your candidate profile. Creating your candidate profile means putting together a description of the role and the duties the employee will be tasked with performing. Then, you can select the essential skills necessary to succeed and the optional skills that would make a candidate an excellent choice. You can also pick deal-breakers that would remove even an otherwise great candidate from the running. It can take some time to assemble this profile, though the longer you’ve been doing it, the easier it will be. You may also have an older document with the profile for the role from before your current employee left. If so, dust it off and update it to the modern demands of the role. Be sure not to use it as-is unless you review it to ensure it’s still accurate. After all, in a modern business, roles, duties, and job definitions change over time.  Create your job posting. Your job posting is an essential part of recruiting. Unless you’re exclusively promoting from within or pursuing passive candidates, your job posting is where you’ll get most of your leads. A lot goes into a good job posting – much of which you should have on hand as a template anyway – but you always need to customize it for the specific role you’re looking to fill. Here’s a guide on making your job posting stand out .  Check existing resources. Once your business is established, you should find it pretty rare that you need to start from absolute scratch when you’re recruiting. You should have existing resources you can check into. Previous candidates who applied to the role but didn’t make it at the time . Keeping a candidate pool warm is an evergreen strategy. Known passive candidates who may be interested now that a role has opened up . Engaging with passive candidates is a long-term project, but you may be able to accelerate the process to pull in a good candidate on short notice. Employee referrals to fill a role with people who have a recommendation from your existing employees . Of course, you can’t skip the whole process on the recommendation of a current employee, but you can get good leads. Internal promotions can allow you to fill higher-level roles with existing, known quantity employees, and then use a lower-pressure hiring process to fill the role they vacated. These can give you excellent avenues to fill an open role on relatively short notice.  Manage expectations. Sometimes you’re only looking for a temporary employee for a given project or a seasonal role, and you know you won’t have the opportunity to keep them on staff when the project finishes. In these cases, you must be up-front with that information. The last thing you need is to get three phases deep in the interview process with a promising candidate, only to mention that the role is temporary and have them drop out immediately. Managing expectations is a critical part of hiring regardless of whether or not you have a time crunch on your hands, but it’s especially vital when wasted time is devastating. Prune Overly-Restrictive Job Requirements You may have heard this phrase before: “Perfect is the enemy of good.” A common trap people fall into – whether they’re learning a new skill, performing a new task, or hiring a new employee – is trying to get it perfect. 99% of the time, “good enough” is good enough. Perfection adds much more to the burden of the task and delays its completion. In hiring, the most common source of this is creating an overdone, too-extensive candidate profile and rejecting any candidate that doesn’t match it 100%. This often happens if you’re trying to replace a specific employee in a particular role, and your candidate profile is too much like a profile of the employee who left. No one will be identical to the person who left, and it’s essential to separate what is necessary from what is just trying to copy the former employee. One of the biggest culprits is skills and experience lists. How many of the skills on your “must-have” list are genuinely essential? Most of the time, you can cut back on that list and open up your candidate pool to a broader group of people. Then, you have more ability to pick someone to fill the role. Everything else, you can train on the job. It is, however, critical to recognize that some skills are actually essential. You need to determine whether or not you have time and the luxury of training a new employee to meet the demands of the role or if your time crunch means you need to have them hit the ground running. It often comes down to the difference between a time crunch that demands your payroll be full or a time crunch that has specific deliverables and deadlines looming. If you can cut back on time spent hiring in favor of more time training, this is often a much more effective way to hire an employee who will stick with your company. On the other hand, if you don’t have the luxury of time for training them, you need to be more stringent in finding people with the right requirements, and that can take longer. Streamline the Hiring Process The hiring process has many steps, from creating a job posting to final interviews, hiring, and onboarding. The more you can streamline and speed up, the better off you’ll be. The biggest areas you can streamline are communication, skills testing, and interviewing. When streamlining communication, you want to be responsive and rapid with your messaging. You have limited time to fill a role, so you need to be on the ball with communicating with your candidates, and they need to be quick with their responses. Make sure to be clear with your expectations; you miss out on great candidates if you eliminate them for transgressions they didn’t realize were rules to break. “For businesses on an accelerated hiring spree, ensure candidates understand the immediate opportunities available to them and be honest about the long-term prospects. Is it a stopgap role only, or is there the prospect of longer-term employment and growth within the company? Candidates will appreciate the transparency.” – Forbes . For skills testing, understand two things: whether or not you truly need it , and if you do, how to accelerate it . Skills assessment platforms are often designed to proctor tests in a limited amount of time, but you need to be clear with your expectations. Anyone who reaches the point of the hiring process where they need to take an assessment should know that they have a limited number of days to do so. Again, it’s all about managing expectations. For the interview process, it’s essential to be flexible. If you try to adhere to a strict in-person, during-business-hours schedule for interviews, you will run into scheduling conflicts and delays. Instead, consider: Sticking around after-hours to do interviews with people who work the same hours you do and, thus, are unavailable at those times. Allowing online interviews . You often don’t need to meet your candidates in person until later in the process; initial interviews may be easier to set up digitally and give you ample opportunity for the easy screening interviews and first-line discussions that make or break a candidate’s viability. Cutting back on the number of interviews . The more rounds of interviews you need to do, the longer it will take, especially if you have more than just a couple of viable candidates. If you can eliminate one interview and spread the questions from it to others, you cut back on the time investment significantly. There are almost always ways you can streamline your hiring process. Often, simply picking up a good ATS platform and configuring it properly can go a long way towards assisting with the initial filtering and lead you to the more advanced, personal decisions that a human has to make. Don’t Be Afraid to Throw Money at the Problem You may have seen studies of today’s modern candidate-driven job market that show entry-level roles with shortages, while higher-level roles (and roles with better compensation) never seem to have a shortage. There’s a good reason for this, and that’s just money. Money can speed up many processes and smooth out many bumps in the road. Invest more in an ATS to filter and manage your candidate list more effectively. Invest more in advertising a job listing to get more exposure in a shorter amount of time. Offer a higher base salary to attract better candidates to the role. Offer a bounty for employee referrals that successfully stick with the company. You may also consider hiring a recruiter who specializes in rapid hiring. This will, of course, have an additional fee, but they will be more experienced with filling roles quickly and can help you get someone with boots on the ground faster than you can on your own. Never Stop Hiring A common problem with many companies is that they treat hiring as an individual task that happens when they have a role that needs to be filled. As such, their hiring process is shut down and mothballed when they don’t have an active need for new employees. Unpacking and starting up that process as necessary takes additional time. Instead, take steps to keep your hiring process warmed up and ready at all times. Maintain a careers page and accept applications even if you’re not actively hiring. Maintain regular communication with your candidate pool via a regular newsletter. Create and maintain candidate profiles for every position within your company, no matter how filled they are or how loyal your current workers are. Make sure your hiring managers are practiced in the hiring process and can get started at the drop of a hat. While it may seem like an unnecessary burden on your HR staff and hiring managers, being prepared when the need arises will speed up the process dramatically. Sooner or later, every business runs into a time crunch in hiring, whether it’s the need to fill out a staff quickly or the need to replace an essential employee on short notice. Knowing how to accelerate your hiring process while maintaining accuracy and reducing turnover is an essential body of knowledge. Do you have any questions or concerns about recruiting during a time crunch? If so, please feel free to leave a comment down below, and we’ll get a conversation started on the topic! We’d be more than happy to assist you and your company however we possibly can!

Companies are currently in an unprecedented place when it comes to employment. At the low end, entry-level workers are spoiled for choice, and a push for increased wages and benefits makes it hard to fill the ranks if you can’t afford it.  Conversely, senior-level employees have their pick of career options at the upper levels. Recruiters struggle to attract these valuable, experienced individuals, and it’s no longer just a matter of the number of zeroes on the end of the paycheck. Recruiting senior-level employees is still possible, but you’ll need to know how to do it properly. Here’s the best guidance we have to offer. Know the Role Inside and Out Perhaps the biggest roadblock to hiring for a senior-level position is not knowing precisely what you need accomplished and who you need to accomplish it. What does that mean? It’s two facets of one problem. On the one hand, you need to know the role. That means understanding exactly what the job duties will be for the individual you hire. Will they be a C-level or director who makes company-guiding decisions using their industry experience and network connections to make decisions? Will they be in senior management, as the person to whom all issues are escalated and who makes the final determination on any problem that crosses their desk? Do they approve budgets, direct spending, and push for initiatives that change the fundamental way your company operates? Before you can even begin looking for a candidate, you need to know the role, which means defining every aspect of the role as closely as possible. The biggest single problem with hiring senior-level employees is that they are often very specialized in their career and experience. They’re good at what they do, but they may struggle if you hire them to do something outside of their wheelhouse. Sure, some may adapt and succeed, but many more will leave for another opportunity more aligned with their skills, which leaves you back where you started. “One of the biggest blockers to hiring senior-level employees is not a lack of qualified applicants, but rather a misalignment between what a recruiter is looking for and what candidates include on their resumes. Before writing the job description, think about what your company is trying to solve by filling this position. Fully understand the needs and qualifications for the role prior to releasing the description, and then write it accordingly.” – Recruitment Juice . Consider creating a comprehensive job profile with the relevant skills, experience, and work history you need, which you can then use to create your marketing and job posting to find the right kinds of candidates . Aim for Passive Candidates The higher you go up the organization chart, the less likely the employees there will ever be actively looking for work. Passive recruitment works fine for lower-level and even some mid-level roles, but senior-level employees are near-universally employed and more or less happy where they are. After all, they have their pick of companies to work for when they want to move on. “A study by Experteer Switzerland shows that 97% of senior candidates in a company want to be ‘found’ or ‘approached’ by headhunters for relevant vacancies.” – Experteer . Senior-level employees are almost always passive candidates. That means once you know the role you’re looking to fill, you need to figure out exactly what skills, experiences, past roles, certifications, and qualifications you need from the person you want to fill it. Then, critically, you need to take this narrow profile of a theoretical individual and look for real people who match it. You can do this in many ways. You can identify comparable roles in other organizations and look for the employees in those roles. You can pick the role where an experienced individual may be promoted into the role you’re filling and look at that one-step-down roster. You can take to LinkedIn and find people with the skills and expertise you’re seeking. Once you find a potential candidate, you need to approach them with an offer. Be discrete! While it’s not illegal, many companies frown upon the idea of poaching employees and may be combative if you try.  Moreover, a candidate may be hesitant to accept your offer if you make it too publicly, fearing reprisal if they don’t like working for you. Consider restricting your messaging to personal email accounts and private social media, and avoid sending messages to company email addresses or calling on company phones. Another thing you might consider is looking for candidates who have a proven track record of success. Senior-level employees often make a name for themselves, whether it’s by spearheading development, pushing for social change, or guiding a company to success in troubled times. Proven success can be just as important as skills and experience on paper. Make a Compelling, Customized Offer A compelling offer for a senior-level employee needs to have three things: A powerful reason why they should leave their current company to work for you. A plain and frank discussion of the job’s duties and benefits. Room for negotiation. When you approach a potential senior-level hire, you need to recognize that your offer, should they accept, has the potential to uproot their life and career trajectory. Unless they are broadly dissatisfied with their current position, they will likely be hesitant to make such a leap. What can you provide to make a compelling case for your role? Learn what makes your candidate tick. Different employees are driven by different motivators. At the upper levels, money is only occasionally a driving factor. More often, these individuals want connections, power, benefits, the opportunity to have a tangible impact on the world around them, or the satisfaction of leading a high-performance team. Explain the advantage of working for you over their current workplace. You mustn’t actively trash talk their current employer. You want to be respectful of their current situation and possibly even avoid making direct reference to it. Instead, know what their current employer offers to the best of your ability, and discuss how you offer something better. Align this with the primary interests of the candidate for the most significant impact. Start with a good pay and benefits package. Pay and benefits are the most subject to negotiation, but you need to start at a good place that offers room for that negotiation. If your starting offer is laughably low, your candidate will know that you can’t offer the growth they want and will turn you down. Pay particular attention to benefits. Often, senior-level employees already make enough money to satisfy their needs. You want to be able to offer benefits that are of particular interest to them, such as lengthy parental leave, unlimited PTO, excellent healthcare, or flexible working arrangements. Discuss opportunities for personal development. Remember that your senior-level candidates will be just as in-demand working for you as they are working for their current company, possibly even more so. You want to be able to offer avenues for personal growth that are difficult to match, so there’s a tangible reason for them to stick with you. These can range from opportunities to network with industry leaders, to working on the cutting edge of your industry, to avenues to develop their skills even further. Offer a compelling vision of their future with your company. “Where do you see yourself in five years” isn’t just an interview question for entry-level workers. It’s an essential aspect of hooking senior-level employees. The key is remembering that senior-level employees have concerns unique to their station. They may be less concerned with short-term benefits and more with their retirement accounts, stock benefits, and a more permanent living situation. They may have 10-20 years of career ahead of them rather than 30-40. They may be more concerned with raising families than seeing the game on the weekend. Stability is often a valued commodity. And, of course, everything above is subject to personalization and negotiation . Some senior-level employees will be more interested in certain benefits or perks of a career than others. Some may be concerned with making the most money possible. Customization is the number one consideration for your offer. Consider (But Don’t Rely On) Employee Referrals A good source of passive candidates can be referrals from your existing employees. However, this is a little different for senior leadership than for the rank and file. In particular, you may be talking to employees about their previous bosses or to C-levels about their former direct reports. Unfortunately, relying on referrals isn’t viable in senior-level positions. There are two reasons for this. The first is that the big draw of a referred employee is a social connection, and that’s generally less important for senior-level employees. The second is that you run the risk of nepotism and similar adverse hiring when you rely on personal connections, which can leave you with sub-par hires that are difficult to remove due to their connections. Pay Attention to Culture Company culture is essential to monitor and improve for long-term business success. With low-level employees, you can hire people who conform to your existing company culture. With senior-level employees, however, you are hiring the people who guide and develop company culture. This means that, in addition to skills and experience, you need to pick candidates who have the cultural values you want in your organization. That can mean people who fit with the culture you have established, but it can also mean people who bring new values to the table and who can show what those values mean. You may be hiring these individuals not just for their business acumen, but for their place as a beacon of a particular kind of company culture . It is likewise crucial that you don’t pick someone whose cultural values clash too much with your organization. Even if you’re trying to move your company in their direction, it will be resisted if the change is too significant. Be Persistent but Patient It takes time to engage with a senior-level candidate and convince them to make the leap to your organization. They may not respond immediately, and if they do, they may not have a positive initial impression. It’s your job to keep at it, engage with them, and answer their concerns. Consider Looking Inward Senior-level roles are difficult to fill. So, why not try to fill them with people you already know all about? Internal promotions can be an excellent way to reward the skills and loyalty of existing employees. These individuals already have social connections and a solid awareness of their coworkers they can leverage to build and reorganize teams under their purview. They also know your business and your systems and can use their newfound power to make beneficial adjustments that outsiders might not recognize. You can also promote up the chain this way. By promoting a senior manager to a director, you can then promote a junior manager to senior manager and a team leader to junior manager. Then, you’re left with the much easier-to-fill role of team leader, and can either promote a standard employee or hire an external team lead. The one area of caution here is that, depending on your company and industry, there may be regulations about the requirement to post a job publicly when it opens. You may not be able to simply promote someone without advertising the role. This is most common among government agencies and contractors but may also be relevant elsewhere. Regardless, looking inward may be just as viable a solution as looking outward. Conclusion Once you have a candidate in mind, engaging with them and negotiating what they truly want out of their role is key to a successful hire. Customization in every part of the process is the key to success. There’s no template process, no boilerplate offer, and no standard package that will fit the bill. Do you have any questions or concerns about recruiting senior-level employees? If so, contact our team today and we’d be more than happy to provide the guidance needed for a successful recruitment!