As a follow-up to my article from 2 weeks ago I wanted to share some strategies for continuous improvement and innovation in the hiring processes that can be quicker to implement than some of the previous article’s points.
Business ownership of the recruiting process
How often have you heard from a hiring manager (HM) that it’s your job to hire for their position? The hiring decision and budget for the headcount (HC) is not yours so your role as human resources (HR) is to create the framework and provide the candidates and market insights for the business to make an informed hiring decision. What are some steps you can take to achieve that?
In the kick-off meeting, create a detailed interview structure and agree on the candidate competencies and skills that each interviewer will assess. The HM can then share those interview assignments with each interviewer, ideally in a group alignment meeting, and they should be included in the interview invitations to each interviewer as a reminder. This should be a mix of technical skills and general competencies/ mindsets and ideally, you can provide a wide range of questions on a “cheat sheet” the interviewers can ask to elucidate responses for each competency.
If there are enough similar roles to fill, it may be valuable to consider an “interview day/days” where all candidates willdo a series of interviews and the interviewers will be occupied all day with the interview process. This is more difficult to schedule but can significantly reduce the time period the interviews take resulting in a shorter time to hire.
Finally, round table discussion on candidates after they have finished interviews can lead to significantly better hiring decisions. Often candidates are rejected at some stage of the interview process because of a misalignment of hiring expectations by interviewers. These objections can be overcome through discussions with the interviewers facilitated by HR before rejecting the candidates. Of course, if there is a good kick-off meeting the hiring priorities should be aligned across all interviewers.
These simple steps along with your input of market data and expertise, help hiring managers feel more in control of the hiring process and therefore take ownership of the process. While at Microsoft I found that HMs with a sense of ownership tended to hire more quickly and confidently resulting in lower turnover rates.
Employer branding is more than advertising!
What do you think of when you envision Employer Branding? If you picture posts on LinkedIn about your new monthly Pizza Night or your D&I initiatives then you’re not wrong, but you’re missing out on some other key aspects.
Career websites are often overly complicated and don’t have a good focus on User Experience. How many times have you been on a careers site and just wanted to find where to see open jobs or how to apply? For many candidates, this is their first experience of your company and can give very different images of what your company is like. It is a major step to change your careers site and often includes global alignment but can significantly improve your employer branding.
Networking/introduction events to your company are an easy way for potential candidates to learn more about your company and what you do without the pressure of an interview. You can specialize them for different types of roles within the company and provide attendees with a follow-up survey asking if they are interested in a call with your recruiters. These events take some time to prepare but often have a good ROI and are very positive for the employer brand.
Industry publications are often happy to publish articles with business leaders about what their business is doing. This is a great place to work in employer branding by also talking about the benefits of working for the company and the exciting work that is ongoing. Since they are industry publications you know it is going to a very targeted audience as well!
Interviewer training is one of the most important aspects of employer branding and yet often the most overlooked. How often has an interview process been undone by interviewers showing up unprepared for the meeting? This can be through everyone asking the same questions about job history or simply not selling your company to candidates. It can also be a process that is significantly slowed by people not prioritizing hiring. Well prepared and well organized interviews make your company stand out from most of the competition!
Increasing employee referrals
Everyone wants employee referrals because the people are a “known commodity” to someone in the company. They also tend to have a better sticking rate in their roles as they should be highly qualified and they feel the responsibility to perform well to make a positive impression on their referrer. How then can we drive an increase in employee referrals?
So, often when I hear HR teams talking about employee referrals they complain that it’s ineffective because their employee referral bonus is too low. While I was at Microsoft the divisions I covered increased employee referral hires from 7% to 54%, while doubling hiring volume, without an increase in the ER bonus! From my experience, it is a change in behavior, not incentive, that drives increases in the number and quality of employee referrals.
Employees often don’t know the open positions in the company and especially in larger companies, who to reach out to if they do want to refer someone. Referral and department info sessions are great ways to introduce your open positions and recruitment team to employees while also letting them know about their own potential career paths and what the different teams are looking for in their employees.
A great low pressure way to meet with referrals is to invite them to networking events you’re running as part of your employer branding so they don’t feel the pressure of an immediate first interview and have the chance to learn more about the company and if you are a fit for them right from the start.
These are just a few of the practical hands-on areas of continuous improvement I have seen within my clients and through my own personal experience. The situation will be different for every company and every industry, but pairing these actions with a strong partnership with a trusted recruitment agency can decrease the time to hire and improve your employer branding all at the same time.
Whether you are a business leader looking to enhance your HR leadership team or a professional seeking strategic career advice, Titan Consulting’s Professional Services division is here to assist. Reach out to professionalservices@titanconsulting.jp to explore partnership opportunities that can propel your business or career to new heights.
Philip Edamura
Philip Edamura leads the Professional Services team at Titan Consulting. He is Japanese Canadian and has lived/worked in Japan for the last 15 years. Prior to rejoining Titan, he worked for 3.5 years as Sr Talent Acquisition in Microsoft's Global Talent Acquisition team. He also has 2 years of experience in a small management consulting firm working on Talent Management and Talent Acquisition process improvement projects.