It also depends on hiring and recruiting the right people to grow your business. Onboarding the wrong employees in your company will not only affect your brand image and company performance, but it could also cost you lots of valuable time and money. Thus, as a business owner, you need to establish an effective recruitment process to ensure you’re hiring the best set of employees for your company.  

Here are the top ten tips to help you refine and enhance your recruitment process.  

Take Advantage Of The Applicant Tracking System  

If you’re still following the traditional way of hiring employees, which involves writing job descriptions, posting them in newspapers and social media platforms, and waiting for applicants to drop their resumes on your office, it may be time to revamp your entire recruitment process. 

At this time and age, technology has already dominated almost the whole business process, including the recruitment process. Thus, to refine your onboarding process, take advantage of the applicant tracking system (ATS) and use it for the entire recruitment process.  

For starters, ATS enables employers to monitor their applicants during the entire process, especially when you’re handling hundreds of them. Furthermore, you can also easily monitor your job postings in one source. In other words, this system will save you from the hassle of keeping hundreds of resume papers and scanning them one by one while handpicking who should get the callback.  

So, if you don’t have this software yet, now’s the time to consider getting one and significantly reduce your overall hiring time. 

Establish A Great Careers Page 

If you have a company website, consider creating a careers page. Most of the time, when an applicant takes an interest in your company or vacant roles, they would browse your website and try to learn more about your brand and its core values. A careers page will serve as your platform to showcase your company culture and illustrate what makes your company distinctive from the rest.  

So, put some effort into setting up your careers page if you don’t have one yet. Meanwhile, if you already have, take some time to enhance your page and keep the vacant roles frequently updated. 

Redefine Your Job Descriptions And Requirements 

It’s prevalent for most businesses to list their job requirements and descriptions in bullet form as if writing a grocery list. While there’s nothing wrong with writing them in bullet form, listing down vague requirements may confuse applicants. For example, you wrote, ‘You will be in charge of handling emergencies.’ That description could mean anything, and if the applicant understood it differently, you might soon end up hiring new employees again. 

Your job descriptions should be clear and inspiring. A well-written description will help applicants understand the purpose of the position and the skills and talent they’ll need to contribute. Furthermore, you need to be transparent when writing job requirements. Avoid listing subjective and biased items, as these could discourage applicants. Some phrases to avoid are ‘must be youthful,’ must have great experiences,’ ‘must be able-bodied.’ 

Utilize Additional Applicant Sources 

Besides a well-established careers page, it’s also a good idea to outsource employees from other talent platforms. This way, you can expand your search and have more access to different talented and skillful candidates who might be perfect for your company. You can also attract more applicants easily when your job ads are published almost everywhere. You can post your job vacancies on platforms like job boards, social media, and virtual groups. 

Streamline Your Interview Process 

Suppose your HR department is already equipped and knowledgeable in posting job ads and interviewing candidates. The next thing you’ll need to ensure is that the hired employees must fit well with the department managers’ needs. Thus, your HR staff and the department managers should meet beforehand to discuss the open role and know which skills, attitudes, and other job-related specifics they should keep an eye out for.  

For example, if you’re looking for new marketing staff, the sales and marketing manager can discuss and make a standardized template for the said role with the HR staff. They may want the recruiter to find someone who is persuasive, flexible, strategic, and with good communication skills. Moreover, you can also boost your recruitment process by conducting background checks. 

Use Various Pre-Employment Assessments 

Besides conducting multiple interviews, you can learn more about your applicants and boost your chances of hiring the right one by using various pre-employment assessments. These assessments are designed based on the specific role, and these will help you know your candidates and find out if they are only overstating their qualifications on their resume or if they’re telling the truth. Some pre-employment assessments you can use are: 

• Job knowledge test 
• Personality test 
• Cognitive ability test 
• Physical ability test 
• Skills assessment test 
• Emotional intelligence test 

It’s up to you whether to use the standard template and questions of the assessments online or if you want to create your own.  

Maintain Active Communication With Candidates 

After the candidates have submitted their application or gone through a series of interviews and tests, there may be a brief waiting period before they can hear back from you, especially if you’re handling large numbers of applicants. During this waiting period, make sure you maintain active communication with them. If this is a struggle, you can create calendar reminders to remind yourself about connecting with your waiting applicants. Keeping them in the loop will retain their interest in the role and make a good impression on your brand. 

Seek For Employee Referrals 

After you’ve decided to hire new employees, consider seeking help from your current staff and ask for employee referrals. Keep in mind that your employees are highly knowledgeable about your company, and they already know what type of new candidates you’re looking for. Furthermore, this will also help you save time from looking for applicants through different talent platforms. So, don’t forget to keep your employees updated with job openings and encourage them to refer to potential applicants.  

Consider Internal Recruitment 

Another practical and efficient way to enhance your recruitment process is hosting internal recruitment. In this case, you can start your hiring process on the inside and try to interview current employees before you even spend time, energy, and money hunting potential candidates outside. Hiring internal candidates will not only reduce your hiring and onboarding process, but this could also show your employees that growth opportunities are available within your company. 

Survey Applicants About Your Recruitment Process 

Whether you hired the candidate or not, asking for their feedback about your company’s recruitment process will help you learn about their experiences and identify which areas you should improve. This will also show the applicants that you care about improving their experience. So, make sure you conduct surveys of both hired and unhired candidates, as the hired candidates may only provide positive and unrealistic reviews. 

Key Takeaway 

Refining your company’s recruitment operation should be an ongoing process. After all, employing the right people is one of the keys to your company’s successful growth. So, improve your recruitment efforts with these tips and see the positive results.