Wireless Integration Career Consultants

Finding and retaining top talent requires in-house recruiters to manage hiring managers’ expectations
A new white paper by global digital recruitment group Evenbase outlines the difficulties encountered by recruiting leaders in dealing with parallel challenges: an unprecedented high volume of applicants, and finding and retaining niche and high-level talent.

Difficulties range from creating the right relocation package for a given candidate and role in today’s housing market to setting hiring manager expectations for timelines and potential candidate profiles, and targeting potential candidates who want what a particular organisation has to offer.

Yet as the white paper points out, in many cases it is up to the in-house recruiter to set the agenda for hiring managers and to proactively research and provide insight and information to deliver the best possible recruiting process and hire.

The white paper was based on a recent recruitment leaders’ roundtable chaired by John Vlastelica, managing director of consulting and training firm Recruiting Toolbox. Vlastelica, a former recruitment head at Amazon and Expedia, provides consultancy services to global businesses such as Groupon and was the keynote speaker at Recruiter’s recent Smart Resourcing 2013 conference.

The 10 attendees were recruiters from Amazon, Sodexo, Guidewire Software, Vestas and other organisations.

Key issues raised and discussed included:

• Recruiters must understand there is “a difference between finding a name/lead, and turning that lead into a candidate”, the white paper said. Fulfilling these requirements can be carried out by team members with different duties. One such division might involve researchers who put lists together, analyse organisational charts and identify target companies.
• Relocation packages may be necessary to encourage candidate mobility. “People may not be living in a house that’s worth what they originally paid for it. Unless you’re getting a big relocation package, you can’t afford to leave,” the paper points out.
• Engaging and, in essence, managing hiring managers through to a successful recruitment puts up challenges to the recruiter. Expectations must be set at the start. Participant Alyson Weeks, learning and development consultant at the Chartered Institute for Personnel and Development, said: “It’s all about pre-framing the whole process and managing expectations right up front. This is about a good transition, so everyone knows what’s happening all down the line, and may even include you managing their diaries as you go. The process from start to finish often takes a lot longer than you think.”

During the process, recruiters must “avoid subservience at all costs”, the paper warns. “If you think of them [hiring managers] purely as a customer and the recruiter as the supplier, the conversation and engagement becomes harder.” Setting timeline expectations is especially critical, and Vlastelica urged recruiters to incorporate a column into all process documents that details the major causes of delays at each stage: unrealistic salary, target profile, bad questions or advertisement.

The paper goes on to suggest that at a strategy kick-off meeting between recruiter and hiring manager, recruiters must set expectations by explaining what can happen to cause major delays and associated costs. This then shifts responsibility to hiring managers for contributing effectively to the process and “allows them a greater sense of ownership”, the paper says.

“Managers react to ‘pain points’: the locations and practices in their day that have recurring problems that appear insurmountable or unavoidable. If you are not talking about a pain point, then they will inevitably find something else to prioritise over recruitment,” Vlastelica said.

Recruiters are also urged to present hiring managers with examples of hypothetical or historic candidates who have a range of backgrounds, salaries, travel and development expectations, and get a response about the feasibility of these candidates. These… “can be used to calibrate expectations and demonstrate the real candidate profiles that actually exist”, the paper said.

• If managers say they want their new hire to “hit the ground running”, that means they want to hire someone who is already doing the same job. The paper asks: “Why would they simply want to do the same thing for someone else? Recruiters are able to offer a candidate far more if they have only eight out of 10 things that they need to progress. The recruiter can then offer a way to achieve those final things. That makes the position a good career move. It’s a different way of thinking.”

To obtain a copy of the white paper, visit www.evenbase.com/recwhitepaper

Power Points

• Do the basics well.
• Understand there is a difference between finding a name/lead and turning that lead into a candidate.
• If looking to relocate the successful candidate for a role, consider the current housing market and whether you can offer a healthy relocation package.
• Engage hiring managers by setting expectations at the beginning, and emphasise your expectations of them in the recruiting process.
• ‘Pre-closing’ using hypothetical or archived candidate resumes can help explain to hiring managers the types of candidate profiles that may be feasible for given roles.
• Innovate in your search through techniques such as ‘reverse engineering’ your organisation’s top talent.
• Consult alongside HR to look at which roles are ‘build’ and which are ‘buy’.
• Survey recent hires to find out if the job meets their expectations and how they would rate the recruitment process.
• Target potential candidates who are naturally motivated by what you are offering

– See more at: http://www.recruiter.co.uk/analysis/2013/05/strategy-key-in-easing-recruitment-pain/#sthash.oWj6Me3s.dpuf

Articles