What Should Your Top Recruiting Priorities Be?

Recruiting priorities are different for every company. In our latest blog, we are focussing on the top five priorities every company should be considering in their recruitment strategy.

Diversity Hiring

Diversity hiring is hiring based on merit, with special care taken to ensure procedures have reduced biases related to a candidate’s age, race, gender, religion, sexual orientation, and other personal characteristics that are unrelated to their job performance.

There are many benefits of having a diverse team including:

• Increase productivity

  A diverse workplace allows for more diverse thinking and ideas due to a wider range of perspectives.

• Increased creativity

  As various cultures and backgrounds get together, there is a lot of opportunity for increased creativity.

• Improved cultural awareness

  Cultural awareness does not happen when you’re surrounded by similar people to yourself. If you want a thriving international company, being culturally aware is an important benefit to have.

• A positive reputation

  Companies that have a diverse workforce are often seen to have better and more positive reputations. Potential employees want an employer who accepts and is tolerant of all backgrounds and who treats their employees fairly.

Growing a talent pipeline

Successful recruitment is carried out before you desperately need someone. Companies that are planning their growth will know that they need people to help them achieve their goals. This is why growing a recruitment and hiring pipeline is so important. Benefits include:

• Reducing the time to hire

  A successful talent pipeline streamlines the hiring process and drastically reduces your time to hire. By developing and nurturing relationships with qualified candidates, you put yourself in a position to hire more quickly.

• Hire better candidates

  The talent pipeline framework enables you to be more strategic, think long-term, and plan. As a result, you’ll be more likely to hire the best possible candidates.

• Improved candidate experience

  A talent pipeline requires a hands-on approach, as you must develop and nurture candidates throughout their journey to being hired. This is a much more candidate-friendly strategy, as opposed to the traditional method of posting job listings and waiting for applications. 

Improving the time to hire

Taking too long to fill a role doesn’t just increase the cost per hire, but with it comes the risk of losing fast-moving (high-quality) candidates.

62% of candidates lose interest in a role if the hiring process is lengthy (Robert Half).

Reducing your time to hire also increases your candidate experience. If an applicant has a faster screening experience, they will feel more positive about working for your company, which could be a determining factor as to whether or not they accept your offer letter, especially if multiple offers are on the table. Plus, if you’re looking for a job, especially after being recently unemployed, there’s nothing better than a company that reaches out promptly.

Increasing retention rates

It comes as no surprise that increasing retention rates are a top recruiting priority. No company wants to hire someone who could potentially leave after 6 months. Turnover costs businesses, on average, £11,000 per person; however, for more senior roles, it can be considerably more.

Retention rates are influenced by a large number of variables, including management, culture, progression, package and competition. There is no one fixed solution to increase retention rates.

Improving the quality of hire

It comes as no surprise that improving the quality of hires is one of the top recruiting priorities. Quality of hire is defined as the value a new hire adds to your company. Specifically, how much a new hire contributes to your company's long-term success. Based on its definition, it's obvious why the quality of hire is considered such a priority. In this candidate-driven market, there are lots of opportunities, and great talent is being snapped up quickly.

Quality people want to work with organisations that have great reputations, great candidate and employee experience and have room for growth. If your business is serious about improving the quality of hires, you need to consider everything that would attract great people and make them stay.