In 2021, 68.9 million U.S. adults quit or became unemployed after getting discharged or laid off from their jobs. Nearly two-thirds, or 47.4 million, were voluntary separations.
Those are all record numbers, resulting in what we now call “The Great Resignation.”
As a result, the competition for qualified candidates has become fiercer than ever. So, if there are job openings in your organization, you want to prepare as much as possible to get an advantage.
To that end, we created this guide to help you find and secure top talent. Keep reading to discover what you can do now to attract and keep a talented workforce.
1. Assess Your Company Culture
In one survey, almost a third of polled employees admitted to having plans of quitting their jobs. One in four said they’d left within the last six months. The number one reason for such decisions was working with a company with a toxic culture.
Toxic workplace cultures, after all, are primarily about gossip, hostility, and power struggles. They’re rife with selfishness, crab mentality, and abusive leadership. They foster fear, cause poor communication, and guarantee low productivity.
All those negativities lead to reduced, even non-existent, employee loyalty. As a result, such companies often experience high turnover rates.
So, before you look for qualified candidates, assess your organization’s qualifications first. One way to do this is to imagine yourself as a potential applicant and ask the following:
- Would I want to work in such a workplace environment?
- Are the people here worth working with?
- What do human resources do to encourage positivity?
- What does HR do to minimize and address negativity?
If you hesitantly answered yes to the first two questions, applicants will likely do the same. So, before looking for new hires, it’s best to improve your company culture first.
Otherwise, you’ll have difficulty attracting qualified candidates. While they may come for an interview, they may refuse your job offer. Even if they accept, they may soon realize they don’t want to stay.
2. Find Qualified Candidates Internally
You may not even have to look for new hires if you have current employees who already qualify.
Internal hiring benefits your organization by saving on recruitment costs. After all, you already have access to a pool of prospective talents within your workforce. All you need to do is to incentivize them either with a promotion or a pay raise.
Internal hiring is also an excellent strategy for retaining top talent. For one, it offers current employees a way to further their careers within the company. It’s also an effective method for recognizing employees and their hard work.
You can start by creating an internal job board with detailed job descriptions. The latter can help those interested in determining if they have the qualifications. If they don’t, then they won’t waste their and your time sending in their application.
3. Develop an Internal Referral Program
If internal hiring doesn’t yield your desired results, an internal referral program may. Plus, it’s one of the least you can do to show your employees you value their opinions.
With an internal referral program, you ask your existing employees to recommend candidates. It’s effective because you’re incentivizing your current workforce to refer other talented individuals. The incentive can also boost employee morale as they may consider it a sign of your gratitude.
Even if your employees’ referrals don’t make it, you may still want to give them a small token of appreciation. It can be anything from a gift voucher to a lunch of their choice.
4. Seek Help From a Recruitment Agency
A recruitment agency is a third-party firm that finds qualified candidates for employers. You can think of it as a hiring manager, except it’s not in-house. That means you can outsource their services only as needed.
When you work with a recruitment agency, they’ll take over the entire process. That includes advertising the job listing, collecting CVs, and interviewing candidates. From there, they vet each potential talent by performing exhaustive background checks.
Suppose you need to fill a position for a Chief Operating Officer or a Chief Executive Officer. Then you can hire a recruiter to perform a supply chain executive search on your behalf. Executive recruitment agencies specialize in hunting, recruiting, and hiring senior-level candidates.
Likewise, you can hire a recruitment staffing agency for short-term or long-term roles. They can fill almost all openings, from entry-level to specialized or professional positions.
5. Provide What Talents Want and Deserve
In a June 2021 survey of 463 U.S. adults, 11% said they refused an employment offer because it didn’t allow remote work. Almost the same percentage said their reason was that the job didn’t have flexible hours.
So, why not offer remote work and flexible hours for roles that can accommodate them? Some examples include IT, accounting, advertising, and marketing jobs. Many experts in these sectors can complete their tasks at home or outside the office.
6. Build a Talent Pool for Future Openings
According to some estimates, 118 people, on average, apply for the same job opening. And even if you get fewer applicants, chances are, you’ll still interview several.
Of those you interview, more than one may possess all the qualifications; it’s just that you can only hire one.
Don’t let that go to waste; instead, set aside the names and contact information of those who don’t make the final cut. Doing so enables you to build a pool of talents you may contact once you have another vacancy. So, when that day comes, you can save time because you don’t have to start from scratch.
Find Qualified Candidates With These Tips
Remember: High-paying jobs are no longer the sole concern of most qualified candidates. Instead, they want to work in a company with an excellent culture of respect and positivity.
So, if you want to secure top talent, ensure your company culture makes it worth working and staying for. From there, you can perform internal or external hiring. Alternatively, seek help from a recruitment agency if you must fill a vacancy ASAP.
