The dreaded term ‘war for talent’ is one I became very familiar with in my fifteen years working in recruitment. If anything, you hear it even more now.
There are several factors at play here but they all lead to one fundamental issue: a vast skills shortage across many industries. I know hospitality and customer service sectors are really suffering. Be it listening to infuriating hold music when aiming to resolve a minor problem or waiting longer than you would deem acceptable in restaurants; it’s a real issue and I feel for employers who likely know they are short staffed and that their customers are suffering as a result — but feel there’s nothing they can do about it.
If we consider that 73% of candidates are passive candidates — meaning they aren’t actively seeking new opportunities — then you can really start to appreciate the challenge employers are facing when it comes to attracting and hiring the right people. Not to mention the numbers needed to deliver. It becomes even more difficult if hiring managers aren’t seasoned recruiters and have never experienced a candidate driven market.
And this is where I think employers need to do something different to make them stand out. The recruitment process should be as easy and accessible as possible for the candidates. Let’s say a candidate is on-the-fence about making a move, but they are time restricted because of how busy they are in their current job. Employers need to make sure they deploy every tactic in their repertoire to persuade them to apply. Using recruitment technology can help with this.
Take a Customer Service Advisor role for example. A lot of employers will invite a number of candidates along to an Assessment Centre. This format is a brilliant way to determine suitability for a role and allows the employer to see more than one candidate at a time — but it’s time consuming and expensive for you as an employer, and candidates are required to take a full day of annual leave, which just isn’t feasible for many people right now.
That’s where video comes in. Employers can still run their Assessment Centre but it can all be done online. This eliminates travel time for candidates, making it a more convenient and accessible process — but it also removes the need to hire costly venues for the day. It can also be done at any time, so you could run an Assessment Centre in the evening if you wanted to.
Use video in your recruitment process and I guarantee you will attract and subsequently hire more people. You’ll save time whilst being seen by candidates as innovative and flexible. If you think that sounds too good to be true, email me and I can arrange for you to see our platform in action — it is true, and it’s very good.