6 Tips for Recruiting During the Holidays

For companies in growth cycles, time off during the holidays is absolutely an interruption. Not a bad one — but one nonetheless. And holiday recruiting becomes more of a burden than a solution. Not only are in-house recruiters or hiring managers going out of town, but potential candidates also have limited availability.

The situation is even more intense for retailer businesses and seasonal jobs which need to rapidly vet and hire seasonal workers to manage customer expectations. 700,000 workers will be hired in this sector alone.

But even outside of the retail sector, the last thing a rapidly scaling company wants is to lose momentum during the holiday rush.

The good news is that holiday hiring can actually be easier. Whether you are seeking seasonal workers or talent for a long-term position, holiday recruiting is often less competitive and attracts savvy job seekers.

6 tips for holiday recruiting

When it comes to holiday hiring, your recruiters — whether in-house or outsourced — need to juggle both their HR team and potential candidates. Combined with en masse PTOs, recruitment can feel like an uphill battle.

However, it’s possible to find talent, onboard seasonal employees, and reduce your stress. The key to preventing a recruiting rut is to plan ahead.

1. Start early

Before you do anything else, it’s critical to ask your recruiting staff or hiring managers to plan their vacation and provide a working schedule. This will help your teams have visibility into when to coordinate interviews. It will also set realistic expectations for estimates about when candidates can expect to hear back from your recruiter.

The last thing you want is for an interview with a top talent target to go south because your company failed to follow up with its candidates.

It’s critical to ask your recruiting staff or hiring managers to plan their vacation and provide a working schedule. This will help your teams have visibility into when to coordinate interviews.

2. Be clear and flexible about availability

Next, make sure you get clear times of availability for each of your candidates. Ask them, with respect to their family time and obligations:

• When would be the best times to connect
• What timeframes are off limits

Theoretically, both the hiring manager and potential employees are looking for a job to work out. It’s okay to ask for times to connect during the holidays, even if it’s outside normal business hours. Just make sure to do so in a respectful manner.

With remote scheduling tools, this aspect can be easier than ever to navigate. Consider asking your recruiters to use a tool like Calendly to send their availability to candidates to streamline the process and reduce friction.

3. Have patience with yourself and your team

Let’s be real: It’s hard to focus during the holiday season. So cut yourself and your team some slack. Yes, this is going to be a harder season to meet your hiring goals. There’s no way around it. It can help to be more relaxed and less rigid about meeting hiring goals during the season. After all, the work you do today can still bear fruits early in the next year.

4. Consider same day offers

One way to speed up the process is to have a same day offer ready for when the right candidate comes along.

How does this work? All you need is some time to reflect on your recruiting needs.

Drill down into what you really need from your new worker. It’s highly likely that job seekers during the holidays are motivated to find a job, and will be ready to start the next year with a new company. To find the right talent, consider refining your job descriptions and creating a checklist of your “ideal employee” for each role that recruiters can use to quickly evaluate qualified candidates.

You’ll also want to ensure that you have a solid communication network in place to share evaluations and potential employee information with your team. This will accelerate the decision-making process.

5. Design attractive offers

Candidates will be sacrificing family and holidays to prepare for and attend interviews. As a result, they’ll be looking for job openings that provide an attractive offer.

Next, you’ll want to position your open roles in a positive light. Candidates will be sacrificing family and holidays to prepare for and attend interviews. As a result, they’ll be looking for job openings that provide an attractive offer, such as higher wages, a signing bonus, and better benefits.

Make sure to include all relevant information regarding compensation in the job description.

6. Prepare for the new year

Finally, you’ll want to use this time to prep for the upcoming year. Since holiday recruiting is often unpredictable, it can be good to work on the backlog of tasks that come with the hiring process. From refreshing job postings and building better benefits packages, to improving the onboarding process, there are several items your team can work on in the interim.

Ready for next year?

Q4 is often the most intense quarter of the year — there’s just so much to finish before December 31st! And there’s more than just holiday recruiting involved for HR managers. Get more tips and tricks to surviving and thriving during the last few months of the year by downloading our Year-End Guide.