Is Your Recruitment Process Fast Enough?

In this competitive hiring market, a slow recruitment process can cause you to lose out on top candidates. Glassdoor Insights notes that, in the United States, the average interview process takes 22.9 days.

Time to hire refers to how long it takes to bring in a new hire from the date you receive the initial application to the day they accept an offer of employment. An inefficient, slow recruitment process can hurt your bottom line.

Read on to discover the reasons you should shorten the hiring process, steps on how to do it, and potential pitfalls to avoid.

History of employee recruitment

There have been many changes to the employee recruitment landscape since COVID-19 started. The pandemic has had many HR departments rethinking the way they attract, hire, and train talent.

Streamlining the recruitment process and finding ways to save time are equally important when sourcing from a globally dispersed talent pool. As such, from initial phone screenings to final video interviews, in-person interviews are becoming less common.

Technology is helping organizations keep up with employee expectations. Applicant tracking systems and other automation tools are allowing more companies to switch to a predominately paperless recruiting strategy. These new tools and systems save time and speed up the recruiting process, resulting in an improved experience for both employers and candidates.

And rather than just focus on the longevity of your senior staff, employee retention begins with the initial hiring process. Look for talent interested in gaining skills and growing with your company. Retention requires the recruiting and hiring of people who are the right fit for your organization.

What is the right speed?

Is there a bottleneck slowing things down in your employee recruiting process?

Why time to hire is important to employees

With slow recruitment, you risk losing out on hiring top talent. According to HR consulting firm Robert Half International:

• 23% of job seekers will wait for only 7 days after interviewing to hear from a potential employer
• 57% of candidates lose interest if the hiring process takes too long

A longer hiring process can frustrate candidates looking for a new job. If you drag your feet, they may accept an offer from another company.

23% of job seekers will wait for only 7 days after interviewing to hear from a potential employer.

Why time to hire is important to the employer

The longer it takes to fill an open position, the more it costs your HR department in time and money. Tracking how long it takes to hire a new candidate helps you measure recruiting efficiency. It can also improve the candidate experience and can help you discover ways to improve the process.

Consider using a flowchart to help keep track of each stage of the hiring process. Look for a recruiting timeline template that is easy to use, and then customize it to complement your in-house recruitment strategy.

The timeline should include HR recruitment tasks such as:

• Identifying hiring needs
• Preparing the job description
• Listing on job boards and social media sites
• Reviewing applications
• Scheduling initial phone screenings
• Conducting final interviews
• Verifying candidate backgrounds
• Making an offer of employment

How to speed up your recruitment process

Here are a few more tips on how to speed up your hiring and recruitment process.

Advertise on social media

44% of job seekers are using social media sites to find job opportunities while 33% research employer’s social sites to get a feel for company culture.

While advertising on job boards can be a helpful strategy, you may miss out on potential candidates. A 2021 jobseeker survey reported that 44% of job seekers are using social media sites to find job opportunities while 33% research employer’s social sites to get a feel for company culture.

Make sure you’re listing all openings on your social media sites — Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, at the very least. Social recruiting also exposes you to passive candidates, those not currently looking for a job. However, those same people may become interested in learning more about your organization after reading a recent job posting.

Limit the number of interviews

There’s nothing worse for potential employees than dragging out the hiring process with countless interviews. They may even become frustrated enough to take an offer from one of your competitors.

Try to limit your process to an initial phone screening and in-depth interview with the hiring manager before making an offer of employment. For high-level executive positions, consider requiring a 3rd final interview of the top 3 candidates.

Streamlining interviews saves your organization time and money, while also minimizing the chance of losing one of your top picks. And, once you find the perfect candidate, don’t delay sending out the employment offer. Most applicants have applied for multiple job opportunities.

Optimize job descriptions

When’s the last time your HR team updated job descriptions? Instead of simply listing what potential candidates will do, take time to also mention what they will get out of working for your company. Writing a better job description will help applicants know why your organization is the one they want to choose over other options.

Don’t keep talent guessing, especially not someone looking for their next career move. List the projected pay range and whether you expect the new hire to work in-office or in a more flexible arrangement. Also include information on any travel requirements, and if you expect remote workers to come to corporate headquarters for the annual team retreat.

Writing accurate job descriptions is especially important if you ever plan to work with a recruiting firm or temp agency.

Work with a recruiting agency

You might have certain times of the year when you need to hire additional staff. A retail business often requires extra customer service reps during the busy holiday season, and a health insurance broker may need more sales agents during the open enrollment period.

Working with an outside agency can help supercharge your recruiting outreach efforts during busy times. And, besides assisting with finding temp short-term workers, an agency can typically provide contract-to-hire and direct-hire staffing services.

Use an applicant tracking system (ATS) to automate the hiring process

An applicant tracking system (ATS) can help automate the hiring process. An ATS helps with everything from pushing a job description to multiple employment boards to pulling applications from different sources into a single access point.

The ATS can also help your HR team advertise openings on social media, quickly scan resumes, and schedule interviews. Look for a mobile-friendly system as Glassdoor reports that 58% of job seekers are using their cellphones to investigate new career opportunities.

Intuitive people operations platform

Are you looking for help managing your employee documents, payroll, benefits, time, and attendance? Zenefits is an award-winning people ops platform. It helps streamline hiring, onboarding, PTO, and more, all in one simple and intuitive HR software program.