Over the next few blogs I am going to cover some HR recruiting successes at Fellowship Technologies and give you some practical tips for recruiting successfully…
Who knew you would have to do research and development in HR? To find successful candidates you must first and foremost know and understand the hiring manager. What are his/her likes and dislikes in an employee, what job skills are most important to him? What personality traits and personal characteristics will make this new employee successful under this leadership? What are the manager’s weakness’ that might require refinement? What would threaten this manager? How patience is this manager?
All of these things matter in the life cycle of the recruiting process. Research shows, on average it takes 90-120 days to fill a position from ad posting to person in the chair. That is just unacceptable to me, because when a department needs a person, they needed them 2 days ago. It has always been my goal to achieve 30-45 days cycle but that requires a tremendous amount of follow up and tenacity to stay after the task. Organizing the process ahead of time and getting the hiring manager on the same page as you is critical to making the recruiting life cycle short and concise. Interview the hiring manager first, helping him refine the advertisement, the job description and his expectations of the process. It eliminates the desire for the hiring manager to quickly blame HR when the resumes coming in are less than stellar. I have done both, flying solo writing my own ads and job descriptions and involving the hiring manager in the process up front, please learn from my mistakes, when I say it is a much stronger process when you involve the person who is doing the hiring. Think of yourself like Eve, as a helpmate rather than Adam as the head (this might be a bit harder if you are a male in the HR role J)
Second, select your methods of advertisement wisely, it will save you time and money. Always offer supervisor and below positions to the current employees first, with an internal posting. You never know who has a passion for a particular area until a position opens up. An employee referral program is also a fun way to general excitement around hiring! The current employees might know someone that has the skill set and the personality to fit into the culture of your organization. Networking yourself and other’s networks are a great starting point to finding and retaining employees. Posting externally can be tricky & costly for the return, depending on the position but our favorite places to post are; internet, blogs, industry websites, associations, colleges, our own website and with our customer base.
So here is a quick reference list, more to come on the next blog!
Recruiting Best Practices
1. Know and Understand your Hiring Manager
2. Involve the Hiring Manager deep into the process
3. Post internally for supervisor and below positions
4. Offer an Employee Referral Program, network
5. Select your advertisement wisely with the intentional purpose for the candidates you want to select, if you don’t know ask around
6. Enjoy the process! And remember you are a helpmate!
In Him, Tammy