6 weeks to hire is too long!

…how to win the recruitment race

by Candace Macfarlane

Looking forward into 2015, a protracted recruitment process might start costing you the market’s best candidates.

How long is your average time to hire?  Four weeks?  Six? Longer??  You’re not alone.  Close to half of employers take six weeks or longer to get to job offer stage.

With job advertisements predicted to continue to increase through 2015, a tightening of the candidate market is certain to follow.  A ‘tight candidate market’ is relative to the market that in the last couple of years has meant that companies recruiting enjoyed the luxury of taking their time and being exceedingly particular about the criteria they deemed to be mandatory.

That luxury is slowly but surely slipping away.

Act now!

If your time-to-hire is excessively long or you are not willing to negotiate on one or more key criteria, your ability to secure high quality talent may diminish significantly.

So what can you do?

As a third party recruiter acting in the best interests of hundreds of clients across highly diverse positions, we have the benefit of accessing some unique insights into the candidate job-seeking mindset.  Here’s what they tell us you can do.

Reduce your time-to-hire

As your recruiting process drags on, a candidate’s engagement in your vacancy decreases. 

This happens for a number of reasons; other exciting job opportunities start distracting them, they start to question the likelihood of success (from experience, if candidates are not kept regularly up to date of progress they can fairly assume it is likely they have not been successful), or, like a honeymoon period in any form of relationship, as time goes on the butterflies disappear and the warm fuzzy feeling starts cooling.

Of course, as an employer you actually want to test their genuine interest and make sure they are really looking for your job, not just their next job, so it requires a balanced approach.  But excessively long processes turn everyone off; even the great candidates expect a level of efficiency.

Set expectations early

If you have an expected offer date or start date, communicate it up front, especially if it is not likely to be resolved within a 3-5 week period.

When candidates know the process and expected timelines they adjust their expectations and are less likely to be intolerant of long processes, even if there are delays.

Over-communicate throughout the process

Those ‘great’ candidates who are willing to be patient through a more protracted recruitment process; those who are already employed and are not under additional pressure to move now, they still need to be kept informed, demanding a level of transparency and communication.

This is especially true for key roles and more senior positions.

Great candidates for these roles often understand the need for a longer recruitment process but are less tolerant when they are kept in the dark.  If you keep them in the loop - even if your update is to let them know that there is a delay - they are more likely to stay engaged and less likely to accept another offer just because it is presented before you come to the end of your recruitment process.

…so long as you keep in touch!

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For further information about Dixon Appointments contact Candace Macfarlane on 03 9629 9999 or email cmacfarlane@dixonappointments.com.au