Recruiting Fresher? Few Factors to be considered

A necessary part of growing your business is recruiting staff. Recruitment is an essential step that ensures that you can bring aptly qualified and motivated people into your business, which is crucial if you are to expand. While the process of finding and sorting through applicants may seem like a tiresome job, there are some simple guidelines that can be followed to ensure hiring a new employee does not become a burden. Corporate giants like Microsoft, Coles Myer and Pfizer have refined their hiring processes, and it should be no different for any start-up or growing small business. You too can ensure a well-oiled recruitment process if you follow these steps below:

Understand What the Position Demands

Before undertaking any serious steps towards hiring a new employee, it is imperative that you understand what the job demands. Be clear on what tasks and responsibilities need to be completed, and what the person operating in that position needs to achieve. Think about what is required now for them to accurately perform and add value, but also consider new projects or changes in the business that may be able to be incorporated into your current recruitment. This will help to ensure you have the adequate skills and resources for the months ahead.

Determine complementary personality traits to match your business

Once you’ve got a clear idea of the Job Description, you need to determine the ‘soft skills’ or personality traits you are seeking in an applicant, which will complement your business. A person’s demeanour, attitude, values and motivations can have such a negative impact on your business if they are not aligned to yours and the business’s goals and values.
Let’s say you are hiring an Accounts Clerk responsible for the Accounts Payable and Receivable functions. You have already spent time identifying your business’s goals and values, and have determined that providing an exceptional customer experience is a top priority. Being highly organised with a high attention to detail might be necessary, but unless this applicant also has a polite telephone manner, along with an exceptional understanding of customer service, then he or she may not be the person to match this position and reflect your business’s needs.
So before recruiting you need to get clear on your needs, otherwise the rest of the recruitment process will be a waste of time for you both.

Write an Appealing Job Advertisement

You need to be clear about what your company needs when you are advertising the position, but you also need to consider what the applicant may be seeking, as recruitment is about both party’s needs being met. When hiring a new employee you need to write an advertisement that not only details the main job responsibilities and necessary qualifications but you also need to appeal to an applicant’s wants and desires and foresee or limit any fears or doubts they may have.
To do this, be sure to discuss positive attributes about the company, the people, the opportunity presented and highlight the benefits that may be received. It is this additional information that can help your advertisement stand out from the crowd. It is better to have a wider range of applicants applying to your advertisement than not enough, especially if it’s a tighter job market. You can then screen and eliminate those who have not met the necessary skills and requirements.

Eliminate Resumes that do not match your Employment criteria

Once you start to receive applications you need to screen resumes eliminating those that do not fit the criteria you have set as being necessary for your business’s needs. Go through the resumes carefully and measure for skills, qualifications, past experience but also ‘soft skills’ and values that you believe will be complimentary. Move swiftly to invite suitable applicants in for an interview as good applicants will always be desired by many companies and its best you move quickly. Great candidates are always in demand and you don’t want to miss the opportunity of interviewing them just because another company who was following a structured recruitment process acted more swiftly.

Conduct in-depth interviews and involve your respected employees in the process

When hiring a new employee to be prepared by determining a set list of questions you would like to ask, questions that will tell you about their experience, their level of skill, their ability to make decisions, their personality, their motivations and their long-term goals or desires.
These questions will give your interview structure. Always ensure that you ask each candidate the same set of questions so that there is no bias and you can judge candidates equally. Always take detailed notes being sure to listen to their responses but also observe their body language looking for any inconsistencies.
Always conduct a series of at least two interviews. You need to stretch the candidate and get to know them under different circumstances. Involve your team in the process, allow them the opportunity to also assess the candidates’ ability to join your team; they can be used to ask role specific or technical questions where they have a greater understanding of the day-to-day responsibilities.
A structured approach will ensure the reliability of the interview process and ensure that you have explored all areas of an applicant’s suitability and not left anything out.

Always conduct background checks

It’s an exciting stage to be at when you have moved through the selection and interviewing stage to arrive at a candidate who you think is the perfect match for the business. However, don’t let your excitement or need for the position to be filled stop you from carrying out employment, reference or background checks. You should confirm skills, qualifications, prior experience and personality traits by checking with those who have worked with this person previously.
A past supervisor will either confirm what the applicant has discussed with you in the interview, or they may divulge further information that had not been given to you. This extra information will help you move forward in offering the job to the candidate, or it will allow you to further explore any doubts or inconsistencies, as you need to be sure that you are inviting the right person into your company.
After doing these checks it is also possible that you have not found ‘the perfect match. If so reassess your short listed candidates and continue interviewing, or you may need to start the process over again. Remember it’s best to be sure before offering this opportunity to just ‘anyone’.

Make the employment offer all about them

You’ve now determined who the best candidate is to add value to your business so don’t let them get away when it comes to offering them the opportunity to join your business.
Make the offer about them, refer back to what they are motivated by, what their goals and desires are, and how this is a match with your business and how you can ensure that their needs can be met by joining your team.
Often times the offer doesn’t have to be about money, as this is not the candidate’s number one reason for leaving their current employer. It’s often about opportunity, lifestyle, management, growth and contribution, so incorporate such benefits that will satisfy these needs. You could offer paid training, a mentoring program, flexible work hours, working from home or extra annual leave.
But only offer these if you are willing to stand by the offer. There is no point offering something and then not delivering as you will only find yourself recruiting again in a few short months as you have let the new employee down and they will see right through you.
For any business to continue to grow and expand it is a necessity that a structured recruitment process is embraced when hiring a new employee? Simply look at many of the corporate giants of today who were once small time ventures, and follow in their footsteps. They have produced a structured process that incorporates the steps above into their daily hiring activities and know that acquiring the best people is imperative to the success of their business, and it is just as critical, if not more so, for small businesses to do the same.