The Recruitment Process: A Step By Step Manual

Unlock the secrets to a seamless and successful hiring process, empowering your organization to build a dynamic and thriving team.

What is the Recruitment Process?

The recruitment process starts with creating job openings, evaluating job qualifications, updating resumes, interviewing, shortlisting, talent acquisition, and it ends with choosing the best applicant. Hence, it can be intense as a standalone process.

However, it doesn’t end there. The new employees need to be embedded in the firm’s culture and familiarize themselves with the different organizational demands. One way to understand the importance of recruitment is to read through these recruiting statistics in 2021.

Why is it Important to Choose the Right Candidate?

The most ignored part of the interviewing process is the employee’s background which modern-day business psychology has proven can influence the chances of success in an institution.
It can be the difference between having a toxic working environment and a harmonious one.
Should the human resource department pick the wrong candidate, it may disrupt the office. It may create resentment among the other employees, and the company may find staff members are not in alignment, which will ultimately affect the company’s profits.

Recruiting Strategies

The recruitment process will require organizations to be highly aggressive to create a robust resource base. From sourcing for resources from the management team to going all out to land the best candidates for the job, it can be overwhelming.
Most companies, therefore, opt to submit job vacancies to online websites and hope to attract the best from there. In fact, recruitment software, recruiting CRM, and candidate sourcing tools are becoming a prerequisite for success.

There are multiple sources where companies can do that, such as:

Using LinkedIn to inform other professionals about the job opening
Sharing the vacancy under the company’s Careers webpage
Sharing on different social media platforms
Posting on job portals
Using more traditional media such as newspaper listings
Or creating an advertisement

Another commonly used technology used by HR professionals is ATS (Applicant Tracking Systems) software, which allows for easier and quicker matching with suitable candidates.

To avoid high turnover rates amongst employees, the organization must always adopt a recruiting strategy that will allow them to go after the best employees while not jeopardizing their chances of success.

How to Optimize the Recruitment Process?

Before any interview is conducted, there needs to be a planning stage. HR departments should evaluate and optimize the processes, analyzing metrics such as the amount of time, cost, and quality of the recruitment phase. Businesses need to be flexible and embrace changes where there is room for improvement.

As technology continues to advance, and especially given the recent COVID 19 pandemic, various institutions have changed the recruitment stage slightly.

Interviews are now conducted online with a host of meeting applications, for example, Zoom, Google Meet, and Webex enabling employers to conduct the interviews effectively.

Phases in the Recruitment Process

Every company needs to be aware of the different phases of the recruitment process and tailor-make their processes to suit the qualities they want. The purpose is not to add to the number of employees but also to find the skills the organization requires that prospective clients possess.

Leadership and dedication are especially appealing to employers, and their introduction can mean the institution’s chances of hitting its targets.

1) Identifying the Void to be Filled by Hiring

Businesses need to understand the strengths and weaknesses existing within the organization. It’s not easy to find the right person if you’re not sure what to look for, and ensuring that the human resource department has the proper profile that can fill the void in the company. Identifying the required skills is crucial for success. It will help the HR team find the right person for the job and strengthen their chances of success.

2) Creating a Job Description

Job descriptions describe the tasks to be carried out by the new employee. Creating a good job description will give a better overview of the qualifications the firm needs to look for. Job descriptions will inform prospective candidates what the institution requires from them and if they are suitable candidates. Some of the essential elements a job description should have are:

Job Position/Title
Job Location
Duties & Responsibilities
Qualifications & Skills
Working Conditions
Benefits, Compensations, Perk

3) Searching for Talent

It is among the most challenging steps in the recruitment process because it is dictated by the availability of skills on the market and the organization’s desire to find the best fit. There might be numerous environmental factors that might influence the selection process, and the company needs to be adequately prepared for such challenges.

4) Screening & Shortlisting

After concluding the talent search, the company will scrutinize the options available and come up with the most suitable candidates that offer what’s missing. The candidates are shortlisted and contacted to have them prepare for the interview. It mainly narrows prospective candidates.

5) Interviewing

The interview panel will meet up with prospective employees and question them with the intention to establish whether they are knowledgeable about the role and if they are the best fit for the organization. It involves asking the potential new employees technical questions and observing their nonverbal communication to gauge if they are competent in their field.

6) Evaluation & Picking the Right Candidate

After the interview, the HR team will analyze the interviewed candidates and prepare a job offer for the best ones. At this stage, if the employee accepts the offer then pre-employee screening, professional references, and all additional background checks are initiated.

7) Onboarding & Welcoming the New Employee

It is the final stage where the company fills the position and integrates the new member into the organization’s culture. Following the onboarding, the employee’s manager should have their first one-on-one meeting with a new employee.