A recent Glassdoor study found that the average hiring process in the U.S. took 23 days in 2014, jumping from 13 days in 2010—the upward trend is also seen in Europe, Canada and Australia.
As many of you know, time can kill a deal for a recruiter. So where is the line drawn between being thorough and taking too much time to fill a position?
There are a number of reasons that cause filling a job order to be prolonged, from a lengthy interview process to the economy. Read the rest of this entry »
Recruiting top talent is becoming more difficult. One recruitment tool being leveraged to recruit top talent is benefits. A March 2015 SHRM survey reports that employers are tuned into benefits as a recruitment tool. More frequently employers are using their benefits packages as the reason for someone to change jobs. Read the rest of this entry »
I just saw a Jobvite Social Recruiting Survey that listed the top 6 reasons employees leave your company. They listed the following reasons: Read the rest of this entry »
Our blog today comes from Nick Bowditch who has recently joined Forsythes Recruitment. Nick has come to Forsythes from Facebook where he was their Regional SME Manager (AUS/NZ). He has re-launched Forsythes’ IT/Tech/Startup recruitment division out of his home office on the Central Coast. He is currently managing recruitment assignments for Instagram, Twitter and Telstra just to name a few. Nick works with innovative startups and small businesses in Australia and internationally, presenting at conferences and inspiring others to take the leap into their own startups, as well as working with big brands helping them connect to small businesses and their communities better – both offline and online.
So your recruitment company has given you a shortlist of candidates to chat to about the vacant position with your startup. So how do you know you are hiring the right person? Think about these 4 things:
Are they doing something that you can’t?
Often in the startup phase you are bootstrapping the business or under some financial pressure. I am a big believer in hiring what you need rather than what you would ideally like. So the first hire – after you and the other co-founder(s) – is often the most important one. Will this next hire mean you can get some money in to then recruit further? Is the role that they will fill something that you and people already in the business could do if you were really pushed? I think hiring for skill gaps in your business is the way to think about it.
Do they share your vision?
Let’s face it, nobody is really going to share your vision, not the way you do. But you can reasonably expect them to be on board at least with what you are trying to do and what you think their role is in that. Unfortunately a lot of startups find out their new employee doesn’t share their vision for the business until they have sapped a lot of your resources and finances and it’s too late.
Do they need structure and a hiding place?
Startups are scrappy. Sometimes you are doing your job and sometimes you are doing stuff you never would have dreamed doing. The scrappiness of startups both attracts and frustrates people who work in that space but it can be a very rude shock if you are not prepared for it. If you work out that someone is used to working in a big corporate space where they can hide all day without it being obvious then you are probably not hiring the right person for your startup.
Understand what motivates them.
What do they want to achieve? What’s going to get the best out of them? What will totally frustrate them? Most importantly, are both you and they aligned on these things? You don’t have to know everything about them but understanding what motivates them is the number one way to ensure you are getting optimal performance from your new startup employee.
What’s been your experience with hiring the right – or wrong – people? What would you change next time?
Today’s post is courtesy of Joshua Ro with People Consulting Group in Seoul, Korea. People Consulting Group places senior executives in manufacturing, information technology, consumer products, banking and finance, telecommunications, logistics and distribution, professional services, entertainment, and fashion. Joshua serves as a member of the NPAworldwide Board of Directors.
Recently, I attended a human resources seminar where most of the attendees were foreign companies doing business in Korea. There I had an opportunity to speak with a HR Director of McDonald’s Korea and she mentioned that they have a high rate of employee retention. The reason is 3 keywords their employees have identified: Family & Friends, Flexibility and Future. McDonald’s Korea’s staff members and employees feel they belong to a Family & Friends, enjoy Flexibility at work which drives better performances, and see a vision for the Future in getting promotion and opportunities.
Then I came to think about the implications of these three key factors in successful employee retention in our own field. The recruitment industry is somewhat notorious for having a high turnover rate.
I understand making staff members and employees feel they belong to a family and/or group of friends is a key factor in retaining them. Amongst any group, there must be some who are doing better than others, yet others who are struggling. Surely it would be your desire to have all of your family members perform well. Thus, investing your time to make them feel they are a member of the family may encourage that high performance and ultimately help you to retain your staff and employees.
Another key to employee retention is providing flexibility at work. We are so used to working from 9:00AM to 6:00PM, but it is important to recognize the different situations of each staff member and employee. Offering flexibility at work, such as giving different options in working schedules, will certainly lift their burdens off from their shoulders and lead to higher performance.
Lastly, envisioning a realistic and tangible future (not a transient one) at work helps retain staff members and employees. Setting goals and making them see what is achievable triggers their sense of fulfillment and satisfaction. This means employees have to see the benefits and rewards generated from both their work and your organization.
Retaining staff members and employees, especially the high performers in the recruitment industry, is challenging. Addressing the “3 F’s” of Family/Friends, Flexibility, and Future improves employee retention and may also increases their job performance and overall satisfaction.
Today’s guest blogger is James Seidel with James Seidel & Associates located in Kelowna, BC, Canada. JSA is an owner-operated firm with clients across western Canada. The firm primarily places candidates in I/T, engineering, and sales. James is a former I/T Trading Group Chair and is currently serving on NPA’s Board of Directors .
There we have it. A shiny new job description is drawn up by the department head and handed to the HR manager. This one is pretty straightforward, lots of keywords and technical jargon to make the internet searching a breeze. It is confidently handed to the in-house recruiting staff (all experts on the latest social media search tools), complete with a guarantee of three or four candidates within a couple of weeks. After all, with four recruiters and a manager, we’ve got our own in-house search firm – with no fees to pay any more!! Gosh, this has become easy and cheap… Read the rest of this entry »