Over the past year, hiring teams have adopted flexible approaches towards recruitment. Moving forward, companies utilizing an adaptable approach towards recruitment and employee retention will find themselves better off when it comes to competing for top talent. The time to start thinking about rehiring and building your future talent pipeline is now. Businesses continue to confront the need to evolve; you need to anticipate talent needs for the future and beyond and reimagine your recruiting channels to find the best talent for your organization.
Below, we break down seven things HR leaders need to do to prepare their recruitment pipeline for a post-pandemic world.
1. Trust Technology for Remote Recruiting
In 2020, HR & Talent Acquisition leaders shifted to platforms that enabled virtual recruitment, interviewing, and onboarding. As many organizations continue to adopt a remote or hybrid work format, identifying and embracing tools that support a virtual recruitment process is essential. Rather than relying on the support of one single tool, HR leaders need to look at solutions that integrate well with one another, creating an efficient process that supports and nurtures their recruiting efforts at every point in the journey. For a strong end-to-end platform, HR leaders need to utilize the following tools:
Shortlisting & Matching Software
Applicant Tracking Systems
Digital or Paperless Onboarding Software
Performance and Goals Platforms
Employee Engagement Surveys
In order to stay competitive, recruiters and organizations need to weave digitalization into their existing processes. Many businesses have stopped utilizing in-person recruitment strategies (at least for initial screening), leading to a rise in digital recruitment approaches. Moving forward, recruiters should consider their recruitment processes a part of the overall employee experience. By embracing tools such as digital and paperless onboarding platforms, job management boards, and applicant tracking systems, recruiters can hire teams of qualified A Players that will take their business to the next level.
2. Assess Skills Gaps and Talent Shortages
As we all know the South-African economy hit an exceptionally high unemployment rate of 32.6 % in 2020/2021? Imagine the amount of talent pool that is waiting to get rehired due to this. Use this opportunity to assess the talents you have lost and need now with the rise of work-from-home culture. The employee skills that might have been crucial earlier will not hold similar value now. So, take your time to study and refresh your EVP for current and future workforce to hire only the best talents.
3. Reimagine your sourcing channels to build diverse cultures.
It’s no longer enough to want to be inclusive and foster a culture of diversity; it’s time to act. Employers must reset competencies and ways they evaluate and attract talent. To build your 2021 talent pipeline, explore sourcing channels you haven’t tapped before, including new online employment marketplaces, job boards and local organizations. By meeting talent through new mediums, you can build a vibrant talent pipeline that will meet your hiring needs through 2021 and beyond.
4. Focus on Your Brand
There is no denying that focusing on building an engaging brand will determine the status of recruitment applications you receive. The more efforts you divulge into establishing your brand, the more likely that potential candidates will notice and connect with your company. For that, you will have to create a detailed yet appealing company portfolio, website and social media presence. Showcase company values and mission in a way that attracts relevant candidates.
5. Boost the Candidate Experience
Unfortunately, some organisations still don’t give the candidate experience the importance it deserves, however, providing a seamless experience and creating meaningful connections with candidates is even more essential now. Companies must deliver a clear message to candidates that promotes trust in them as a future employer. This may require fine-tuning the current recruitment process, giving recruiters the chance to develop a more thoughtful, engaging, empathic and transparent process, which will remain valuable even after the pandemic is over.
6. Don’t wait to connect with passive talent.
With more people working from home right now, passive talent could have more availability. Now is the time to engage these potential employees and begin building a future talent pipeline. Connecting with candidates now to share your employer brand message in introducing your company will allow you to develop a funnel of talent with the skills you need once your organization is in a position to bring on new hires.
7. Align Recruiting Strategies with Business Strategies
It is quite obvious that you have a completely new set of business development goals planned for the post-Covid world. Consider the idea that you will have to match these with your recruitment plans for both to fit profitably. Conduct discussions with your team about changing the type of roles that your company currently seeks.
In the post-Covid-19 world, speed and agility will be critical. Once the economy fully reopens, companies will need to ramp up extremely quickly, and the ones that can accelerate the fastest will have a lasting advantage. Even though a crisis, by definition, often creates a ripple effect of personal and organizational distress, it’s also an opportunity. Now that you understand what’s needed to thrive during & after difficult times, it’s time to revisit your recruitment planning process. When you’re ready to grow your staff, get started with a free job posting with DIGGER.