The global health crisis disrupted the hiring and recruiting patterns businesses that job seekers have used for years. When looking at the 2019 recruiting predictions and trends for 2020, we can draw only one conclusion: nobody expected things to change so fundamentally. Today, the recruiting landscape is evolving by the minute, with top HR experts and seasoned CEOs adjusting to the workforce market’s new realities. So let’s see the significant recruiting trends, tools, and methods to get the best candidates for your company.
Top 3 recruiting trends to consider this year
To be successful in your recruiting efforts, you have to keep up and swiftly adapt your hiring patterns to our challenging times. Posting job offers online and asking candidates where they see themselves in the next five years will not help your business tap into that talent pool everybody is competing for this year. So what are top HR experts putting their money on this year?
1. Applicant tracking systems
We have talked about Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) before. This recruiting software type manages candidate profiles and databases. They help your HR team identify the best available candidates matching the descriptions of the job you have available. Using ATS, you shorten the recruitment process and save money. However, their most significant advantage is that they help you pre-screen potential candidates and customize your interviews and assessments to lead you to the best employee for your company.
Many recruiters fear that the rise of AI and software for recruiting, onboarding, and offboarding will leave them out of a job. It is not the case, of course. On the other hand, technology leads the charge in every field, so it is better to embrace it sooner rather than later.
2. Pre-employment assessment tools and instruments
Merit hiring or skills-based hiring is not something experts invented last year, but it is something to incorporate into your recruitment strategies and fast.
The 2020 U.S. Executive Order on Modernizing and Reforming the Assessment and Hiring of Federal Job Candidates clarifies that successful companies switch their perspective from degree-based/work experience hiring to competencies and skills-based hiring, prompting the Federal Government to do the same.
This approach is a global game-changer in a game that was already afoot.
If you want your business to stay ahead of the competition, you should invest in skilled employees. In this framework, a hiring testing service will be of tremendous help. The instruments used focus on assessing a candidate’s soft skills and transferable ones, cognitive skills, personality, temperament, attitudes, etc. Paired with behavioral interview questions and emotional intelligence evaluation, the modern pre-employment assessment tools for skills are your surefire way to find the best human assets for your company.
Identifying soft skills in workers is not an easy feat. You will have to work with professional agencies providing such types of assessment tools or buy the tools and train your HR department to use them to their full potential.
When they talk about soft skills – or, better yet, employability skills –, top HR experts mention:
- adaptability,
- excellent communication capabilities,
- teamwork,
- problem-solving aptitudes,
- critical thinking,
- conflict management,
- proactivity, and more.
3. Collaborative hiring
Many companies know and use employee referral programs, but collaborative recruiting is a trend many companies embraced last year. The strategy is to turn every employee into a brand ambassador that is also a headhunter. Many businesses adopt this approach as they realize it comes with plenty of benefits and that talent exists beyond job aggregators, online ads, and social media.
Some excellent candidates do not even consider looking for another job until a friend (your employee) presents an opportunity they cannot refuse.
On the other hand, being recruited by a team of collaborating employees rather than a couple of busy HR execs makes the candidate thrilled to work in what seems a collaborative work environment.
As you can imagine, collaborative recruiting involves a series of well-crafted strategies, many of which relate to your company’s branding, pre-employment assessment strategies, interviewing tactics, and organizational core values.
Final thoughts
To say that the world is changing would be an understatement. Nevertheless, just as you look for highly adaptable candidates, you should adapt your recruitment approach to the new reality. Recruiting now relies more on technology than ever. It focuses on finding the best candidates for remote jobs, as it might be the future, like it or not. Ultimately, recruiting means upping your diversity and inclusion policies, testing for soft and hard skills, and focusing your attention on employee retention.
Are you ready to incorporate such hiring trends in your business this year? What else can you think of related to adjusting your recruitment processes?
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