A recruiter often spends the day going through hundreds of resumes, cold-calling candidates, shortlisting candidates, scheduling interviews, and sending assessment links to candidates. Recruiters play key role in bringing change in the candidate’s lives by sharing the good news of opportunities and offers. The task though exciting, is also filled with day-to-day repetitive activities that if performed inaccurately, might cost the business loss of good talent and in turn loss in revenue. Here, Alibha Priyadarshini from CEIPAL, shares a few mistakes that recruiters should avoid to attract more talent –
Incomplete messaging on job descriptions
The most common mistake made by recruiters is not curating proper job descriptions and not marketing them correctly. A job description is the first thing that candidates read about the position. Often, recruiters just list down a set of duties and responsibilities and publish them. A good job description consists of a summary of the company, roles and responsibilities, job location, perks, benefits, optionally compensation, and company culture details. Even if recruiters manage to add all the information, they often tend to use gendered terms(use words like ‘rockstar’, ‘ninja’, ‘superhero’). To capture candidates’ attention recruiters should incorporate details of company culture and use the words that showcase inclusivity.
Not following up with candidates
Job hunting is incredibly stressful for candidates, and a lack of proper communication adds to the anxiety. Overburdened with multiple candidate responses, recruiters forget to keep everyone in the loop. Poor interaction often causes poor candidate experience and leads to candidate dropouts. Keeping candidates in the dark about their application progress does not reflect well on the employer brand. Recruiters should ensure that they stay in close contact with the candidates and keep them informed about their application status.
Feedback Submission
Deciding to accept a job offer is a big life decision for job seekers. Even if they are not selected, candidates always want to know the feedback on their applications. The key to a successful candidate engagement strategy is to build trust with the candidate. This requires consistently keeping in touch with them and sending them feedback on their assessments and interviews.
Scanning through resumes in seconds
On average, employers look at resumes for only six seconds. Since recruiters are usually time-constrained, instead of going manually through each resume they can rely on Applicant Tracking System for shortlisting resumes. The Applicant Tracking System can impartially assess the complete information collected from resumes and shortlist the candidates that best fit the position.
Rushing the hire for filling the position
To fill a position early and meet the hiring goals, recruiters tend to push candidates for job positions that might not be a good fit for them. Candidates at higher levels are often offered mid-level positions and freshers are offered positions beyond their current skill levels. With such a rush, recruiters not only drive the candidates to decline the offer but also burn the bridge to contact those candidates in the future.
Not checking for culture-fit
Recruitment is no longer based only on educational qualifications and skillsets. Company culture is exceptionally important for any organization and the wrong candidate can make or break the cohesion that exists in the company. When the candidates share the company’s vision and values, they find it easier to excel in their careers and contribute more to the business. Thus, the hiring professionals need to measure the cultural compatibility of the candidates with the organization.
Is Recruitment Automation the answer?
After all, to err is human. Recruitment specialists often face burnout with everyday mundane tasks. Recruitment automation is the key to solve all the above-mentioned problems. Recruitment software like Applicant Tracking Software and Recruitment CRM allow recruiters to cut down 70% of time spent on sourcing candidates. With features like resume parsing, AI-based candidate sourcing, recruitment chatbots, recruitment marketing, etc., recruiters can handle the complete recruitment cycle with full visibility of the talent pipeline and thus increase their productivity.
