Make poor hiring a thing of the past

According to research carried out by Oxford Economics the average cost to hire a new member of staff is a whopping £30,000 over six months. This includes things like recruitment costs, training, mentoring, wages and the cost to get your new employee to full productivity. So, it goes without saying that if you can hire right first time around your business could save thousands of pounds.

Unfortunately, in a time of skills shortages and low unemployment getting it right first time around, every time, is getting more and more difficult. There is no magic answer to a perfect recruitment campaign, and you are always going to have a few bumps in the journey. In fact, 95% of businesses make poor hiring decisions across the UK every year, so if you are experiencing problems it’s not just you!

The problem with a lot of businesses is that no matter how attractive the job on offer might be if the employer hasn’t got a robust recruitment process in place the chances of losing talent through bad practice is greatly increased. From the planning to the onboarding, drop a ball and you risk having to settle for second best or worse having to start all over again.

Getting the hiring process right isn’t rocket science it just needs to be managed well right from the start.

Here are some basic tips that will help you think about how to streamline your recruitment process and start hiring better and quicker.

1. Planning: Thinking about what it is you really need and the impact it will have on the business if you do or don’t hire the right person. A well written plan should analyse everything and form the basis for everything else, including deciding who is responsible to run the campaign. 

2. Job Description: A well written job description shouldn’t just be a list of duties, it should form part of the working agreement too. It also allows you to allocate time to each component of the job and document the skills, values and behaviours required to fit the bill.

3. Responding in good time:  Getting back to unsuccessful applicants will help your brand as an employer. 35% of candidates tell their friends and relatives about poor recruitment experiences and 25% tell their work colleagues. The same goes for successful candidates, so get back to them quickly before they get disillusioned and disappear.

4. Interviews: Should have structure. If you can, get a panel of interviewers together with pre-scripted questions. This not only helps with decision making it also helps remove unconscious bias and hasty decisions based on one person’s opinion.

5. Offer and Onboarding: get the offer right and don’t undercut. It’s also your legal responsibility to send the contract with the offer letter, and whatever happens don’t let your potential employee drift away. Handholding between the offer and start date is important; all it takes is a phone call.

Make poor recruitment choices a thing of the past and learn the secrets of how the run successful a recruitment campaign. Get in touch and sign up to our interactive workshop that will provide you with the framework, tools and skills to save you £1000’s of pounds in recruitment costs.

Ian Banks

One to One Personnel Director