Everywhere I travel I hear the same thing: it’s a struggle to find and secure top talent. As I’ve written many times, you no longer have the luxury of simply recruiting talent, you have to compete for talent.
Yet beyond having that mindset, what can you do to increase your “win rate”?
Use Speed as a Competitive Advantage
If your hiring process is slow, then chances are you’re losing good people to your competition. Companies that treat the hiring process with urgency are not only quick to identify and pursue the best talent, they also send the message that they’re driven to succeed; they’re on a mission.
Software company Intuit provides a great example. They’ve accelerated their hiring process to where candidates go through an intensive series of interviews and evaluations across a single day. Intuit employees who have proven to be good talent evaluators play a major role in the process. At the end of the day the evaluation team makes decisions and will often give successful candidates same-day offers.
That’s using speed as a competitive advantage.
Design Their Experience: The Better They Feel, the More You Win
One of your prime objectives in the hiring process is to have each candidate feel good. About your company, about the people they meet, about the work environment, about the position they’re applying for, and about their future prospects. Design your hiring process with all of these in mind!
Think: Do you let candidates know not just what your company does and how it operates but what it values and how it makes a difference in society? Do you have candidates meet people who they can identify with? People who engage them with genuine interest? People with positive energy? Do they get to experience the work environment? Is it upbeat? Is it fun? Do meaningful things get accomplished? Do they see how they could play an important role within your company? And do they see viable career paths that appeal to them?
Everything a candidate experiences throughout the hiring process should build positive associations. So that they want to work with you. By doing this, you’re far less likely to lose the ones you want.
Yes, it’s a struggle to secure top talent. But you can gain an edge. Use speed as a competitive advantage and design the candidate’s experience to build positive associations. Then measure your win rate. And let your competitors bemoan how hard it is to secure top talent.
Make it happen.
Michael
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Hiring in a Tight Labor Market? Here’s How to Increase Your “Win Rate”
