Do you remember the last time you found the perfect candidate for one of your key roles only to lose them to a competitor? Or perhaps your applicant accepted a counteroffer from their current employer? 

These situations remind us that hiring is a two-way process. 

You're not alone if you've experienced rejections from an applicant or candidate. You may have asked yourself: 

• Where did it go wrong? 
• What could you have done differently?
• Was it something you said in that face-to-face interview? 

You may well have adopted the same personality traits as a nervous candidate yourself. To avoid this feeling, we must focus on creating an irresistible employer brand.

Let’s start to think about the recruitment process as a two-way approach. Recognising the importance of selling the company to candidates is essential to improving your hiring process.

Why is the assessment process important to hiring effectively? 

One of the most important moments in the recruitment process happens when the candidate interviews with you. The candidate experience here can have a big impact on their final decision, because the interview stage is where a candidate will form their views on the organisation, and the specific job, based on their experience.

During our reviews of a client’s assessment process, we regularly experience face-to-face interviews that need improvement. The design of the process skews toward evaluating candidates’ suitability for the role and the organisation.

Employers are assessing candidates but ignoring the fact that this is when the candidate will assess the organisation too. Here a candidate will decide whether the company is also a good fit.

Pitfalls to avoid during the interview process

Employers run the risk of losing potential candidates who you’ve spent time engaging with by:

• Not inviting candidates to ask questions about the open role or job description.
• Failing to ask about plans for the future.
• Not engaging in key topics that may impact hiring decisions.

It is important to ensure that you train your hiring managers to represent the organisation in the correct way. Hiring managers must step beyond the traditional interview techniques. Interviews shouldn’t see employees and employers sitting across a table in awkward silence. There are a number of ways to adapt to the modern expectations of an interview.

Three ways to refocus your assessment approach internally

Achieve “Approved Recruiter” Status

An Approved Recruiter training programme can set benchmarks for your Learning & Development team. Managers who will recruit as part of their role need to pass the course before they are able to interview for new hires.

For one Hays client, this approach generated immediate improvements to the candidates feedback post-interview. Not every company will have the ability, or the resources, to develop and deploy this official approach. But you may want to consider applying set criteria for all hiring managers to follow.

Distribute training via Learning Management Systems (LMS)

If your organisation has a good LMS platform, consider creating a module for assessment best practices. A best practice module can help to train hiring managers on:

• How to sell the organisation.
• How to identify the candidate's areas of interest.

To encourage your team to engage with the LMS, offer support on using any assessment toolkits. Make it easy to engage with interview assessment processes. This will prevent the recruitment team from falling back into one-sided interview tactics. You’ll be able to implement new approaches fairly and with confidence.

Host face-to-face training on delivering a positive candidate experience

If you find that a self-guided LMS doesn’t work, consider a more direct approach to improve your hiring process. A common approach is for internal recruiters to review a set of training slides. We recommend that at least one third of these slides focus on:

• Building rapport with the candidate.
• Understanding their individual needs and wants.
• Building the candidate's interest in the organisation.

Face-to-face training still plays a major role in amending behaviours. Avoid patronising the team by explaining why the assessment process is important to hiring. Focus instead on adapting to a new world of recruitment rather than on “correcting” past behaviours.

Discover how to enhance the candidate journey even further: Six ways to improve your candidate experience.

Checklist for improving your recruitment strategies

When you consider the return on investment, making your assessment a two-way process should be a top priority. You can save time and money by recruiting only once, rather than repeating the process after a candidate rejects your offer.

To improve your hiring process, consider the following:

• Invest in your employer brand proposition.
• Train hiring managers to promote the organisation during interview.
• Be positive and encouraging during interviews, to avoid off-putting candidates.
• Invite candidates to ask questions to the interviewer.
• Offer honest insight into your workplace - remember that candidates will soon know if you sell an unrealistic expectation.
• Demonstrate your company culture on social media.

Making these small changes will help your hiring managers to qualify candidates for a new role. Hiring applicants who are bought-in to your company culture can turn great candidates into new employees. These employees can then become future leaders for your organisation.

Save time and stress by taking a holistic approach to assessing candidates

Developing a holistic solution, focusing on the candidate experience should be a priority for all forward-thinking employers. When was the last time that you ‘mystery shopped’ your own recruitment process? Do you understand the experience you have designed for your applicants?

Make it a priority to impress your candidates as much as they impress you. In doing so, you will quickly have a plan of attack to improve the candidate experience.

Developing a two-way assessment process with Hays

By developing an effective two-way assessment process, you can ensure potential candidates choose your organisation over the competition. Learn more about winning the battle for talent: 

• How to optimise your candidate experience for Generation Z.
• Why a great contingent value proposition is important
• Six ways to improve your candidate experience

Or contact the team to explore how we can elevate your hiring strategies. 

AUTHOR

Jon Mannall
EMEA Managing Director, Enterprise Solutions at Hays 
Jonathan is the Managing Director for EMEA, leading Enterprise Solutions teams across 11 countries. With a team of over 400 resourcing professionals, Jon ensures that our clients are provided with the workforce engagement solutions that meet their human capital needs, including permanent recruitment, contingent labour and outsourced services.

Having been with the company since 2011, other roles have included Client Director, Service Delivery Director and Head of Sales for the UK.

Prior to joining Hays, and after completing his Masters in Philosophy and Management, Jon worked in the RPO and MSP sector for 10 years with a range of Financial Services, Public Sector, IT & Telecommunications, and Insurance clients in Sales and Operations Director roles.