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We all know the recruitment and selection process can be inefficient, but it doesn’t have to be. Focusing on goals before your first candidate sits down for an interview is a great way to cut out the fat from the recruitment process and get the correct people for the job faster.
Why is it so important to improve your recruitment and selection process? According to the Society of Human Resource Management, the average time to hire for a small business is 29 days, and for a larger organization, this number can rise to as many as 43 days. The best and brightest in your field likely won’t be willing to wait a month or longer for a position at your company, especially not if your competitor can scoop them up faster.
Enter goal-based job descriptions. By focusing on your goals before ever picking up the phone, you can streamline the process and improve the candidates applying to your positions. Let’s take a look at two major steps for improving your process and cutting out recruitment and selection inefficiencies:
Step 1: Get Goal-Oriented During Requisition Approval
Before you dive into the deep end of your recruitment and selection process, first you need to rethink your requisition approvals. After all, the road to better personnel selection starts way before you start drafting your job descriptions.
So what's the answer to improving your selection process? Keep an eye on your organizational goals and ensure the new hire will be able to contribute to your company in a meaningful way.
After all, not many organizations can afford the costly specter of employee turnover. This is because employee turnover can cost you as much as $50,000 and break down your corporate communication. In a recent survey, more than 27 percent of leaders pegged employee turnover and role change as an impediment to cascading corporate communication.
Keeping an eye on your organization’s goals makes it easier to know what positions you need to keep your team moving. Making req approval goal-based helps the process move faster by setting timelines before talking to candidates. You'll know exactly what role the future hire will play in the organization and how this new position will contribute toward tangible goals.
It also reduces inefficiencies and employee turnover, improving your personnel selection before you even draft a job posting. Keeping requisition approvals goal-based forces you and your team to focus on how the candidate will fit into your company and how they will contribute toward specific goals. This decreases the chance of costly employee turnover by ensuring your candidates have a well-defined role and purpose from their first day on the job.
Step 2: Pen Great Goal-Based Job Descriptions
Utilizing goal-based job descriptions can really help you cut out the fat from the recruitment and selection process. Current job descriptions don’t tell candidates enough information about the job or how their contributions work towards organizational goals. Most of these descriptions are vague or far too sales-y.
They're trying to sell the candidate on your company without telling the candidate exactly how their contributions will fit into the overall company mission statement. This greatly hampers your selection process, as the wrong fitting candidates apply for jobs while better candidates look for job descriptions with more substance.
To improve the candidates coming through your recruitment process, you need to engage with the best people as early as the job description. You can engage the best candidates by showing them how their future position will align with company goals and guidelines.
In fact, a recent survey showed that 58 percent of workers would be willing to take a 15 percent pay cut in order to work for an organization with the same values. Put your organizational mission statement on display so future employees can easily see if they'll be the right fit, not only for the job but for the goals your company is working towards.
You should look to make job descriptions goal-based, specific, and actionable. For instance, one of your job descriptions might say your candidate needs to have five years of programming experience. But this doesn't tell the candidate exactly what they'll be doing or what specific kind of experience is necessary to perform the job. It doesn't tell them what functions they'll be performing or how those functions fit like puzzle pieces into the overall organization.
Instead, a goal-based job description would list the type of programs a candidate should be proficient in, as well as how these programs will be used in the role. It would also briefly sketch how the job, in general, fits into the company's mission statement, and how individual contributions will help the company move forward.
Personnel selection is about more than finding a candidate who can just do the job. Good personnel selection is about finding someone who will really add value to the organization and help you achieve your goals, both large and small.
Attracting the right candidates in the recruitment and selection process isn't always easy. The best way to find the best people is to ensure your recruitment and selection process aligns with your overall company goals and strategies, so you add someone to the team ready to move your company forward.
How do you use goal-based recruitment and selection to improve your hires?
photo courtesy of denverjeffrey
