The Ultimate Hiring Experience
Your hiring process is your product. Here's how to provide the ultimate hiring experience.
We'll concede, it doesn't matter what app, type of app, or hiring tech you use, it will not fix or be a replacement for an awful hiring experience. This where you as an employer bare the responsibility on ensuring applicants, candidates, and new hires are treated just as any customer would: nothing short of excellence.
Ultimately, you should think of your hiring process as one of your product offerings. Every company has one and you’re competing for talent, it’s to your benefit to offer the best possible hiring experience. Just like you create onboarding guides for SaaS customers or unboxing experiences, you should always strive to offer an unforgettable hiring experience.
We've put together this guide to help you provide the ultimate hiring experience from the minute you post your job post to the minute your new hire logs onto their desktop on the first day.
Often times a job post can be an overlooked component or piece of the hiring process, however it's one of the most important. It sets the standard of expectation and it's often times the first impression job seekers get of your company, its culture, and its mission.
Ensuring you have a well written, succint, and insightful job post is key to attracting talent. You can read our ultimate guide to job posting for more.
You can approach this from a few fronts, a) you can provide 1-click applications which is the easiest thing for applicants, but leads to high quantity/ low quality results; b) you can provide question-based applications that require 10 to 15 minutes to complete and can draw away talent because it requires a high degree of investment and high friction; or c) you can offer something like Clarify that's just in the middle with the right amount of friction that asks applicants to quickly and succintly highlight their achievements and best work, which can lead to better conversational insight at the interview stage.
Regardless of what route you choose, it's important to think through your approach at this stage because it can create headaches for you and your applicants.
You've likely been at both ends of the hiring process, either as a recruiter / hiring manager or as a job seeker. One of the most common complaints (and rightfully so) from job seekers is not hearing back after they've applied for a job.
We get it, it's likely not possible to email every single applicant throughout the course of your hiring process, but it is possible to automate some of this communication. You can use Clarify to automate and notify applicants that: their application was received succesfully; their application was viewed; and their application was not a fit.
With Clarify employers can send an email notification to applicants letting them know their application has been viewed. You can turn these on by going to Settings > Automations.
You can always choose to individually email applicants with feedback. Just remember to communicate and automate wherever and whenever possible.
We can't say this enough, it's critical for both Recruiters and Hiring Managers to be aligned on what's expected of the role, the applicants, and the job search. Otherwise expect wasted time and money, potentially bad hiring decisions, and a detrimental impact to the business.
If you're not aligned you risk a lengthier hiring process and a bad interview experience. We've seen our fair share of interviews where either a) the applicant suddenly is suprised to be interviewing for a different role than they applied for and b) where Hiring Managers don't realize until the interview stage that the applicant wasn't a fit for their vision of the role.
Lastly – and this should go without saying – don't be rude or disrespectful, applicants are also your customers.
You should be clear on your job offer, don't leave your soon to be new hire guessing. Make the start date, compensation, any bonus(es), and pertaining information clear. It's always best to bullet point these key pieces of information.
There are employers that know the first day on the job is one of if not the most important steps in the hiring process, there are others that somehow think their job is done and flounder away. Be the former, not the latter.
Countless times we've seen new hires get to their desks whether Remote or In-Office, with no logins, missing licenses, email addresses not setup, spinning around in their chairs twiddling their thumbs. Why? because the Recruiter and/or Hiring Manager failed to communicate with IT to acquire and setup the appropriate resources needed for the job.
This is not just a waste of time for you but offputting for a new hire. It leaves a bad first impression.
Are you looking for an easy and straightforward way to improve your hiring process? Get feedback from both applicants that took part throughout the hiring process and weren't hired AND your new hires. You should view yourself as an Applicant Success Manager, it changes your viewpoint and approach to the hiring process.