Businesses have never done as much hiring as they do today. They’ve never spent as much money doing it. And they’ve never done a worse job of it.
In a recent Harvard Business Review (HBR) article titled “Your Approach to Hiring is All Wrong” that’s part of a larger series on Recruiting, Professor Peter Cappelli tells readers that as an industry we’re, to put it plainly, a hot mess.
Whether addressing some of the more obvious shifts in how we recruit today, how many companies are ignoring the internal candidate/employee experience, or our incredible and ongoing challenge to get our arms and minds around the true analytics of recruiting, hiring, and retaining talent, Cappelli tells it like it is and includes data points gathered from Korn Ferry, SHRM, and CareerXroads.
[Listen: Lars Schmidt talks with Peter Cappelli about today’s hiring practices. ]
Five things CXR thinks you should pay attention to
A few things that are called out and that CXR has been recommending for years but that for some reason or another continues to be difficult for so many leaders to execute on:
- Get real with job descriptions and requirements
It’s 2019, and we’ve no excuse to have job descriptions posted that are simply a list of 32 bullet points, 3 pages of “nice-to-haves”, nearly unreadable, or an incredible showcase of how skilled someone was at using Ctrl+C on the company’s media page. - Stop posting “evergreen” or “ghost” requisitions (Yes, even you. No, you aren’t special.)
While less skilled or even lesser networked recruiters think that this is a great way to build pipelines, it’s not. The “black hole” experience that this typically delivers to candidates is not only sub-par but we know that the large majority of people that apply to these future jobs simply don’t get looked at or contacted at all. - Start internally for talent and work outwards
Focusing on an internal candidate experience can bring benefits to not only speed of hire but incredible cost savings that span beyond that single role. Tack on to this the long-term impact to culture and brand when a company is known for developing and promoting from within and splitting that budget between external and internal recruitment marketing and technology becomes a no-brainer. - Ditch the funnel mentality and focus on a chute
It’s long past time to put the top of your funnel on a diet. Through realistic job descriptions and previews and more targetted recruitment marketing and advertising (just for starters) organizations can realize that it’s better to encourage candidates to opt-out early on their own. The result is a more qualified pool of talent that recruiting teams will have more time to fully review and hopefully engage. - There’s more – go read the full article.
Peter Cappelli goes into detail around his thoughts on over a dozen other sticking points in practice today. It’s worth the read and we’d even recommend forwarding the article (if not at least this overview) to all of your colleagues and peers. After all, a rising tide lifts all boats.
[Also Read: Building your recruiting tech stack: One step at a time]
As a fan and longtime subscriber to HBR, my recommendation is for TA leaders and practitioners alike to pay for full access and contribute to the production of this wonderful resource. At a minimum, continue to check out the recruiting series and insights from Wharton’s Prof. Cappelli.
