Candidate-centric recruiting: What jobseekers won’t put up with in the hiring process

An enduring skills shortage has forced employers to get creative in their recruitment practices. How can your business change its hiring process to secure the best candidates?

WorkPro’s new It’s Not Me, It’s You: Challenging the Status Quo of Australia’s Hiring Landscape report has exposed the new lay of the recruitment land for Aussie businesses. The report found that recent times have shifted the balance of power more towards the candidate rather than the hirer and revealed three considerations for prospective employers to keep in mind.

1. Enhancing the candidate experience

“The candidate experience is not merely a ‘nice to have’; it’s a non-negotiable,” said Tania Evans, founder and chief executive at WorkPro.

When it comes to boosting candidate experience in the hiring process, WorkPro said, there are three things to prioritise: speed, ease, and transparency.

For all three, effective use of digital technology can be a game changer. “With a singular focus on human capital as an organisation’s most prized asset, HR and recruitment is predominantly a human-to-human process, which no amount of technology can ever overshadow,” said WorkPro.

“But, with 61.4 per cent of total respondents having worked through the digital revolution, technology was understandably viewed as a great facilitator during the application and recruitment process.”

Ninety per cent of respondents to the WorkPro survey said that technology simplified the process for them, while 86.4 per cent said that email and phone calls were their preferred methods of communication during the hiring process. Video calls came in as the least popular mode of communication, at only 5 per cent.

In relation to transparency, employees value structure in hiring processes, regular feedback, and openness in relation to salary, company culture, and the recruitment process.

2. Expediting the time to hire

“When it comes to the protracted time to hire, the message is unmistakable: acceleration is key,” said Ms Evans.

“Employers need to be cognisant that the pace of their hiring processes sets the tempo for candidate engagement, influencing their perception of the organisation as a whole.”

According to the WorkPro report, employees aren’t enduring long, drawn-out recruitment processes. Consider the following:

• Forty-four per cent of respondents would be unwilling to wait more than a week to hear from an employer after a second interview.
• Seventy-three per cent of respondents received a response within a week of applying for their last role.
• Fifty-six per cent of respondents secured a job offer after just one interview.
• Eighty-eight per cent of respondents secured a job offer after two interviews.
• Fifty-eight per cent of respondents who said the process took less than two weeks rated the experience higher than those who waited longer.

Not only are employees getting hired faster, they’re staying in their jobs for shorter periods. For instance, more than 69 per cent of respondents had two or more jobs in the last two years.

“It is becoming clear that the companies who will come out on top are those who have adopted the notion of short-term tenures becoming the norm,” said WorkPro.

3. Leveraging transferable skills

Though action has been taken to address the national skills shortage, there’s no denying that it continues to plague Australian businesses.

Indeed, research from RMIT Online and Deloitte found that the digital skills gap alone is costing Australian businesses $3.1 billion annually, while the federal government’s recent Annual Jobs and Skills Report concluded that Australia is facing a skills shortage to a level unseen since the 1960s.

Addressing the gap will take action across the board – from immigration policy to educational subsidies – and will see employers getting creative in finding ways to attract and retain skilled talent.

“It’s time to pivot our focus from industry-specific experience to a more expansive view that identifies and values skills transferable across different sectors,” explained Ms Evans.

According to the WorkPro report, 60.7 per cent of respondents had been offered positions in industries beyond their prior experience, while 62.4 per cent of respondents would be open to job offers in new industries if their skills were transferable.

This idea was echoed in a recent HR Leader article on the case for broadening recruitment horizons by tapping into previously overlooked talent markets. As noted by Lauren Karan, director at Karan and Co: “I don’t think it’s just that we can’t find people; I think it’s that companies need to adapt.”

“The only thing we know that is constant is change. So, if you’re not changing the way you hire and you’re not hiring smarter, then you’re going to get left behind,” said Ms Karan.