3 New Year’s resolutions for recruiters

Recruitment is constantly changing. Lately, recruiters have had to deal with talent shortage issues, as well as keep up with technology that is forever evolving. To help you nail recruitment in 2023, here are HR Leader’s three areas to focus on.

Stand out from the crowd

In order to engage candidates and navigate a tight talent market, recruiters should be looking to innovate and break away from what everybody else is offering. As LHH’s managing director James Mcilvena said in an HR Leader webcast in partnership with LHH: “Recruitment difficulty is going up … The bit that stood out to me was the employee responses to that, and are people really doing things differently?

“I would be encouraging anyone to really consider, ‘What am I doing differently?’ Even if it is ‘buy’ rather than ‘build’, asking, ‘Am I being more flexible with the requirements of the role? Am I negotiable about what level of learning curve there’ll be for individuals as they step into a role? Am I looking in different places? Am I providing the right environment, or am I just being inflexible on the role requirements and inflexible on how I’m sourcing?’” said Mr Mcilvena.

Creating an employee value proposition (EVP) that looks attractive to candidates may be a great way to bring in talent. Enboarder and Lotus People discussed the importance of a good EVP in Attracting and retaining talent in 2023, an HR Leader webcast in partnership with Lotus People and Enboarder.

Iona Colville, divisional manager of HR and talent at Lotus People, said: “Organisations are having to look at their EVP overall in order to remain competitive.”

Keep up to date with recruitment tech

Technology can make your life easier as a recruiter by streamlining processes, but it can also engage candidates more, creating a better experience.

Sally McKibbin, a senior national account manager at Indeed, discussed the benefits of using tech in hiring with The HR Leader on 1 September 2022.

“Automation in recruitment is really beneficial, as it can speed up the process of matching skills to jobs and also helps with reducing time spent on tasks like looking at CVs and reference checking,” explained Ms McKibbin.

Recruitment tech can also help with unconscious bias from decision making, allowing for more inclusive hiring.

People Scout discussed some of the best types of tech to invest in as a recruiter:

• Applicant tracking system (ATS)
• AI sourcing tool
• Candidate relationship management (CRM) software
• Recruiting chatbot
• Recruitment analytics
• Onboarding tool

While all the options may be overwhelming and difficult to understand, doing your research and finding which system will work best for your organisation can help make your life easier and improve the candidate experience when recruiting.

Broaden your horizons

An approach to talent shortages that may benefit your organisation is expanding out your talent pools and hiring outside of the norm.

As discussed by Indeed’s APAC economist, Callam Pickering, for HR Leader: “The first action to take is to broaden your candidate search. That could include targeting different demographics, for example: older workers, people with a disability, or First Nations peoples. It could also include adjusting the requirements for some roles – do you really need five years’ experience, or will two years’ be sufficient?”

Upskilling current staff and promoting from within is yet another way to combat talent shortages. If staff already know the company and are eager to step into a different role, why not utilise them?

Upskilling existing employees can create a positive culture that shows that hard work is rewarded. Not only that, but according to an article by The HR Director, upskilling can save, on average, up to 92 per cent of what it would cost to hire externally.

Upskilling can help in a tight talent market, promote a healthy work culture, and save money. It’s a win, win, win.