7 Recruitment Strategies to Hire the Best Talent

Empirical evidence has proved that there is a huge disparity between the skills produced by the country’s academia and the ones that are in demand by the industries. With this existing challenge of staying ahead of the competition, it is even more difficult to pick the right candidates off campuses. Companies are now adopting new and innovative recruitment strategies to hire talent produced on college campuses.

Recruiters know and understand that the need of the hour is to adopt new-age, tech-driven hiring techniques. A LinkedIn survey has already proven this and rated “innovative strategies” as a critical area to focus on.

Why it is important to have a recruiting strategy in place?

Skilled employees are the cornerstone of a robust workforce but finding talented resources and hiring them is not an easy task. Success in campus recruitment lies in the strategies a company makes use of. There are many tried and tested mass hiring strategies that still yield results and there are many new and innovative methods that are helping businesses of all sizes find the best entry-level resources. But finding recruitment strategies that work for your business requires an assessment of your organisation’s needs. Let’s take a look at the key elements in an effective recruitment strategy.

What are the elements of a successful recruiting strategy?

1. Workforce Planning: Analyse the number of skilled resources required for each team in an organisation to complete its day-to-day tasks.
2. Channels: Understand the type of job sites, networking sites, or social media platforms that will boost your recruitment efforts. Invest in channels that give you the best results.
3. New Hire Onboarding: In a highly competitive job market, it is important to speed up the onboarding process and the HR team should be trained to address all the queries a new employee might have.
4. Retention: A company’s retention rate is the best indicator of a successful recruitment strateg Retention efforts must always be an on-going process and its key focus should be on helping employees to grow in their careers.
5. Employee Branding: Develop a strong employee value proposition and take steps to make potential job seekers aware of this proposition.

So, what are some of these innovative ways that can be used as a recruitment strategy to absorb the best talent off campuses?

Recruitment Strategy 1: Measure the effectiveness of your current strategy 

This is in fact one of the most important steps in strengthening your recruitment strategy. Having a good understanding of the methods that are bringing you results and the ones that are draining your time and money will help to fine-tune your recruitment efforts. Analyse the different channels that make it easy for you to find the best entry-level candidates. Organisations that rely on online assessment platforms for campus and other mass hiring requirements can cut down the time required to identify a qualified candidate and to onboard them for the job. Replacing novel recruitment methods with such innovative tools will steer your recruitment efforts in the right direction and give you maximum results.

Recruitment Strategy 2: AI-based technology to identify best prospects

The recruitment market is making great efforts to move along with current trends in technology. Companies that understand the need to apply the latest trends in areas such as production and marketing, also tend to realise the same need to adapt innovative recruiting strategies. Jeanne Meister (founding partner of Future Workplace) mentions that recruiting, along with employee training and development, is most likely to get affected by AI-enabled chat bots. AI is growing to play a significant role in the hiring process in terms of both the quality and the quantity being recruited. With the ever-growing data of prospective candidates and the high-touch procedures involved in hiring, AI is being used to reduce the manual burden. Low-level tasks, such as scheduling interviews and filtering the database are being done by AI to provide useful information to the recruiters.

Recruitment Strategy 3: Revamp your career page

Among many things, today’s young generation of job seekers gives importance to workplace culture and employee benefits while applying for jobs. Many companies fail to provide the transparency required for candidates to make such informed career decisions. Organisations can create appealing career pages featuring current employee experiences, perks offered, extra. Freshers often wish to be part of a fun and thriving workplace so featuring photos and videos that symbolise an organisation’s work culture will be a game-changer. Another important factor is to maintain a uniform style of communication in your career page and on job networking sites like LinkedIn to maintain consistency in the messages you deliver.

Recruitment Strategy 4s: Use remote recruitment model to tap into colleges from distant locations

In the current time where geographical distance is no more a barrier in communication, companies have realised the need to allow their recruitment process to also reach beyond such boundaries. Companies such as LinkedIn have also considered crossing geographical lines in order to hire top talent for their teams. The company has been recruiting this way over the years, and also recommends the same to other companies that aim at hiring a diverse and highly skilled talent.

Recruitment Strategy 5: Build an employer brand using Virtual Reality (VR)

In today’s age, the companies not only expect the candidates to exhibit their skills, but they are ready to go a step ahead by proving their own worth to the candidates. Companies are working on hiring the best talent while establishing that they are a great place to work by making use of innovative recruitment strategies. In a recent example, Jaguar partnered with the Gorillaz (a virtual British Band) to build an interactive skill-based mixed reality app for recruiting top engineering talent. This global initiative by Jaguar aimed to hire over 1000 engineers for their expanding Land Rover segment. In a similar instant, Marriot joined hands with Facebook to experiment a game based assessment for the former’s recruitment drive. The company used this VR platform to engage top talent as well as convey the rigorous environment inside a Marriott kitchen.

Recruitment Strategy 6: Conduct a National Hiring Day

Ranking high on the list of innovative hiring ideas is arranging a well-planned annual recruitment event, often referred to as a National Hiring Day. Companies such as Convergys, Mc Donald’s and Macy’s have been known to adopt large-scale hiring drive to attract and hire the best talent. This sort of hiring gains tremendous external publicity which is advantageous for high volumes of hiring. This strategy also invites a lot of free publicity which makes it a cost-effective move for the recruiter. In instances, where high speed and big volume of hiring is imperative for the business, announcing a specific day or days for hiring can show instant results. The high volume also impacts the instance of job offer acceptance positively. This approach has a dual advantage for the company i.e. along with high volume of hiring, it also speaks of the growth image of the company externally.

Recruitment Strategy 7: Engage with wait-list candidates

Often the number of resumes put on hold is higher compared to the number of candidates who are selected for a job. The waitlist often has a wealth of potential resources who could do well in other job roles within the organisation. With a great candidate tracking system, recruiters can quickly narrow down well-qualified candidates and by following the right strategy, can pique the interest of the finalists for other job roles. Even if they are not currently interested, chances of them re-engaging with you for a job will be high in the future. 

Bonus Strategy: Reach out to passive candidates

The no-show rate of campus recruits is often high as freshers may attend multiple interviews and will select only the best job offer available to them. Even if you fail to on-board certain entry-level talents, periodic engagement can help to keep them interested in your organisation. Social networking can play a major role when reaching out to such passive candidates, engaging with them through email campaigns or social media platforms can encourage the candidate to contact you if they are switching jobs.

Recruitment tools offered by MeritTrac

MeritTrac offers a variety of recruitment assessment solutions that specifically cater to hiring skilled entry-level candidates. Recruiters can evaluate cognitive skills, behavioural traits, domain skills, communications skills, and more through MeritTrac’s assessment platforms such as Pariksha, SmartTest, CodeTrac, etc.

To hire freshers with good employability fit, recruiters can subscribe to AceTrac, a platform that gives them access to well-qualified student communities and educational institutions. AceTrac improves the employability fit of candidates through periodic assessments and performance reviews. Recruiters can subscribe to the platforms and have easy access to entry-level candidates who can easily adapt to the workplace and deliver their best with formal training.

Conclusion

New-age recruiters are resorting to a range of innovative and effective recruitment strategies and practices to hire the best talent from universities and colleges.  It is only through a good recruitment strategy that an organisation can hire and onboard the best resources for their organisation. To make these strategies a success you must make use of innovative tools that simplify the tasks of hiring and training the right candidates for your company. Reduce miss-hires and attrition rates while recruiting entry-level candidates and improve employee engagement with MeritTrac’s unique recruitment solutions.