Just having the right tools for a successful hire isn’t enough. If, as a hiring manager or recruiter, employees quit after just a few months, that’s known as a ‘mis-hire’. Mis-hires can cost companies money and precious time. To avoid it, recruiters and hiring managers should start from the beginning—with the hiring process.
Ensuring the company has an effective hiring system is crucial to bringing in the right developers. Candidates, as well as everyone involved in the hiring process, used to be focused on technical skills. Global systems were developed around that same focus. However, the past year and its challenges have shifted attention to other things. Hiring managers and recruiters need to stay on top of what developers desire in a job just as much as developers should be aware of what they are applying for.
Here are 3 tricks to making the hiring process a little easier:
- Know what kind of job needs to be done.
The first step to the hiring process is determining whether an external hire is really needed. Often, companies can delegate tasks to current employees who are a good fit for what needs to be done. Hiring externally can be costly and, if it isn’t necessary, it should be avoided.
If a developer does need to be hired, setting up a job description that clearly outlines the tasks, responsibilities, benefits, salary, and so on will be a vital step in securing valuable candidates.
- Obtain the best tools to improve the interviewing process.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, remote interviews have become a lifeline for finding the right candidates. Many things can be said about what a good interviewing process looks like but, what it doesn’t look like is:
- Not understanding questions candidates may ask
- Not having knowledge of the company (third-party hiring managers or recruiters)
- Asking irrelevant or invasive questions
- Giving tests to candidates outside of their experience
Consider what developers may have experienced in previous professional environments and try to mimic that. If a candidate is comfortable with the interviewing process, he or she is more likely to perform better.
- Make sure the company culture is something a candidate would fit into.
Candidates are slowly becoming equally focused on both the job and the culture of the company they are applying for. Similar to the interviewing process, candidates should feel that the business’s culture matches something they’re used to or at least comfortable with. If they think they would hate to work at the company because of differing values or cultures, he or she won’t apply or may drop out of the hiring process at any time. An important piece of experience to consider regarding candidates involves the size of companies they have worked at. Having a history with a large corporation but applying to a job at a small business are vastly different experiences, and vice versa. The most important thing to remember with this trick is not to deceive the candidates but be upfront and honest with them in all aspects of the hiring process.
