Have you updated your Employment Value Proposition (EVP)? If not, get it on your to-do list. It can help you attract and retain talent in a competitive labor market.
Don’t have an EVP? Today’s job seekers expect a prospective employer to showcase their employer brand front and center.
An Employer Value Proposition is also called an Employment Value or Employee Value Proposition. Your EVP should succinctly explain the value you provide to a potential candidate as well as your existing employees. This includes compensation, benefits, perks and, increasingly, your company’s commitment to causes your employees care about.
Why Is an EVP Important?
An Employee Value Proposition is a useful tool in any labor market. But it’s especially important now, because it’s never been more difficult to find top talent. Surprisingly, recession fears and rising inflation haven’t put a damper on hiring, at least in most industries.
Employer Value Proposition Example
You don’t have to be a large business to create and benefit from an EVP. Small businesses can (and should) articulate what they have to offer, specifically the benefits of working at a small company. Swipeclock, for example, is a 100-employee company. Here are some excerpts from our employment value proposition:
Our team casts a wide net across numerous locations, lifestyles and backgrounds. We celebrate the uniqueness and strength found in diversity and inclusivity. It’s our differences that make us interesting, and our shared belief in Swipeclock’s core values that bind us together. Resilient: We are a resilient group of individuals. We know the business environment can be unpredictable. Thriving means being able to pivot, respond to the unexpected and keep the focus on what’s important — our customers. Agile: Phenomenally agile are able to take a problem and work it into a success story. With our agile mindset, we seek to deliver solutions quickly and respond to customer inquiries with the same speed. WorkforceHub.com
How Has Your Value Prop Changed?
As reflected in the title of this piece, it’s time to update your value proposition. Your company and employees have changed dramatically. If your workforce is thriving, you have been successful at supporting your employees and adapting to the new world of work and life. In other words, you have a strong EVP.
Have you revamped your benefits package by adding mental health coverage or childcare? It’s never been more important to strengthen your commitment to work live balance. Do you provide hybrid working and flexible schedules to make life easier for your current employees? What causes do you support? Your ideal candidate shares your values.
How about career development? This has become increasingly important to candidates and employees. A work environment where employees understand their career paths is critical if you want to improve retention and find the right talent.
If so, update your Employer Value Proposition so you can convey these things to prospective candidates. Furthermore, it will help you unify your workforce which will, in turn, reduce employee turnover.
This evolution in thinking has undoubtedly been accelerated by the Covid-19 pandemic, which put immense pressure on leaders to not just communicate their values but also to demonstrate them. In the face of difficult decisions, employers suddenly had to decide whether their professed ideals and “north stars” were real and substantive or mere lip service. They gained a heightened awareness of the importance of organizational purpose, team cohesion, and employee experience. Bryan Adams, Harvard Business Review
What if I’m Creating Our First EVP?
It’s important to realize that your company’s EVP merely expresses the value of working for your organization. In other words, you already have an identity and culture. To write your value prop you need to figure out what it is.
Begin by identifying what makes your company special. An anonymous employee survey can help. In addition, you can check Glassdoor and other workplace review sites to see what current and former employees say. Customer testimonials and feedback from your support team can shed light on how your company is perceived in its space.
How Can We Improve It?
Once you understand your current value proposition, you can make a plan to improve it if needed. This is called your employer brand strategy.
If you have high turnover, it’s not just your EVP that’s weak, Unfortunately, it’s the company culture upon which it’s based. If this is the case, it’s time to re-evaluate the employee experience you provide as an employer. Create an ideal Employer Value Proposition to guide you as you work toward it.
If your employees are loyal, but don’t have clarity why, you have a communication problem. This is not the worst problem to have. It means you have a terrific culture and can create a strong Employee Value Proposition. As discussed previously, use focus groups to identify your company values.
Then, work to get your compelling Employment Value Proposition out to your team and potential candidates. Share it with employees in your HR portal. Have your talent acquisition team Include it in your job descriptions and discuss it in interviews. Talk about it in company-wide meetings.
Knowing how to write a job description is one of the key components to attracting and hiring the best talent. That means it’s an essential skill for hiring managers, HR professionals and recruiters.
What is a Job Description?
A job description is a formal listing of the specific responsibilities and important details about an employment position. Though it isn’t the exact thing as a job posting, the job posting includes the job description. A job posting may include additional information about the company.
Be a template for writing your job posting and advertisements
Increase the diversity of your applicant pool
Serve as a guide for writing your interview questions and candidate evaluation
Set realistic expectations for the new hire
Assist managers/supervisors with performance reviews and identifying areas for training or development
Prevent legal problems with federal agencies in the event of a discrimination allegation
Why is a Good Job Description Important?
First off, a job description is usually the first touchpoint a candidate has with your company. If it’s professional and compelling it reflects well on your organization. Conversely, if it’s full of cliches and trite phrases, or grammar and spelling mistakes, high quality candidates will pass it by.
In addition, a good job description will set expectations for prospective applicants. This saves everyone time and frustration. If a job description doesn’t clearly outline the role, unqualified job seekers may apply. Or perhaps qualified job seekers will apply without understanding the nature of the position. If they are hired and the actual job is different than what the job description described, they may move on. At that point, you’ve both wasted time and your company has wasted money. Not to mention that the former employee won’t be likely to speak well of the experience. If it happens repeatedly, it can damage your brand.
How to Write a Job Description
What makes a good job description? Creating a standardized process is the first step.
Firstly, gather the appropriate people for the task. The manager to whom the position will report might be the best person to take the lead. If there are other employees performing similar jobs, they can also contribute. Additionally, if the position is new and will relieve current employees of work load, they should be part of the discussion.
Secondly, perform a job analysis. You need as much data as possible. The job analysis may include the job responsibilities of current employees, internet research and sample job descriptions for similar jobs. It would include an analysis of the duties, tasks, and responsibilities of the position. The more information you can gather, the easier it will be to write the description.
Thirdly, write the job description. The format and style for writing job descriptions is different from any other type of business writing. It is not a complex process, but you should follow a basic format and include specific components. The basic components are listed below. Following the list, we discuss each in more detail.
Here is a job description template:
Irresistible intro
Job location
Job title
(Optional) Salary or wage
The person the position will report to
Job responsibilities
Candidate requirements (must-haves)
Desired candidate qualifications (nice-to-haves)
Work environment
Statement about company and benefits
EEOC statement
Irresistible Opener
Many job postings start with the location and job title. We have included an intro because it will set your job posting apart. Today’s hiring environment is very competitive. Job seekers interested in your opening will see dozens (maybe hundreds!) of postings for the same position. What will make yours stand out?
That’s where a unique, enticing opener comes in. Tap your marketing team to help you with this part. Specifically, whomever writes your landing pages, social posts, website copy or email nurtures. It’s their job to grab the reader’s attention using as few words as possible. Recruitment and marketing have much in common. Both seek to bring individuals to your company, whether a job seeker or customer.
Check out this lead-in for a Content Marketing Manager position:
Interested in defining how AI shapes the future of work? Cresta is on a mission to make every knowledge worker 100x as effective, 10x faster and 10x better. (LinkedIn)
Here’s one for a Graphic Designer position at a marketing agency:
Think fast and edit faster? Dream in 9:16? Ok, we’ll cut the BS. Sculpt designers make the attention-grabbing social media creative assets we need and love. Can you help us make awesome content? We’re hiring freelance and full-time creatives.(Sculpt)
Compare it to this snoozer:
Under the direction of the Art Director, the Graphic Designer will perform a wide variety of graphic design functions. Responsibilities include design and production of print and digital collateral: brochures, direct mail, environmental graphics, invitations, advertisements, and graphics for web, social media, e-mail, and video.
Job Location
If the position is remote, this may not seem important, but include it anyway. Regardless of where the employee will be working, let them know where your company is based. Many job seekers search for positions by city. LinkedIn and other job sites also send postings to candidates. They match up job locations with the candidate’s location. Therefore, if you don’t list a location, you may not get the same exposure for your posting.
Job Title
The job title should accurately reflect the type of work. For example “clerk,” “processor,” or “analyst”. Furthermore, it should also indicate the level of work being performed; “senior analyst” or “lead accountant”. Avoid acronyms, jargon, and overly-creative job titles. Be clear and concise. Don’t make it difficult for applicants to know if they want to apply. You might call your website manager a Digital Alchemist. Don’t do it in a job description.
Job Summary
The job summary describes the primary reason for and function of the job. It also provides an overview of the job and introduces the responsibilities. The job summary should describe the job without detailed task descriptions. Its length should range from one sentence to a paragraph, depending on the complexity of the job. It is easier to write the summary once you have completed the more detailed information.
Example: A job summary for a Human Resources Director
“Manages the human resources function and day-to-day human resources management activities throughout the organization. This includes employee recruiting, orientation, compensation, benefits, and related programs. Manages all HR functions, staff, and the HR department budget.”
Key Responsibilities
Begin each job responsibility with a present tense action verb and describe the area of responsibility in action terms. Normally, there will be 7 to 10 responsibilities, depending on the job. Examples:
Develops marketing programs directed at increasing product sales and awareness.
Writes programming code to develop various features and functionality for commercial software products.
Designs and develops user interfaces for commercial software products.
Supervises technical support employees in providing technical support to organization clients.
Manages development of advertising and various marketing collateral materials.
Minimum Candidate Requirements
This section describes the minimum knowledge, skills, and abilities. This information helps determine if the candidates are minimally qualified. However, avoid arbitrary requirements that are difficult to validate. Include only the minimally acceptable requirements. Moreover, do not inflate requirements and be specific and realistic.
It’s important to remember not to consider the education, experience, or skill level of current job holders. Include only what the job actually requires. Moreover, ensure the requirement relates to how and why the job is done
Requirements should include:
Education —the type and minimum level, such as high school diploma and/or bachelor’s degree.
Experience —the type and minimum level, such as three to five years of supervisory experience, five years of editing experience, and two years of experience with content management systems.
Special skills — such as languages spoken and computer software proficiencies.
Certifications and licenses — such as industry certifications and practitioners’ licenses.
Desired Additional Candidate Requirements
Of course, there are always additional qualifications on your wish list. Be careful, however. If you list too many, you may discourage perfectly qualified candidates. You also don’t want your job description to be too long.
Work Environment/Physical Requirements
Work environment and physical requirements often overlap, so we’ve included them together. Consider the following example:
Must be able to perform work requiring manual dexterity, climbing, lifting, and working at heights and in confined spaces where advanced mechanical aptitude is required.
In this case, the physical requirements describe the work environment by default.
Consider noise level, temperature, exposure to chemicals, indoors/outdoors, proximity to moving machinery, repetitive motion, UV light, etc.
Here is another example:
Install all types of solar panels and associated equipment in residential and commercial settings. Most installations are performed on rooftops.
When describing physical requirements, list specifics such as lifting heavy objects or standing for long periods of time. Examples include:
Requires ability to lift large and heavy packages.
Must be physically capable of safely lifting a minimum of 50 lbs. without assistance.
Requires the ability to work flexible shifts.
Must be able to travel 50% to other job sites.
Able to meet tight deadlines in a fast-paced work environment.
Disclaimer
All job descriptions should have a disclaimer that clearly states that the description is only a summary of the typical functions of the job, not an exhaustive or comprehensive list of all possible responsibilities, tasks, and duties. Additionally, disclaimers should also state that the responsibilities, tasks, and duties of the jobholder might differ from those outlined in the job description and that other duties may be assigned. It’s important to understand that in a labor union environment, the job description could be literally interpreted.
Make the Job Description About the Candidate
It is helpful to think about what would make the job enticing to the applicant. Be intentional about this editing step. With any kind of business writing, it’s natural to get wrapped up in our own perspective. It’s takes conscious effort to see the description through the eyes of the job seeker. Doing this effectively will improve the performance of your postings.
What to Avoid in Your Job Description
Unnecessary qualifications: only include what is actually required to perform the job.
Non-inclusive language: remove language that could discourage candidates from underrepresented groups, e.g. “digital native”
The more people that review your description throughout the editing process, the better. As mentioned previously, ask current employees performing the job to review it. If you are not the hiring manager, you need to work closely with that person to make sure it effectively conveys all aspects of the position.
Many people at your company could help describe the culture and work atmosphere. This is another area where your marketing team could help the description come alive.
If your team is working remotely, put your job description draft in a Google Doc so team members can review and add feedback at their convenience.
Job Description Examples
Drywall Carpenter General Foreman
Sacramento, CA
$35-$40 an hour, Full-Time
Essential Responsibilities and Duties
Supervise all field production activities
Assist the Foreman in planning the job, ordering materials and managing employee schedules
Establish project goals and monitor the success of goals throughout the project
Monitor labor efficiencies, project labor needs for the duration of the project
Achieve productivity objectives by effectively managing and assigning tasks to crew members
Maintain an accurate labor tracking log and communicate with key project personnel
Use a proactive approach to anticipate and resolve potential issues
Skills and Experience Requirements
3-5 years experience as a General Foreman Drywall framer or similar role
Lift and/or pull 75 lbs., climb ladders, work off ladders, lifts or other equipment
Ability to maintain a standing position for extended periods of time, fully squat, bend or kneel while wearing a tool belt
Capable of working in a variety of weather conditions
Uphold company core values of integrity, leadership, passion and excellence at all times
Support activities at all job sites as directed
[COMPANY NAME] provides commercial construction services throughout the United States, delivering innovative solutions and outstanding service to our customers for time-tested buildings and facilities. As a 100% employee-owned quality contractor, we hire the best people, give them exceptional training, and provide robust opportunities for professional growth.
What to Avoid in Your Job Description
As you craft your job descriptions, make sure you avoid the following:
Poor formatting (keep things organized with bulleted lists)
This is the second post in our series: How to Hire Employees: The Ultimate Guide. In today’s post, we discuss how to create your selection criteria. This is one of the hiring process steps that is often overlooked. As with other components, the best practice is to create a standardized process and use it for each applicant.
How do you determine your hiring selection criteria?
Your screening criteria is the framework for evaluating and comparing applicants. It may include:
Resume review
Screening questionnaire
Prescreen phone call
Assessment
In-person or video interview
Social media review
Background check
Reference checks
Note that you can change the order or eliminate some elements. For example, some employers perform a reference check after extending the job offer. And other recruiters talk to references before administering the assessment. Bottom line, build a recruitment process that works for your company, budget and hiring team.
Internal Hiring vs. Posting Publicly
Internal hiring makes sense in many situations. If you’ve been having trouble filling a position and have someone on staff with the necessary skills, for instance. Nevertheless, you’ll have to fill the internal hire’s original role. Another consideration is whether you are trying to increase diversity in your workforce. Internal hiring can reinforce the status quo.
Importantly, internal hiring is an essential part of a career advancement. Thus, you have to coordinate internal hiring with your career paths program as well as your hiring plan.
Who should be involved in the hiring decision process?
In addition to the hiring manager, who should have a say in which candidate is chosen? Some companies use outside recruiting firms. If you have a recruiter with a proven track record of finding star hires for your company, take their advice seriously. In addition, consider giving the new hire’s team a say in the selection. This can work as follows: have the team review the top three candidates (already approved by the hiring manager) and come to a consensus on which one to offer the job to.
Furthermore, some business owners (typically for smallish orgs) want to sign off on each hire. As mentioned, whichever plan you choose, document it and apply it consistently.
What is a screening questionnaire?
In this article, we focus on first-pass screening questionnaires. We discuss interviews, reference checks and background checks in subsequent articles.
A screening questionnaire is a first-pass filtering tool. It is used to isolate a subset of qualified candidates from the total applicant pool.
To create a screening questionnaire:
Using the job description, identify the essential requirements and rank in order of importance
Write a question for each of the selection criterion (skill, certification, years of experience, etc.)
Determine the scoring system for the questions
Organize questions and format in a document
Why does defining screening criteria come before posting the job? Once you begin the process, you are competing with other employers to find great candidates. Take the time up front so you don’t slow yourself down after the start.
Plus, you can still make changes to your job description if necessary because you haven’t already posted it. A good selection process requires a good job description. If you find yourself struggling to define your selection criteria, you probably need to go back improve your job description.
Write Your Screening Questions
As mentioned, you should have a list of job requirements from your job description. Now it’s time to write a question for each requirement. Remember, your job description splits skills into “must-haves” and “nice-to-haves.” The “must-haves” are your essential, or key selection criteria.
Skills Gap Analysis
A skills gap analysis can help you create a hiring plan and identify roles and responsibilities. If you do a skills gap analysis, use the findings to clarify job roles and the specific skills necessary.
Back to screening questions. You will probably need a question and answer for each requirement. The question should determine whether a candidate meets the requirement. Therefore, make it clear and concise with action verbs.
Types of screening questions:
Yes/No answer (binary choice, can be a knockout question)
Multiple Choice
Select one answer from multiple choices
Choose as many as desired from multiple choices
Essay
How do you choose which types of questions to use? The first consideration is the number of applications you expect to receive. If you are hiring for a niche, highly-skilled role and don’t expect to receive many applications, you might have time to read essay answers. Consider, though, if it would make more sense to discuss those questions and answers in the interview.
On the flip side, if you will be fielding hundreds of applications, you won’t have time to read essay questions. For high-volume hiring, consider automation. Inexpensive applicant tracking systems have templates for questionnaires. More importantly, they tally scores automatically. Therefore, in the candidate database, the highest scoring candidates will rise in the queue. If you use knockout questions, an ATS will mark eliminated candidates Do Not Pursue. Though you’ve eliminated them for the role to which they applied, you can keep them in your database in case you want to reach out to them in the future for another role that could be a better fit.
Clearly, spending time up front to create a thorough screening questionnaire will pay off by finding a qualified candidate more quickly than ever.
How does filtering automation save time?
It’s important to understand the order of operations. With an ATS, your application contains the filtering questionnaire. Therefore, applicants self-filter before you start reviewing resumes and conducting interviews. Let’s do the math. Suppose your open position attracts 100 applicants. All of them complete the filtering questionnaire as part of the application process. Out of the 100, suppose 50 are knocked out because they lack the basic qualifications. If you generally take 5 minutes per resume when deciding which candidates to move to the next step, a filtering questionnaire saves you 250 minutes or a little over 4 hours. If you have 3 open positions simultaneously, that’s over 12 hours saved for just one step in the selection process.
Example Filtering Questions
Suppose you are hiring for a WordPress Web Developer. Let’s say your highest priority is whether the candidate has 4 years experience developing WordPress themes.
WordPress Web Developer Sample Filtering Questions
Do you have 4 years experience developing WordPress themes? Y N [KNOCKOUT]
If the applicant marks NO, they are knocked out of the applicant pool.
Do you have 4-6 years experience developing WordPress themes? Y N [2 POINTS]
Do you have 6-8 years experience developing WordPress themes? Y N [4 POINTS]
If the applicant answers YES, they receive extra points as indicated.
What is your salary requirement? [ESSAY or Y/N]
You can let the applicant enter an amount or list the maximum compensation budgeted and let the applicant mark Y or N regarding the amount.
Apply Scoring Criteria to Resumes
In addition to screening questionnaires, you can create scoring rules for resumes. For example, you can assign a numeric point value for skills, certifications or qualifications. Let’s say you’re hiring for a server in a restaurant. You could assign points for a valid food handler’s permit or number of years of experience.
Scoring Applicants
When the applications start coming in, you’ll need to score each one using your predefined criteria. You will calculate a total score for each applicant. This serves as a first pass assessment of the candidate’s match to the position. It will also eliminate applicants if you use knockout questions.
The mechanics of applicant management depend on whether you have a paper-based or digital process. If you accept paper applications, you can sort them in piles or folders by score. On the other hand, if you only accept digital applications, you can record scores in a spreadsheet. If you know how to create formulas in Microsoft Excel, you can let the spreadsheet tally scores.
Assessment Tools
Another option is to use professional assessment tools in the hiring process. If you have the budget, pre-employment assessments can save you a lot of time. Assessment tools not only measure aptitude and skills, they can predict how a candidate will perform in the position. There are hundreds of companies that create assessment software and tools–specializing in various job positions and industries. You can research them on Capterra,G2, or Software Advice.
Social Media Review
According to a 2018 CareerBuilder survey, 70% of companies look at candidates’ social media pages as part of their evaluation process. It’s safe to assume that number has risen since the survey was conducted.
Should you check applicants’ social media profiles? Sure, you may be able to find out a lot of stuff that you can’t legally ask on an application or in an interview. But is that a good idea?
Recruiter and researcher Atta Tarki advises against the practice. After his team reviewed 266 U.S. job applicants’ social media sites, Tarki said:
“…a significant share of profiles contained details that companies may be legally prohibited from considering, including gender, race, and ethnicity (evident in 100% of profiles), disabilities (7%), pregnancy status (3%), sexual orientation (59%), political views (21%), and religious affiliation (41%). Many of the job seekers’ profiles also included information of potential concern to prospective employers: 51% of them contained profanity, 11% gave indications of gambling, 26% showed or referenced alcohol consumption, and 7% referenced drug use.”Stop Screening Job Candidates’ Social Media, Harvard Business Review, October 2021
Another member of the research team added:
“You can see why many recruiters love social media—it allows them to discover all the information they aren’t allowed to ask about during an interview, but that’s a problem, because one of the hallmarks of legal hiring practices is that they focus on behaviors within the work context. There should be a clear distinction between what people do during work and what they do outside of it.” Chad Van Iddekinge, Professor of Management, University of Iowa
Work Efficiently as a Team
Finding the top candidate is more likely when it’s a team effort. But don’t leave collaboration to chance. When building your hiring process, be proactive and intentional about collaboration. The hiring team should be involved in:
Creating a hiring plan
Mapping the hiring process
Writing the job description
Deciding where to post the job
Identifying the evaluation criteria
Designating roles and responsibilities
Evaluating the candidates
Interviewing the candidates
Extending the job offer to the top applicant
It bears repetition: an applicant tracking system can streamlines the entire process and help you ultimately find the right candidate. First of all, you can write and manage screening questionnaires in the system. Secondly, you can build workflow checklists to show where each applicant is in the process. Thirdly, you can assign tasks to team members (and set auto-reminders) so everyone knows what they are supposed to do. Finally, each member of the hiring team can add notes for all to see.
Crafting Your Applicant’s Journey
The applicant, or candidate journey, is the total experience for the job seeker, starting with the application and continuing through every touch point. The applicant journey reflects on your employer brand. For example, a confusing, disorganized process will give candidates the impression that your company is disorganized. In a tight labor market, you can’t afford to neglect the candidate journey if you want to compete for top talent.
How do you ensure a positive applicant journey?
Here are some tips:
Make your application process mobile-friendly and painless
Text or email your candidates frequently to keep them updated on their status
Make it easy to schedule an interview by texting the candidate a link to a shared calendar
Write interview scripts and ask the same questions of every candidate
Use applicant tracking software to make the hiring process as quick as possible
Applicant management is crucial to business success. That’s why large companies have massive hiring teams. At a small org, in contrast, one person may handle the entire hiring process. Today’s post includes an overview of applicant management for small businesses and HR departments of one.
What is applicant management?
The recruiting workflow has dozens of components which may include:
Write and manage job descriptions, job postings, interview scripts, candidate scorecards, and hiring communications
Post job ads to company careers page, social media and job boards
Engage with potential candidates on LinkedIn or other sites
Now, let’s discuss these HR processes and recruiting tasks in detail.
Job Description
A job description is an internal document and formal listing of the specific responsibilities and important details about an employment position. Note that the job posting or job advertisement is not the same thing. A good job description will:
Define the job responsibilities
Reduce the applicant pool to those who qualify
Introduce the applicant to your company
How do you write a job description?
First, define the basic information about the position. Next, identify the specific skills and qualifications the position requires.
Location of job (or remote)
Job title
Salary range (optional)
Job responsibilities
Necessary qualifications
Desired candidate credentials
Statement about company and benefits
EEOC statement
Disclaimer
Make sure your job description is straightforward and concise. Avoid acronyms, jargon, and witty job titles. Remember that job seekers will search job boards using the job position and location. Therefore, put those in the headline. If it’s a remote position, put it in the job title. Example: Medical Coder (Remote Full-time).
All job descriptions should include a disclaimer that states that the description is only a summary of the typical functions of the job, not a comprehensive list of all possible responsibilities, tasks, and duties. Disclaimers should also state that other duties, as assigned, might be part of the job. This is most important in a labor union environment where the document can be literally interpreted.
Should you include the salary range?
There are good arguments for including the salary range as it will encourage applicants who have similar expectations–and filter out those who have different requirements. Note also that some cities and states mandate salary information in job advertisements. The National Law Review gives an overview here: New Wage Range Disclosure Requirements in Multiple States.
Create a Job Description Template
Create a template for your job descriptions so they will all follow the same format. Your job description will also be a template for writing job postings, candidate interview scripts and candidate evaluation forms. For an in-depth guide on writing job descriptions, see How to Write a Job Description. With an applicant tracking system, you can create and manage a library of recruiting job descriptions. If you have several hiring managers, they can help you build the templates and update them as necessary in your recruiting software.
Advertise Your Job
Once you’ve written your job description, it’s time to get the word out. Post the job on your company’s careers page if you have one and social media sites. Job boards are also important as many job seekers use them exclusively. Choose job boards based on the position. Money.com recommends the following sites:
ZipRecruiter: Best for Large Scale Recruiting
Indeed: Best for Free Job Posts
LinkedIn: Best for Executive and Upper Management Positions
Handshake Job Search Site: Best for College Recruiting
Dribble: Best for Scouting Designers and Creatives
There are also sites that cater to a specific type of job, industry or talent pool. These include diversity candidates, tech jobs, remote jobs and internships. For more information on posting jobs, see Job Posting: Where and How to Post Job Listings.
You may find that paid listings are worthwhile in recruiting when there is a lot of competition for applicants. Paid listings get a higher profile on the boards.
Employee referrals are a great source of candidates. Be sure to ask your team for recommendations!
Applicant Management Analytics
Use analytics to best manage your recruiting time and budget. This includes tracking the source of everyone in your candidate pipeline so you can tell which venues are delivering good candidates. Results may vary based on the particulars, so track that too. These include job location, job type, education level, years of experience, hours, and physical requirements. For example, a college job board may attract good applicants for an entry-level job while a tech job board like Dice would attract qualified applicants for a senior IT position. Applicant manager software is an indispensable HR tool. In will automate recruiting, candidate tracking, reporting.
Organizing Applications
Hopefully, soon after posting your job, you’ll start receiving applications. Whether they are paper, electronic, or a mix of both, gather them in the same place and form. You can scan paper applications to create a digital copy. Create folders to manage your job applicant pool. You might have three: 1. Top Applicants, 2. Unqualified (Do Not Pursue) and 3. Partially Qualified. In other words, Yes, No and Maybe.
The goal of the first-pass sorting is to isolate the best candidates and eliminate the unqualified applicants. You don’t want to waste time in your recruitment process on candidates that don’t meet the basic requirements. You only want to touch their resume once. Remember, however, to keep their applications. There may be some candidates that would be a good fit for another position. Build a database of applicants to consider for future openings.
Engage With Candidates
It’s important to let applicants know immediately that you’ve received their application. Many candidates prefer to communicate by text. If you decide to advance them to the next stage, tell them right away so they won’t look elsewhere. If you eliminate them, be considerate and inform them so they can pursue other openings. Don’t ghost your candidates! It is just plain uncool and gives your business a bad reputation. (Be aware, however, that many applicants will ghost you. Unfortunately, it comes with the territory.)
You can create email or text templates for each type of hiring process communication. “We’ve Received Your Application,” “Let’s Schedule a Phone Screening,” “We Would Like to Set Up and Interview,” “We are Moving Forward With Other Candidates But Thank You for Applying,” etc. An ATS (applicant tracking system) can save you a lot of time with candidate communications. You can store templates and set triggers for automatic emails personalized with the candidate’s name and the position they applied for.
How to Conduct Interviews
When you have a pool of promising candidates, it’s time to schedule interviews. Many companies start with a phone screening. The purpose of this call is to verify qualifications and experience, clarify any questions you have and get a sense of the applicant’s communication skills.
Phone screenings should further whittle down your applicant pool as you move through the hiring process. The next step for the candidates you are recruiting is a video or in-person interview. The best practice here is to create an interview script based on the job description. An interview script helps you evaluate each candidate based on the same criteria. Learn more here: How to Conduct an Interview With a Job Candidate and here: Define Your Hiring Selection Criteria.
Score Candidates
When you write your interview script, create a scorecard for evaluation. During the interview, or soon after, fill it out and then sort quality candidates by score. Have your hiring manager and all members of the hiring team use the same scorecard. Learn more and see scorecard templates here: How Manager Feedback and Interview Evaluations Improve Hiring. Applicant tracking software has templates for scorecards and other evaluation tools.
Reference Checks
If you didn’t ask for references on the application, do it now. This is where you talk to previous employers and look for any issues that were not uncovered. Try to automate this process as much as you can. For example, send an email to the references asking them to fill out a linked questionnaire. Or, call the references and fill out the questionnaire yourself. Either way, try to gather information in a consistent manner from each reference for each final candidate.
Background Checks
Background checks are an important part of an employer’s recruiting due diligence. They protect your business, your employees, your customers and the public at large.
Background screenings protect:
employees from violence or harassment
customers from theft or harassment
your business from fraud, theft, a tarnished reputation or legal liability
Laws that Govern Background Checks
The Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) applies when employers hire a third-party service agency to conduct consumer credit reports and other investigative reports. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) enforces the FCRA. When a third party service performs background checks, they may obtain information termed as “investigative reporting.” An investigative consumer report may contain subjective judgment regarding the job candidate.
How does the FTC define a “report”?
It’s important to know that a report doesn’t need to be in written form. A report could refer to information obtained in a short phone call which is communicated orally to the hiring manager in another short phone call.
An FCRA consumer report is “Any written, oral or other communication of any information by a consumer-reporting agency bearing on a consumer’s credit worthiness, credit standing, credit capacity, character, general reputation, personal characteristics or mode of living. In the employment context, this definition may, for example, include credit reports, criminal history reports, driving records and other background check reports created by a third party, such as drug tests.”The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM)
Employers must provide the applicant with a formal written disclosure and obtain the applicant’s consent before conducting the research. The disclosure and consent form must be a separate document and can’t be included in the application. The employer must disclose that the information may be used to influence the hiring decision.
After you’ve gotten consent from the applicant, you must inform the background check service that you notified obtained their consent and verify that you met with the FCRA anti-discrimination provisions. If you are asking a company to provide an ‘investigative report’—a report based on personal interviews concerning a person’s character, general reputation, personal characteristics, and lifestyle— you must also tell the applicant or employee of his or her right to a description of the nature and scope of the investigation.
Extend the Job Offer
When you’ve made your choice, it’s time to offer the job. If everything has gone well, the candidate is excited and wants to join your team. If everything has gone quickly, they are still available.
Send an offer letter that states clearly the key information about the offer, including wage, location and start date. You might also want to include where and when to report and any other details that are specific to the offer. Give the candidate a signature line and send it out.
Don’t waste any time. Remember that talent acquisition is extremely competitive. Now that you have identified this person as the ideal candidate, you can be certain that others have, too.
It helps to have a job offer ready to go before you start the process. Use an offer letter template to make this a speedy and consistent process. Include your company logo, standard text and merge fields where you can easily add the details for the specific position. Create the template in advance and have it ready to go for this and your next hire. Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) have job offer letter templates. Once you’ve created a template for each job position, you can store and manage them in your ATS.
Collecting feedback from your hiring team is critical to making a good selection. But it can be challenge to compile and collect the feedback from each decision make. In this article, we’ll go over best practices for collecting feedback, and how to make the most of it.
What is a Hiring Team or Hiring Committee?
The hiring team includes everyone responsible for any part of the hiring process. In a very small org, it may be the hiring manager and business owner. In a larger company, it may include ten or more. This might include the hiring manager, director to which the hiring manager reports, and some members of the new hire’s team.
The hiring manager leads the hiring team. This is the person who requests to fill the position. Requesting a position is called a job requisition. It’s helpful to create a formal job requisition process.
Why is Having a Hiring Team or Hiring Committee Beneficial?
Companies that involve more than one decision maker have better hiring outcomes. Because each decision maker has a unique perspective, a collective evaluation is multi-dimensional. When several people in various roles participate in evaluating candidates, your process is more comprehensive.
A group decision is especially important for determining whether the applicant will work well with your team. Consider a scenario where the new hire will work closely with other team members but have less frequent contact with the manager. In this type of structure, it’s important that those who will work directly with the new hire evaluate the candidate.
You have to be careful when evaluating cultural fit, however. If members of the hiring committee use age, gender, or ethnicity in their decision, you’ll have difficulty building a diverse team–and increase the risk of a discrimination challenge. Decision makers should limit their evaluation to characteristics that aren’t discriminatory.
When assembling a hiring team, consider including people in your company who have a proven track record of picking winners.
The Challenges of Collecting Hiring Team Feedback
Once you’ve assembled your team, you can’t expect the process to work if you don’t standardize it. Unstructured evaluation processes are absurdly ineffective and inefficient. An unstructured process includes the following pitfalls:
Conversations dispersed among channels: face-to-face discussions, emails, texts, phone calls, inter-company apps like Slack
Failing to document hiring team collaboration: none of the evaluators has access to all evaluation discussions
No formal scoring system: each member of the team uses a different yardstick for evaluation, or none at all
Team members waste time duplicating processes: when the hiring manager fails to assign tasks like background and reference checking, assessments, interview scheduling, etc.
Losing track of applications: if the applicant database isn’t centralized, you can lose great candidates
Poor hiring outcomes: a haphazard system doesn’t take advantage of each evaluator’s unique expertise which downgrades the process
What is a Structured Feedback Process?
A structured process encompasses both administration and evaluation. Let’s look at each.
Hiring Workflows
A structured administrative process is also called a hiring workflow. The best practice here is for the talent acquisition or HR manager to design a hiring committee process. First, they identify necessary tasks. Secondly, each task is assigned to the appropriate member of the team. For example, the HR manager might contact references and the hiring manager maintains the interview calendar. Furthermore, there is a formal process for communication. For instance, some teams require all communication done through a group email sent to all decision makers.
In addition to electronic collaboration, make sure you have frequent in-person meetings to keep the process on track. The hiring manager can keep everyone updated on the process and remind members of any overdue tasks. Of course, in-person meetings are a challenge for remote teams, but at least hold meetings by video so the process isn’t completely asynchronous.
Hiring Stages
Identifying hiring stages allows the team to track each applicant’s status. This speeds up the process and prevents bottlenecks. Create folders (electronic or paper-based) to track applications–Schedule Phone Screen, Schedule First Round of Interviews, Do Not Pursue, Check References, Waiting for Background Check, etc.
Reducing time to fill improves the quality of talent for the simple fact that it is less likely the top candidates will be snapped up by a competing employer with a faster process.
Structured Evaluation
In addition–and this is super important–you use interview scorecards to rate candidates. Formalized evaluation combined with an efficient workflow gives you hiring superpowers. An interview scorecard addresses each necessary hard and soft skill required for the job. The evaluator assigns points based on how well the candidate meets the requirement. The scorecard can also address nice-to-have skills by using a lower point value.
The hiring manager should require decision makers to complete the scorecard during the interview or shortly thereafter. Then compare candidates by score.
Here is an example of a section of an interview scorecard:
The Benefits of a Structured Feedback Process
When you combine a great team with a structured process, you increase your odds of finding superstars. You can standardize everything–from team communication to candidate scoring. Let’s review the benefits of a structured process:
Helps each evaluator consider each skill and characteristic
Is faster because members of the team follow a checklist
Helps prevent bias because evaluators use a scorecard based on the job requirements
Standardized communication keeps everyone in the loop
Helps differentiate applicants with similar qualifications
ApplicantStack Automates Collecting Hiring Team Feedback
ApplicantStack is an affordable applicant tracking system for small to mid-size businesses. It automates the entire process, but in this article, we will only discuss collecting team feedback. In ApplicantStack, the hiring manager can create scorecards and send one to each hiring committee member. The scorecard also contains links to the candidate’s resume and completed application screening questionnaire.
ApplicantStack Calculates an Average Rating for Fast and Easy Comparison
As mentioned previously, each member of the hiring team completes the form during or after the interview. Then—voila!—ApplicantStack combines the forms and calculates an average rating.
When each applicant has a consolidated rating, it’s easy to compare candidates. The process is also less likely to be influenced by unconscious bias.
Auto Reminders Reduce Hiring Delays
Do you have a team member who habitually forgets to send interviewing feedback? ApplicantStack helps with that as well. If someone forgets to turn in their evaluation form, ApplicantStack nudges them with a reminder email. This takes the pressure off the hiring manager. (They won’t miss the awkward conversations.)
Centralized Applicant Management
The evaluation forms and candidate ratings are stored and managed in ApplicantStack. Forget printing evaluation forms. And nobody has to maintain applicant files or log ratings into spreadsheets.
Let’s recap the benefits of using ApplicantStack to collect hiring team feedback:
Electronic evaluation forms are stored and managed in the system
Create custom scoring criteria for each job posting
Team members rate candidates with the same scoring criteria
The evaluation form links to the applicant’s resume and questionnaire
ApplicantStack calculates an average rating from the collective scores
Easily compare candidates with formalized scoring criteria
This article is part of our hiring guide for small businesses.
At some point in your role as a hiring manager you’re going to be faced with the question of how to hire employees. Hiring an employee is one of the most critical functions you can fulfill as a hiring manager.
Hiring an employee is a lot like getting married; you’re going to spend a lot of time with this person. Employees who work in the same office spend over 2,000 hours together each year. You need to find the person who has the skills, work ethic, and fit for your culture.
How do you hire employees? More importantly, how do you hire the right employees? It’s a matter of knowing best practices for hiring and sticking to them.
This hiring guide will teach you all the essentials and some extras that will help ensure that the next time you hire a new employee it’s a match. Everyone wants the right employees. You have a much better chance of hiring them if you have an efficient process in place.
Before you rush headlong into hiring, take a moment to review your company’s needs. It’s a good idea to write a few things down as you get started. This will help you stay on track and address the needs that initiated hiring a new employee in the first place.
Here are some points to consider:
Is there really a need for a full-time employee?
Can the job be temporary, part-time, seasonal, or outsourced?
Does the new job affect your ACA status?
Where is the job in the organization?
How will the change affect the organization?
Is there a deadline for hiring?
Test Your Assumptions
Even if you feel that you know what your company needs, take the time to test your assumptions. Run through some scenarios as a sanity check. Check with other managers and interview employees.
Ask questions about the role you are considering. You’ll use this information to refine your understanding for the job role in the next step. Be wary of bias. Employees and even managers will craft their answers to get the extra help.
To avoid biased answers, ask direct questions about the specific functions the new employee will fulfill. Ask about expected outcomes, and how those outcomes will move the business forward.
Collect your notes and refine your written understanding of the business case for hiring a new employee. Now run a few scenarios to determine if your expected outcomes are viable, what it will take for the employee to meet those expected outcomes, and whether the outcome solves the original problem.
Resources for Knowing Your Company Needs a New Employee
Here are a few resources that can help you gather your thoughts on why you might need a new employee. Look for ideas to focus your hiring effort on solving your original need with a better understanding of your objectives for the new hire:
The first step of how to hire employees begins with writing a great job description. The job description serves many important purposes:
Defines the job responsibilities
Reduces the candidate pool to those who qualify
Introduces the applicant to the company and its culture
It’s important that your written job description includes all the components to communicate the right requirements. This will help you get to your most compatible hiring candidates faster than your competition.
The Components of a Great Job Description
Keep your job description simple and to the point. Be sure to include all the details that potential candidates need to know about the job. The job description is your first opportunity to attract qualified candidates and filter out the ones who aren’t a good fit.
The components of a good job description include:
Job location
Job title
List of job responsibilities
List of candidate requirements
List of desired new hire credentials
Statement about company and employee benefits
EEOC statement
Effective job descriptions avoid acronyms and jargon. They are clear and concise. They convey the company’s personality and make it easy for candidates to judge whether they want the job and if they qualify.
Be sure to choose and stick with a standard format for all of your job descriptions. This will make it easier to create new job descriptions and will present your company in the best light.
You can find plenty of examples of job descriptions by searching Google or visiting popular job sites like Indeed, LinkedIn, JuJu, and CareerBuilder. Use these examples to craft your own unique version. If you copy a template to get you started, be sure to rewrite the description so that it fits your company profile and prioritizes your key requirements.
Get Team Input on Job Descriptions
When you have your description drafted, get input from the team. This will help you refine priorities and get buy-in from your team on the kind of person you are seeking. This early input will assure you won’t have any surprises in later stages of the hiring process.
Share your job description with key team members and consider asking them the following questions for focused feedback:
Is it complete?
Is there a clear distinction between requirements and nice-to-have qualities?
Is this an accurate description of what the company needs?
Is the pay rate appropriate for the described position?
How does this description compare to jobs listed by the competition?
The job description is important both during the hiring process and as a clear yardstick for measuring performance. If you cannot evaluate an employee against this description, you should revise it.
Resources for Writing the Job Description
In addition to the advice in this section, there are many resources on the web to help guide you. I’ve gathered some of the more helpful job description resources and listed them here for you. These additional resources will help you write the description for your next hire:
With a great job description in hand you can expect to attract top talent. Before you post the job, spend time to identify the criteria you will use to determine which applicants deserve your attention.
It’s important to have this list together before you post your job so you are ready to handle incoming applications in a timely manner. Screening applicants will take more time if you aren’t prepared. When applications start coming in, you’ll want to screen them as quickly as possible so you don’t lose a candidate in the waiting.
Defining Your Screening Questions
Look at your list of requirements (…I told you they’d come in handy). For each one, think of a question that you can ask each applicant to determine if they are qualified. Sometimes this will be a yes/no question. For example, you might require that the applicant be authorized to work in the US. Or you might require that they be at least 21 years old. In these examples, the answer is clear cut. Ask a yes/no question.
Other qualifications are better posed as multiple-choice questions. For example, if you require a specific college degree or certification, you could ask their highest level of education and provide a list to choose from. Consider this example:
High School Degree
Associate Degree
Bachelor’s Degree
Master’s Degree
Similarly, you could ask for years of work experience and provide ranges. Remember, if you have ranges be sure they don’t overlap!
Be sure to include answers that fall outside your requirement range. In this example, “High School Degree.” This will allow candidates who don’t match your criteria to self-select for the wrong options. In this case, “High School Degree” becomes a knockout answer in your screening if you are looking for an associate degree or higher.
Prioritizing Your Screening Questions
Once you build your list of questions, consider which ones are appropriate during the initial screening. You want to be able to identify those applicants who are truly disqualified, but you don’t want to eliminate anyone that might be a good candidate for an exceptional reason.
For example, you may find a candidate that doesn’t have the right education level, but that does have an unusual breadth of experience.
Prepare for Screening Early
Take the time to create the screening tools now, rather than waiting until the first applications roll in. There are three great reasons for this:
You will have enough to do when your inbox fills up with applications.
You can still make changes to your description if necessary because you haven’t already posted it!
Once you begin the process, you are competing with other employers to find great new hires. Take the time up front so you don’t slow yourself down after the start.
Prepare to Watch For Keywords In Resume Reviews
Another element of defining your screening criteria comes through the resume.
Think about the keywords you expect to see in a resume that matches the job description. For example, if you are hiring a waitress you might expect the words restaurant, waitress, or server. If you are hiring a controller, you might look for CPA and MBA.
Make a list of the keywords you think will indicate a match. Think about the relative weight each word carries. In the financial officer case, perhaps CPA is more important than MBA.
Using an Applicant Tracking System for Automation
If you use an applicant tracking system (ATS), you may be able to use both the questions and keywords to auto-assess your candidates. This can save a tremendous amount of time.
Applicant tracking systems allow you to automate much of this process. Look for an applicant tracking system that can help you screen candidates automatically.
Even if you don’t have an applicant tracking system, identifying and quantifying your review criteria before you post your job is a good investment. Your competition may be looking for similar job candidates, and you don’t want to slow down the hiring process at this stage.
Be ready and refine your list of questions so that this early phase can go as quickly as possible.
Alert the Team
While you’re at it, make sure that you alert the people on your team who will be involved in the evaluation and selection processes. They need to know what the evaluation criteria are, what their roles and responsibilities are, how the process will work, and how to keep the process moving.
Advanced preparation and transparency are key to success.
Resources That Will Help You Prepare for the Screening Process
In addition to the advice in this section, you can find additional resources to help you prepare for prescreening your incoming job applicants. Here is a list of additional resources that will help you prepare for the screening process.
We’ve come a long way from the old days of placing job ads in print newspapers. In those days, if your best candidate didn’t read the employment section that day, you were out of luck.
You could turn to ‘head hunters’, but there is a hefty price to pay for that. If you have a storefront, you can post your ad in the window or on a bulletin board, but that only gets you as far as the foot traffic walking past your window.
These days, online posting is where it’s at. If you are serious about hiring a new job candidate, your options are online. The question is where to post, and how.
Here are your answers…
Where and How to Post a Job
When it comes to posting a job listing online, there are almost too many options. On the social network side there’s Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. All are important, but there’s more…
There are free job boards like Google for Jobs. There are paid job boards like CareerBuilder and Monster. There are hybrids where you can post free or enhance with a paid version like Indeed and LinkedIn. You can post to your own website and push to search engines or post on specialty boards like Craigslist. Your employees can post to their social media, too.
With all these choices, it can seem daunting. And the thought of a deluge of unqualified applicants can be depressing. Who has the time to post to a dozen sites and manage all the incoming applications?
…Not many busy professionals, but if you want to find the candidate in the shortest time, your best option is to post to as many job boards as possible.
Building Your Job Posting Strategy
You need to have a strategy for where you advertise your job and how you track the performance of each applicant source. To begin, keep it simple…
The first and most obvious source for candidates is your staff. Someone on your team may be qualified and want to apply for the job. Be sure to give them a way to apply. You may even want to give them a few days head start on the process. Hiring candidates from within the company is less expensive and provides an opportunity to hire experienced workers into more responsible positions. This strategy can be very effective and allows you to shift your hiring strategy to a more entry-level position if you are successful. Risk is lower, and you’ll save a lot of time and expense.
Your staff may also have people in their social network who can qualify for the job. Many companies provide incentives for referrals for just this reason. Social media has made it easy to reach friends of friends. Referrals can shorten your hiring timeline and increases your trust in the new employee. Make it easy for staff to alert their connections to the job opportunities at your company.
Another obvious place to put your job openings is on your own job board. If your company has a website, put it there. Make sure applicants can see the entire job description and have options to apply or refer a friend. The application process should include a way for the applicant to send their resume and provide contact information.
If you have an applicant tracking system, it may offer a custom job board for you. These can be handy because they have built-in search and display options that your own website may not support, and can be connected to your site through a “Jobs” link. They also typically provide a way to upload a resume and fill out an application. These handy options can reduce the time it takes to find a viable job candidate.
Commercial Job Boards
Free and paid job boards are essential for today’s job hiring environment for several reasons:
People seeking jobs routinely visit these sites.
Your posting is on equal footing with other postings, making small and mid-size companies more competitive for job applicants.
Filters and search criteria may identify your company as the best match for a qualified applicant that otherwise may not have thought to consider your position.
Job boards provide an easy mechanism to connect you with more job seekers. The more job seekers you can get in front of, the higher the chance you will find that next candidate. Job boards will also reduce the time it takes to find a candidate. This is critical in today’s competitive job environment. The faster you can find that job candidate, the quicker you can fulfill those job requirements we talked about in Step 0.
Professional job boards are critical. Use them.
Which Job Boards to Choose
Now comes the complicated part: choosing the job boards that are right for you and the job at hand.
You may find that paid listings are worthwhile when there is a lot of competition for applicants. Paid listings get a higher profile on the site. You may also find that for some jobs, you have better success with niche job boards.
Free listings are a no-brainer. Post your job to as many free job boards as possible. This will take some time, but you can reduce that time if you have followed the advice in the first three sections of our process:
You know your organizational needs.
You have a solid job description ready to cut and paste.
You have your prescreening questions ready to go.
Paid job boards are essential if you are competing with other national companies, have specific skill requirements that are unique, or have highly specialized requirements. Paid job boards can be important, too, if you are hiring for a highly competitive job role or need a candidate fast.
Paid job boards will highlight your listing based on a higher level of criteria. They will also use featured tools to match your job description with candidate skills. You may find that paid listings offer more advanced tools that can help you solve your hiring needs faster, and with a more candidate.
Tracking Your Job Applicants
Whichever you choose, or if you choose all the above, be sure to track the source of all applicants so you can tell which ones are delivering good candidates. Remember that results may vary based on the particulars of the job description, so track that too.
Variables that might affect the quantity and quality of responses from any given job board and posting include job location, job type, education level, years of experience, hours, and physical requirements.
Of course, time is the gating factor in doing this kind of analysis. If you are doing all this by hand, you may find that you are quickly overwhelmed. An ATS system can be very handy in reducing the amount of effort you have to apply to track applicants. Applicant tracking software will also help you generate important data that can make your next hire even more competitive, quick and easy.
Setting Up Your Job Boards
Each job board has its own setup requirements. Try to keep your company and contact information similar across the boards. This will help you minimize maintenance activities.
Keep your login information secure but easily accessible for when you do your posting. Schedule time to post each job to the boards you choose. Be ready on the receiving side to field the applications as they come in. If you are doing this by hand, you’ll need to plan time to watch for email notifications or login to view new applications. Respond to them as quickly as you can.
Don’t Forget Social Media
Remember that social media can be an effective channel for job posting as well. Create company accounts for Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn to cover the major bases. Make posting to these channels part of your regular job posting routine.
It’s easy to forget your social networks. You’ll want to plan time each day to check each social network for new applications, comments, shares and likes. Don’t forget to check your inbox for questions or private messages; social networks offer a wide range of communication options. You need to keep an eye on each of them.
Applicant Tracking Software Can Help
Applicant tracking systems can be a big help in the job posting process. Doing all this by hand is possible, but applicant tracking software will reduce the time required by a significant amount. It can also help you find that job candidate a lot quicker. You’ll beat the competition to the better candidate and fill your job needs faster.
Applicant tracking and recruiting software can provide many efficiencies, letting you:
Post to all job boards at one time.
Manage your credentials for each job board so you don’t have to login separately.
Automatically track application sources and job applicant details.
Post to social media and track responses automatically.
Generate unique links for posting to niche job boards or email.
Create and maintain an internal job board.
Automate screening of candidates based on your criteria.
Automatically receive and store applications and resumes.
If you are serious about hiring or have a high turnover in your business, consider an applicant tracking system to help you optimize your hiring process.
Resources to Find the Right Job Boards for Your Next Job Opening
Here are some additional resources you can look to for advice on which job boards to post to. Many job boards provide niche opportunities or special features that may be specific to your industry. Do a little research before you decide, make a list, and post to as many as you can:
Now comes the fun part! Once you’ve defined and advertised your job, get ready to field applications.
The beginning of this step in the process should be an email from you to your applicant that acknowledges receipt of their application. You’ll want to communicate to your applicants as soon as possible to let them know they are in the running. This will keep their attention on your company and tune them into responding quickly.
Set this up as an automated task so that you:
Save time otherwise spent sending individual responses.
Appear interested and responsive.
Avoid phone and email calls from applicants seeking status.
Present a consistent and timely message to all applicants.
Buy a little time for screening.
Focus Your Candidate Screening
The first level of screening should focus on 2 objectives:
Eliminate the clearly unqualified
Highlight the top candidates
You can save your team a lot of time by removing candidates that do not make the grade for the job.
At the same time, though, be careful not to knockout a candidate that might be exceptionally qualified. For example, if you have a job that requires an undergraduate degree in computer science, anyone without it might be considered unqualified. However, you might have a candidate that has extraordinary experience that makes them worth hiring (Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg were all college dropouts).
Use the questions and keywords list you devised in step 2 to help you do a quick evaluation and sort the applications. You may want to do this in batches or at the end of the job opening window to save time. However, this may come at the cost of losing top talent to time.
Sorting Out Top Job Candidates
After the quick sort, go through each candidate in detail starting with the top candidate. Double check the knockouts. Then decide which ones deserve to go to the next level.
For those not moving on, consider whether they should be retained in the pool of potential future candidates. For example, if the applicant is a student who will graduate the following year, perhaps they could be a candidate for an internship in the summer or an entry-level position in the future.
Keep Communicating with Job Candidates
It’s a good idea at this point to send another email to all candidates. Give them a status update. For candidates moving on, let them know that they will be scheduled for a phone or in-person interview. For the rest, let them know that they were not chosen for the position.
Be sure to follow company guidelines and HR best practices for the content of these emails.
Watch for Bottlenecks in Your Screening Process
The initial screening can be a painful process for all involved. There can be a great deal of inefficiency, particularly if you have a high response rate. This step in the process can be fraught with danger.
You can miss great candidates because knockouts are too restrictive. You can lose other great candidates because they are snatched up by others before you finish your process. You can waste precious time wading through unqualified applications.
If you find the screening process to be a bottleneck for your organization, consider an applicant tracking system. An ATS can automate many of the tasks associated with this important first touch with applicants. For example, you can set up automated emails for each step in your process.
You can also typically have the applications go directly to the ATS (instead of your email) and scored against your criteria. This allows you to skip right to reviewing candidates in priority order. It is much easier to review candidates when you see them in context of each other and can go to details quickly and easily without jumping back and forth between files or pieces of paper.
Resources to Help You Screen Your Job Applicants
Here are additional resources to help you screen your job applicants. This is a critical stage of your hiring process, and it makes sense to have a good grasp of what you’ll be dealing with. Applicants will respond to your communications in a variety of ways, some positive and some with frustration.
Be prepared to handle the task by learning all you can in this area. Here are some great resources to help you build on this advice:
Once you’ve eliminated the unqualified, it is time to go to the next level. Interviews.
Typically this is either a phone interview (as a second screening) or an in-person interview. Either way, the candidate and one or more of your staff need to agree on a date and time for the interview.
Scheduling seems like a simple task but rarely is. It can be particularly frustrating when calendars are constantly filling up. Another issue is how the substance of the interview is shared with others. As much as possible, try to move the process quickly and efficiently so that valuable time is not wasted.
Scheduling Interviews
On the scheduling side, use a scheduling tool that can access the calendars of all your staff involved in the interview. You can then set a date and time for the interview and communicate it to your candidate.
Even better, set a window for the candidate to select a date/time combination that also works for them. This is particularly important if you have multiple candidates and multiple interviewers.
For example, if you have 10 candidates that appear qualified based on their applications, you should conduct an initial phone interview with each prior to an in-person interview. This will give you a chance to reduce the number of people you have come into the office for team interviews.
You’ll save a lot of time if you can send an automatic email to each job candidate. Invite them to choose an interview date and time based on your calendar. Offer a selection of times, or use a tool such as Calendly to offer a range of times with automated scheduling. Even better, use your ATS system to manage everyone’s schedule.
As each of the 10 candidates in our example follow the link, they see the combinations still available to them. Once each chooses an interview slot, the pool of available times goes down by one.
Include Team Scheduling to Optimize Time
In another example, let’s say you are hiring 10 seasonal waitresses. You have 20 applicants that seem qualified so you want to schedule them for an in-person interview with you and several team members.
In this case, you’ll want to schedule time with your team and announce a speed-date interview session to each of your candidates. Scheduling specific times won’t be necessary if you block out a time and receive candidates as they come in. Candidates won’t mind waiting a few minutes to get started, and you can round-robin your team so that everyone is conducting an interview at the same time.
Send an automated email inviting the candidates to come at a specific date/time that fits your team’s schedule. Receive candidates as they come in.
You may even want to do a series of phone and in-person interviews in a similar round-robin format where you hand off to the next teammate after each 15-minute call. Whichever method you choose, scheduling is going to be a big part of the process.
Everyone Involved, from candidate to hiring manager, needs to be looped in as efficiently as possible. Fortunately, most people now use either Google or Outlook calendars, so coordination should be possible.
Resources for Scheduling Interviews and Managing Time
Here are some interviewing related resources that will help prepare you for interviewing new job candidates.
Let’s discuss how to conduct an interview the right way. Like anything, good interviewing requires preparation. How should the interviewer prepare for an interview? Notice that steps 1-6 all take place before the candidate arrives. If you follow the steps and prepare well, the actual interview will go smoothly. By all means, the things you do to prepare are just as important as what you do when you are conducting the interview.
Understand the Job Description
If you wrote the job description, you have a good idea what the position entails. But take it a step further by talking to managers. Ask them about soft skills. Also, talk to employees in the same (or similar) job role. When you have a deeper understanding, update the job description.
Write an Interview Script
An unstructured interview prevents good evaluation. Fortunately, it’s not hard to write structured interview scripts. We cover this in detail in: Why Structured Interviews Are Critical. Follow the steps to create structured interviews as part of your hiring process.
It’s helpful to organize questions in three categories: questions about job specifics (hard skills), soft skills (behavioral) and situational. Hard skills are also called technical skills and are job-specific capabilities or knowledge necessary for the job role. They are acquired through on-the-job training, experience or formal education. Therefore, hard skills can be quantified. For example, an ability to write code in JavaScript, measure blood pressure or speak Spanish.
Conversely, soft skills are behavioral attributes that help an employee succeed in their work. Working well with team members, problem-solving and effective time management are examples of soft skills that would help with any job. Soft skills are also called interpersonal skills, non-technical skills and essential skills. Situational questions relate to soft skills as well.
Job role-specific: What experience and certifications do you have in the [INDUSTRY] field?
Soft skills or behavioral: What if you had to solve a difficult problem and your manager was away?
Situational questions: How would you respond to an angry customer?
The Importance of Standardized Scoring
It’s key to understand that to improve interviewing, you need to improve evaluation. To do this, standardize candidate scoring. An interview scorecard is the easiest way to do this. Use the job qualifications to create the scorecard. It doesn’t need to be complex, but each person on the interview team must use it. When everyone is working from the same playbook, it’s easier to compare candidates. It also helps to remove “gut feelings” from the process.
Share Your Mission and Values
The job seeker has the power in today’s employment dynamic. Moreover, it’s clear that job seekers care about what your company stands for. Certainly, the applicant is scrutinizing you as carefully as you are scrutinizing them. For this reason, write an Employment Value Proposition and practice sharing it. In a great interview, you showcase your culture and values.
Group vs. Individual Interview
If you’re doing high volume hiring, it may work to do a group interview. For example, if you need to quickly hire multiple candidates for the same job position, a group interview (in person or a virtual interview) may work for your company.
Group interviews are most effective when hiring for positions that require excellent people skills, especially when the job regularly deals with consumers or the public. Group interviews are also effective when teamwork is an integral part of the job. The group interview allows an employer to observe behaviors that are reflective of success on the job before the employer actually invests time and money into hiring a candidate.The Society for Human Resource Management
Know Hiring Laws Inside and Out
Business owners, recruiting and hiring managers make mistakes all the time. Therefore, protect your company by learning the do’s and don’ts of legal hiring. Additionally, if you have legal counsel, have them sign off on your interview questions.
Review the Candidate’s Application
The more familiar you are with the candidate’s resume, the better. First, it gives you important context. Secondly, it will help you maintain eye contact and put the candidate at ease.
Schedule the Interview Location in Advance
You don’t want to wander around looking for a conference room with the applicant in tow. If possible, use a private room with comfy chairs. A glass-windowed room can make an introverted candidate uncomfortable.
In the past two years, video interviews have become commonplace. If you conduct virtual interviews, ensure the tech is ready to go. Indeed, nothing lowers your confidence (and company image) like tech glitches.
Don’t Crowd Your Interview Calendar
Schedule enough time for the interviewee to elaborate where necessary. Add a 15-minute buffer between interviews so you never have to rush a candidate-or make the next one wait.
Download our free eBook: The Interview: The Step-by-Step Guide to Exemplary Hiring Practices.
Step Up Your Communication Skills
Now that you’ve prepared well, it’s time for the actual interview.
Turn off your phone or have your assistant hold your calls
Offer the candidate something to drink
Speak slowly
Listen intently
Stick with the script-even if you have an urge to stray!
One of the hardest steps on the path to hiring can be quantifying feedback. If the process is working right, unqualified candidates were eliminated early, so there can be a risk of feedback becoming very subjective.
Start with Hiring Criteria
To help ensure that all of your staff evaluates candidates in a consistent manner, start with the hiring criteria.
Make sure everyone is on board with the qualification list and what constitutes a good match. Create a feedback form that everyone uses so that you can compare all perspectives. Make it as quantitative as possible, then give some room for opinion. Let everyone weigh in, and then combine the data for easy review.
Collecting Feedback from your Team
Make sure you include instructions for providing feedback. Instructions can include the interview criteria themselves. Also include the method for providing feedback, whether by email or printed form. Let your team know when the feedback is due, and be wary that this process can take a lot of time.
To shorten the time, ask for feedback immediately. This will keep the interview process as short as possible. You’ll also get fresh feedback that doesn’t rely on memory.
Share Feedback to Your Team
After the interviews are complete and all the evaluations are in, make them available to the team so they can do a final assessment on which candidates are top contenders. Make it as easy for them as possible, presenting all assessments for each candidate, and a roll-up for all candidates.
It’s a good idea to provide a summary survey that each team member can complete. This summary survey can ask them questions about their final analysis including which candidate they felt was the most for the job.
Have each team member name their top three candidates in order of priority to make it easier to match the best job candidates.
Make it as easy as possible to narrow the field.
Resource on How to Assess Job Candidates
You can learn more about interviewing and assessing candidates from this resource.
At this point, you should be down to only a few candidates for the position.
It’s time to check references and do background checks.
Checking References of Job Candidates
You may have collected references at the very beginning of the process or may do it now. In any case, this is usually the point where you invest time talking to previous employers and looking for any issues that were not already uncovered.
Try to automate this process as much as you can. For example, send an automated email to the references asking them to fill out a linked questionnaire. To speed this step, call references and fill out the questionnaire yourself. Either way, try to gather information in a consistent manner from each reference for each final candidate.
To save time, you can begin checking references during the interview process. Create a checklist and ask a team member to conduct phone interviews while candidates are being interviewed.
Performing Background Checks on Job Candidates
There are many organizations that can conduct a background check and other specialized checks that you might require such as drug testing and driver history. Notify the candidates to let them know you are conducting the checks.
Background checks are best handled by a professional company that specializes in background checks. Note that there may be regulations to navigate. Be careful not to ask for information that may be protected either federally or by state law.
If you are conducting background checks, make sure your job candidates know up front. There is likely paperwork and agreements to sign before background checks can be initiated.
Let everyone know what the criteria are for the background checks, and provide candidates the opportunity to opt out if they have concerns.
Making a Selection
Once the checks are complete, it is time to make a selection. Give the selection team access to all candidate information (unless it is confidential) and make it easy to compare candidates if there are more than one still standing. There are tools available to speed this process and make it easier to review all candidate and reviewer information.
Resources to Help You Make a New Hire Selection
Here are some additional resources that can help you make a selection. This is the most nerve-wracking part of the hiring process, and it deserves some additional know-how. Learn as much as you can about selecting your next new hire and get comfortable with the stresses of selecting candidates.
Now that a decision has been made by you and your company, it is time for the applicant to weigh in. If everything has gone well, the candidate is excited about the job and wants to join your company. If everything has gone fast, the candidate is still available for hire.
Send an Offer Letter
Send an offer letter that states clearly the key information about the offer, including wage, location and start date. You might also want to include where and when to report and any other details that are specific to the offer.
Give the candidate a signature line and send it out.
Get to this process as quickly as you can. Remember you have competition out there. Now that you have identified this person as the ideal candidate, you can be certain that others have, too.
It helps to have a job offer ready to go before you start the process. Begin with a template…
Use a Job Offer Template
Use an offer letter template to make this a speedy and consistent process. Create the template in advance and have it ready to go for this and your next hire.
Include your company logo, standard text and merge fields where you can easily add the details for the specific offer. Keep this template on hand for future job offers so you don’t have to reinvent the wheel. It helps to save time, too.
The offer step is important to execute as quickly as possible, so it helps to have the tools standing by to get the job done fast.
Resources to Help You Formulate Your Job Offer
Here are some samples and resources that can be useful in defining your offer.
Congratulations! You have crossed the goal line and have successfully filled the job.
But just as in football, there is still work to do after the touchdown. Time to go for the extra point—onboarding your new hire now, before they report to work.
Onboarding Your New Hire
Onboarding is a topic for another day, but suffice it to say that there is a huge upside to tackling onboarding ahead of the first day. It makes day one more productive and less painful for everyone from the new hire to hiring manager and colleagues.
It also helps establish your new hire faster and more productively. Onboarding can save you months of ramp-up time and helps build company loyalty in your new employee. Statistics show that employees who experience a thorough onboarding process are more likely to spend more time at the company, and will be more productive, faster.
Onboarding typically includes a lot of paperwork. Instead of having new hires spend hours in the new workplace filling out forms, give them the power to do the work at their convenience before reporting to work. Employee self-serve portals, online documentation, digital employee handbooks and a personal digital file cabinet are all part of the onboarding process.
With onboarding, employees have the opportunity to complete tasks before they come to work. Then when they come to work, they are ready to work.
The Components of Onboarding
The onboarding process is specific to every company, so it’s hard to determine a standard. However, there are common onboarding processes that you will want to consider.
Here are some common components of onboarding:
Tax forms
WOTC forms
ACA forms
Benefits enrollment
Direct deposit and payroll details
Emergency contact information
Employee handbook review
Policies and procedures
Safety instructions
Timekeeping instructions
There is a great deal of efficiency to be had for all involved simply by moving these processes off paper and online. There are plenty of tools available to help you make that happen and make everyone involved jazzed about getting down to business on day one.
Resources for Onboarding Your Next Employee
Here are some resources that can be useful in understanding the scope of onboarding and ways you can streamline the process.
So there you go. If you’ve made it this far, you should have a solid understanding of the hiring process. Use this guide to plan your next hire. You’ll find the steps in this guide to be invaluable to knowing how to find new applicants and how to hire employees.
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