Coronavirus has upended society in a way no other event has in recent memory. Estimates of when life might return to normal vary by months, but the consensus seems to be that at some point in the near future we’ll be doing the same things we had been doing at the start of the year. Which means the same problems will greet us once we get back to the office.
The hiring process is one of those problems. Research by Glassdoor found that the average amount of time it takes to fill an open position has grown by nearly four days in the previous six years. Gartner, the management and technology consultancy, recently conducted a similar study that focuses on white-collar jobs. The results? Standard hiring time for a white-collar role is a whopping 68 days, up 26 day from a study taken six years ago. Those extra 26 days can lead to staggering losses.
Take an enterprise sales position, for example. With a standard $1 million annual quota, your average loss in revenue every day an account executive post remains open is $4,150. Multiply that by the standard hiring time, and you’re out over $250,000.
Managers could blame everything from the proliferation of hiring committees to an increase in hiring tests and assessments, but there are smaller, everyday habits that also contribute to the issue.
For the past decade my agency has specialized in helping early-stage startups hire quickly. Though every industry is different, we’ve found six universal ways to fix the process, get hiring down to two or three weeks and stem the tide of all that lost productivity.
Writing a clear job description
The problems begin with job postings that are too vague to attract the right candidate pool, too hip in an attempt to enlarge that pool or so restrictive (in a quest to ward off unqualified applicants) that they come off as negative or unfriendly.
Prospective employees are not only looking for a role fit but also a culture fit. The best way to start with the right pool is simple clarity: duties, requirements, benefits and employee characteristics.
Not delegating to HR
For busy managers, it’s common practice to dump the launch of an interviewing process on HR for the box-checking of qualifications and the initial call. The smart know to avoid delegating.
Time kills deals, and the best candidates are in high demand. Being the tortoise in this race only narrows the talent pool. Because box-checking can be easily gleaned from a résumé, the best managers are quick to pick up the phone, see if there’s a fit and most importantly get candidates excited about the opportunity.