Recruiting is the art of juggling candidates and then finding them a home. It’s no easy feat to manage the flow of applicants while maintaining the overall effectiveness of the
talent acquisition process. The chances of making mistakes rise as the number of squeaky wheels increase in a fast-paced environment.
The least you can do in the recruiting war zone is insulate yourself from silly mistakes. That said, here are five dumb things recruiters do:
- Set unrealistic expectations with the hiring manager
When it comes to the recruitment game, everyone wants to be a hero – no one wants to say no to a hiring manager and crush their idea of a dream candidate.
However, by overselling a manager on what you’re capable of doing you’re setting yourself up for failure. A realistic Service Level Agreement (SLA) should be set between recruiting and
hiring managers so they know what to expect.
When hiring managers have unrealistic expectations, they set a domino effect in motion that impacts the business. For example, by assuming a certain number of sales people will be hired, financial forecasts may be overly optimistic. If a number of
engineers are overpromised at a time, a product can easily fall behind schedule. Don’t let pride get in the way of business.
- Refuse to learn from Glassdoor reviews
Taking feedback is not easy, but it is necessary for growth. Ignoring feedback leads to repeated mistakes and keeps an organization from moving forward.
Glassdoor provides a valuable forum for feedback not only within an organization, but also from prospective employees. Every recruiter should monitor reviews related to their interview process so they improve their process.
Reading
Glassdoor reviews helps reveal bottlenecks and how your team’s candidate experience is perceived. Being able to implement changes from interview feedback will create a much more efficient process and increase the likelihood of candidates wanting to work for you.
- Allowing weak job descriptions to be left online
A poorly written job description reflects negatively on your company, so ensure your job descriptions accurately convey what you’re looking for. Although hiring managers need to detail the specs, recruiting ultimately holds the responsibility of crafting job descriptions.
Spelling errors, bland work requirements or general inaccuracies
scare candidates away. All show poor attention to detail. Worse, job seekers assume those errors reflect a larger problem.
Write job descriptions that make candidates want to apply. Don’t let good talent slip away because of laziness.
- Failing to follow the Golden Rule of recruiting: treat candidates as you’d like to be treated
Candidate experience is increasingly important. The interview process is not as secretive as it used to be – your employer brand today can be easily lost in a competitive talent market.
Ignoring the candidate experience is a fatal mistake. Everyone plays a part in the process, but the recruiter is the focal point. Even if candidates are complete misfires, they deserve to be treated with respect and honesty.
Simple things like keeping candidates in the loop and answering questions in a timely manner make an impact. Be empathetic to job seekers, too, as we were all in their shoes. Think about what you liked and didn’t like about working with certain recruiters, and how that affected your view of the company. Viewing things from the job seeker’s point of view can help you improve your overall strategy and hire better talent.
- Passing on seemingly imperfect candidates
A job description can never describe the absolute perfect candidate. Relying on a
job description and a grocery list of skills to look for is a bad habit and an easy way to spin your wheels during a search.
Passing on candidates because they don’t meet every single requirement means a recruiter is either scared of having their hand slapped by hiring managers or is unaware of what’s important for the role.
Regardless, it slows hiring, creating a bottleneck in the interview process. Take a chance on candidates that show the potential for a role. Remember, many skills can be easily learned or refined in the time it’d take you to find and close that “perfect” candidate.
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