As a small business owner or startup founder, you are going to need to bring on great talent to help grow your business and take care of your customers. Your challenge will be how to compete with the larger companies for this talent. Especially, when they can pay more salary and provide more benefits than you.
One way is to provide a great candidate experience. There are lots of HR tech companies working on improving recruiting and hiring. But the candidate experience is something that has to be done at the human level. No matter how good the economy, people will always be looking and having a great candidate experience will be your advantage.
First thing, this is about to be 2020. You should not have candidates fill out anything in pen. They should not have to upload a resume and then fill out an online application that asks for the exact same information that is on the resume.
Your candidate experience should be as great as your customer user experience. I am of course presuming that you have a great customer user experience. The fewer clicks and touchpoints the better.
The information you ask for from the candidate should be relevant to the position. For example, if you are hiring for a position that requires a Masters degree and 10 years of experience. You probably should not ask for a copy of their High School diploma.
Without a doubt don’t ghost your candidate. Yes, it is tough to keep the candidates up to date on what is going on, especially if you have lots of candidates. But providing them updates will help set you apart from other companies.
This will greatly improve your employer brand. People talk and would you rather have former candidates say the candidate experience with your company was great or that it was just another black hole.
Also, if you have a great candidate experience, those people who were not hired this time are more likely to apply again.
Lots of companies put on a show for the candidate. They make the work and the workplace seem like a fairy tale. This does neither side any good. Show the candidate how things really are at your company.
Don’t say everyone gets off at 5 pm if that is not the truth.
Keep in mind that usually both the candidate and the company usually puts on a false façade. This does neither side any good. As the company be fully transparent and this should help the candidate to show their true selves.
Ask questions about how people communicate. How do people work best or worse. How are you going to help them succeed. Make it clear that you will be invested in their success. People want to work where they will have an impact and make a difference. Having a great candidate experience will influence them to apply for positions at your company
Check out the cavnessHR podcast where we talk to small business owners, founders and people who help them succeed. If you're interested in being a guest, reach out to me at jasoncavness@cavnessHRcom or just reply on this platform.
Like this article?
0
CavnessHR: Focus on your business, we've got your HR
Be Great Every Day!
