Why You Should Care and What You Can Do About it
My colleague Nick Bacon, recently shared his insights on current hiring trends, and one trend is that hiring is on the rise! As we all vie for top talent to meet our increasing demand, I thought it might be helpful to discuss what job seekers actually want and what you can do it about it.
Flexibility
Clicks’ latest IT Recruitment and Retention Report – the 24th edition in this series – highlights the importance of offering flexibility as a recruitment attraction and retention strategy. Of the 400 employers we surveyed nationally, working from home and offering flexible hours were the two most effective strategies used by organisations. This means it will be important to ensure your workplace offers genuine flexibility to compete for talent as this benefit is fast becoming the norm.
Employers Who Care
Job seekers want to work for employers who can demonstrate they are good corporate citizens. According to an employee engagement survey, 51% of respondents wouldn’t work for a company that doesn’t have strong social and environmental commitments. This may include eco-friendly work practices, partnering with suppliers who have good CSR practices, and providing opportunities for your staff to volunteer in the community. Whatever suits your organisation, it is important to have a solid Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) program in place.
Additionally, it’s reported that 70% of job seekers value an organisation’s commitment to diversity when considering prospective employers. I believe this commitment starts with an inclusive recruitment process that is free from unconscious bias. That requires being aware of our own biases, however confronting that may be! I invite you and your hiring teams to complete the Harvard Implicit Association Test, which tests for unconscious bias. With that awareness, you can build an objective recruitment process that may include: gender-neutral language in job ads, reviewing applications with names removed, behavioural-based interviewing, utilising psychometric assessments and case studies, or other task-based activities when determining suitability.
Fair Pay
It has been suggested that the perception of being paid fairly is more important for engagement and job satisfaction than higher pay. With 20 years of recruitment experience, I have worked with thousands of job seekers and cannot stress how important it is to be upfront and transparent about pay. Failure to do so may mean stressful negotiations when you should be celebrating a new hire or worse – a last-minute dropout. Being open doesn’t mean sharing what everyone is being paid, rather it is about sharing the process to determine the salary, including market research or industry benchmarks used. This works best when that transparency is shared at the start of the process and reconfirmed at the offer stage. I’ve even seen it included in offer letters!
Insights into what it’s really like
Job seekers are really interested in understanding what it is like to work for your company. Specifically, they want to know about the company culture, what will the role be like, and the working style of you and your team. Job seekers will visit your website and read company reviews on sites such as Glassdoor. However, you can provide them with a richer experience through:
- Office tour (if applicable)
- Designing selection assessments that provide insights into the role (such as case studies or presentations)
- Team catch-up (at the appropriate stage in the recruitment process)
- Videos and social media content that showcases the rituals, celebrations, and ways of working that is unique to your organisation
- Being clear and upfront about the challenges, opportunities, and expectations for success
- Encouraging and allocating time to go through questions candidates may have about working within your organisation and team
The key is to ensure that the onboarding experience and beyond match the candidate’s expectations coming into the role.
Tapping into what job seekers want will benefit you in many ways. The most obvious is that it will assist you in attracting great people to your organisation and growing your biggest asset! Addressing what job seekers want will help open up access to a broader pool of talent. This also means when prospective employees become team members, they are more likely to be engaged, focused, and energised to put in discretionary efforts. Having a top-performing team ensures a material positive impact on the success of your organisation.
Clicks specialises in IT recruitment. Our recruiters have 12 years’ industry experience on average. As Australia’s favourite IT recruiters, we can help you find top talent, fast! If are hiring this year, please reach out to me or your Clicks Account Manager to see how we can help.
Tamara Ryf
Regional General Manager, VIC & ACT
