Recruiting has been evolving faster than most people can keep up, for both employers and employees. However, recruiters don’t have the luxury of taking a step back to watch the action. You have to go with the flow, especially since sourcing talent and talent acquisition overall are major drivers of revenue and growth in organizations.

What you need to succeed today in the competitive market is the right mix of hard and soft skills, supported by technical tools for that extra edge. We have compiled these 6 tips from expert recruiters that you can instantly act on to ensure more successful recruitment and talent acquisition for your employer or clients.

1. Stay Empathetic: Identify With the Candidate Journey

Can you remember when you too had to look for a job? What were you looking for in an employer, and how was the like experience for you?

Job searching can be as nerve-wracking for the employee as it is for the employer. Maintaining an empathetic approach makes you a clear winner in the process. Take steps to structure and optimize the candidate experience from the first point of contact with your organization. It should be one that sends positive signals about your culture and values.

For example, keeping candidates in the loop along the way, even if you choose to go with someone else, shows them that you value them. Other ways to create a good experience include:

  • Provide accurate job descriptions upfront as well as information about the terms of work and benefits package

  • Introduce them to the rest of the team

  • Collect feedback and use it to fine tune the candidate experience.

2. Consult With the Team

Collaborative hiring is the process of involving the rest of the team in the hiring process. It works great in almost all cases because employees have a more on-the-ground experience that enables them to judge how well a candidate will perform more accurately. This is especially important for highly technical roles.

Collaboration also helps to remove the possibility of unconscious biases that we all have, whether we are aware of them or not.

We recommend involving the team as early as the sourcing stage. When you are writing your job description, for example, the team can help you come up with an accurate list of the duties, roles, and responsibilities that the role involves.

Collaboration plays one other important role: it helps you identify the pain points that your existing employees face. By continuously improving on employee experience, you can minimize the turnover rate and improve employee satisfaction.

3. Onboarding & Offboarding

Many organizations realize the power of smooth onboarding to maximize the value of new hires. A well-structured onboarding cuts down the time needed for employees to adjust to the position and fulfill their duties, thus saving you money.

However, have you thought about offboarding? When employees move on from the organization, they don’t have to do so on bad terms. Cultivating a post-hire relationship can be just as important, because these people can be amazing ambassadors for the brand.

With sites like Glassdoor, your prospects can read reviews of what it is like to work with your brand. You want to send a positive brand image, or you will lose your edge in the highly competitive job market. Not to mention that, past employees can always return if they left on good terms.

4. Take Ownership of Brand Engagement, Reputation & Perception

In addition to a proper offboarding process, you need to take control of your organization’s reputation and perception as a strong employer. Innovative brands have taken to sharing images on Instagram of happy employees on vacation, in the office, or during events to build a positive perception.

Engaging positively with candidates also goes a long way toward building a positive image. From a personalized approach and respectful communication to involving current employees in building a brand image, there is a lot you can do to sell your brand to the right people. Remember, recruitment these days is a lot more like marketing.

5. Be Organized

Your organization skills are probably the focal point of everything you do. Having to interact with a lot of people, you don’t want to be replying to emails a week after they are sent or missing important lunches.

Aside from using organization tools to plan your tasks and calendar, your correspondence also needs to reflect a sense of organization. One way to do that is to set a time bracket every day when you will be replying to chats, emails, posting on social media, and generally interacting with your prospects.

Another useful approach is to use modern tools to handle tasks such as analysis, outreach, and tracking along the talent search pipeline. LinkedIn has a few paid features for professional recruiters who handle a large volume of prospects regularly including LinkedIn Recruiter and sponsored InMails.

6. Leverage the Power of Referrals

Top recruiters today know the value of employee referrals. For one, referrals reduce your workload because existing employees can guarantee candidates with the right experience, culture fit, and skill set. Today, referrals make up 88% of superior candidates being hired.

Employee referrals are just one way to widen the net. Equally important is to avoid screening out good candidates on the basis of experience, education, or even personality. Keep an open mind, especially during the first stages of recruitment. That quirky candidate may turn out to be the best fit for the role, and especially if you have a great grooming and onboarding program.

In the same way, seek to build diversity and freedom in your team. It should be obvious, but we’ll say it: don’t discount people on the basis of age, gender, race, or personal circumstances. That stay at home mum who can only work remotely can be a big advantage for the team. Plus, diversity and flexibility is a big competitive advantage.

Sourcing Talent to Bring People Together

As a recruiter, your work is to bridge the gap between employers and employees and ensure a fair exchange of value. It’s a tough job that requires you to sift through a lot of propositions and prospects, but modern tools such as Interseller can make it much easier.

Interseller is a software platform that enables you to source and reach out to high-quality prospects from places such as LinkedIn. That way, you can find and connect with potential hires quickly, easily, and effectively. Request your Interseller demo today to see how we can help you access more high-quality prospects with minimal effort.