How COVID-19 Changed the Recruiting Process

In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic changed the recruiting process forever. With the pandemic, came the rise of the Great Resignation. Many people realized that they wanted to continue working from home, find a job aligned with their interests, or combat rising inflation with a higher salary.

According to one survey, in 2022, 23% of surveyed employees said that they would look for a new job, so the trend of employees quitting will continue.

Because of this change, many companies have had to shift their recruiting process to keep up with the changing times and the demand for talent.

While some companies had hoped that these changes would be temporary, some of them seem like they are here to stay. So if you’re interested in attracting the right talent to your company to remain competitive, keep reading to learn about what you should change in your hiring process.

Job Boards

Almost everyone can agree that traditional job boards look much different from years ago. With so many people looking for specific roles, the rise of niche job boards has become popular.

There are no long lists of links and inapplicable jobs that job seekers have to look through. Now, they can jump onto a platform and find the perfect job that will match their skillsets.

These specialized job boards might also help you more directly reach out to the talent you were looking for. You should sit down with your human resources team and look over each job opening and see what would be the best channel to promote it on.

More Competition

COVID-19 also brought along more competition when employees realized they had the power in the market. There are millions of companies in the United States, and with more people turning to the gig economy, there is more competition for open positions.

With remote work becoming popular, more employees can now work for different companies or companies that aren’t near them. This gives you a wider pool of talent to pull from, making it harder to attract the best candidates.

However, there will also be more churn as employees decide not to stay at a company for twenty years.

“A recentreport found that 60% of all millennials are willing to leave their job before the first year. With the rise of work from anywhere, hire from anywhere, and an easier interview process all done on the computer, there’s no reason for employees not to be looking for a better opportunity. Companies need to be thinking about having a constant stream of potential candidates to fill their workforce,” said Evan Sohn, CEO of Recruiter.com.

Networking

With the push to digital recruiting solutions, recruiters have to find new ways to network. However, while networking over social media is possible, many people are becoming burnt out from too much digital usage.

Because of this, many people are still trying to connect with people outside of the digital realm. So even though you might be trying to network on these social networking sites, make sure that you don’t forget to create professional networks in person as well.

That might even produce more quality connections.

Technology

Many recruiters were already using some form of technology before the pandemic, but now with remote work and a competitive market, the need for technology has become even more critical.

Recruiters can use all kinds of different tools that follow human resource management. These tools are meant to improve the workflow and find a way to maximize the time that the recruiter has to find potential candidates.

For example, a recruiter might use machine learning software to identify ideal candidates for a specific position. They can even use that software to reach out to those candidates and recruit them for the open position.

Recruiters also utilize technology like an applicant tracking system (ATS). This will create an applicant pool database of resumes and candidates. This organization will help recruiters easily find candidates when they have a new position.

Some tools can automate part of the recruitment process. For example, some calendars will let the applicant pick a time that works for them for the interview, saving time to go back and forth to find a suitable appointment.

These tools can also automate other steps, like sending out emails to passive candidates, keeping interview notes, or more.

If companies aren’t taking advantage of great technology, they will lose talent to the other companies.

Remote Work

While some companies were remote before the pandemic, many companies sent their employees to work from home to stay safe when COVID-19 started. However, many employees don’t want to go back to work in the office, and many companies are changing to remote work.

Recruiters didn’t stop working when everyone went remote. Instead, they switched to virtual hiring using Microsoft Teams and Zoom platforms. This became the new normal for many hiring managers and recruiters, but many candidates enjoy the experience of being able to interview at home.

Now, recruiters are starting to replace screening phone calls with video interviews. Final interviews might be purely virtual interviews, or they might have a mix of in-person interviews as well.

However, this method has been more popular doesn’t mean that there haven’t been challenges. Many recruiters and HR professionals struggle to identify good candidates through video interviews.

To fix that, many talent acquisition leaders recommend taking a step back from your interviewing process and figuring out what needs to be changed. Do you need to ask better questions to determine the candidate’s skill set? What areas can you be more flexible in? Can you learn about reading body language through a screen? Do you think the applicant would be a fit for your company culture?

Virtual interviews will likely be very popular in the future, but in-person interviews aren’t going away just yet. Many recruiters still want to conduct in-person interviews, but make sure you still offer virtual interviews as well, or you may be losing out on top talent.

Update Your Recruiting Process Today

If you’re interested in attracting top talent to your business and having recruiting success, you might want to look at your recruiting process and see which areas need to be improved upon.

Do you feel like you need more recruiters to keep up with increased hiring demand? Check out our recruiters that you can hire on an as-needed basis.

Do you feel like you need more technology to help source candidates? Check out our advanced talent pipeline software.

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By Alyssa Harmon