Achieve High Performance Recruitment Without Sacrificing Candidate Quality And Recruiter Well-Being

Employers struggle to attract, hire, and retain qualified candidates and the current labour market is not helping. According to Indeed’s Insight “How Recruiters See the Workforce Over the Next 12 Months” Report, a tight labour supply in IT and engineering is expected to continue to impact hiring. Employers understand that building and maintaining a high performance recruitment pipeline will help them overcome their talent acquisition challenges.  

In this article, we showcase how to recruit better to overcome labour challenges and thrive in a challenging hiring landscape. What’s the key? An appetite and desire to focus on employee wellbeing first.

High Performance Recruitment Evolves

According to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE), an independent think tank with its headquarters in Mumbai “More than 40% of India's population is under the age of 25, but as of December 2022, nearly half of them - 45.8% - were unemployed”. Fewer jobs with more and more competition remain one of the most significant near-term obstacles for the Indian jobseekers. Shortage of job affects jobseekers greatly, as it slows the economy and leaders to higher unemployment.

According to CMIE's (Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy) Economic Outlook, India’s ageing population creates another challenge. The number of young people has increased by 2.64 crore (from 35.49 crore in 2016–17 to 38.13 crore in 2022–23), yet their employment rate has plummeted by a startling 3.24 crore. Hiring practices, processes, and tools require an overhaul to win talent in a hiring landscape that is changing in fundamental ways.       

At the same time, empowered jobseekers expect higher wages, greater flexibility and meaningful work. The key to building a recruitment team to overcome these challenges and efficiently and effectively hire great employees is to focus on well-being, technology, and continuous improvement.  

Create a culture of well-being

High performance recruitment starts from within. If you are not concentrating on your recruiters and talent acquisition leaders’ well-being, it is more challenging to attract other jobseekers to your organisation.

According to Sashi Kumar, Head of Sales at Indeed India, “Employers must assess these developments in order to rethink their current workplace regulations and hiring methods. A competitive wage is no longer enough to attract top personnel. Additionally, employees are prioritising possibilities for learning and upskilling, particularly in the rapidly changing digital skill sets and 50% of employees are preparing for new prospects via reskilling/upskilling.”

Despite concerns about the economic slowdown and the resulting layoffs, employers remain hopeful about recruiting in 2023. According to Indeed's workforce survey, 45% of employees anticipate a 20% boost in recruiting, with January showing increased demand for talent across all categories. 

In high-performance recruitment, pay attention to how your recruiters and talent attraction leaders are feeling. While high levels of stress and burnout exist within the profession, talent leaders can find ways to manage their teams’ burnout. First, companies should regularly listen to their HR and talent acquisition professionals to understand what they’re facing. Hold formal or informal conversations regularly outside scheduled performance reviews.

It is not just HR professionals whose expectations around well-being at work are increasing. Employees at all levels seek workplace well-being, including increased happiness, satisfaction, purpose, and manageable stress.

Creating a culture of wellbeing involves measuring well-being and building a strategy to improve it, such as starting or improving an employee wellness program. Such programs affect employer branding and are an effective way to stand out from competitors. 

Embrace technology — but stay human

Looking towards the future of recruiting, employers can expect to see advancements in hiring technology everywhere. High performance recruitment involves identifying these advancements and understanding how they can improve productivity and efficiency in your organisation. Take artificial intelligence (AI), for example, and what it can do for your recruitment. Automating simple tasks decreases administrative workloads, so recruiters can focus on candidate quality and experience.  

Navigating the rapidly changing hiring landscape and its new technologies requires constant learning and experimentation. AI-powered tech tools need rapid feedback and prototyping, making the learning curve problematic during implementation. Employers can foster a learning culture and encourage staff to experiment with new technologies as they are implemented. Additional benefits such as training and education are another way to promote learning while attracting and retaining staff. 

But remember, employees and jobseekers still crave a human future.  Employees want to learn new skills to keep up with their job’s changing needs, with digital and interpersonal skills as their top priorities. Indians want to keep up with technological growth in the workplace, the study shows, as well as improve interpersonal skills to better support human connections.

Promote continuous improvement in the workplace

High performance workplaces strive for continuous improvement. Employers must seek ways to improve efficiencies and be open to employee-driven ideas to enhance the organisation. While it may take time to encourage teams to be open to—and even enthusiastic about—change, the results are transformational when everyone commits to steady improvements.

Here's how to improve the recruitment process: 

• Build strong communication with your HR team
• Listen to how you can streamline existing processes
• Find gaps in your recruitment or onboarding strategies needing improvement
• Involve your recent hires—what parts of the recruitment process do they think could be better? 

Start Improving Your Recruitment Process Now

Building and maintaining high performance recruitment requires a concerted and ongoing effort, but the benefits it can bring are immense. Improve your recruitment process by measuring and understanding employee well-being, identifying technologies that can enhance productivity and efficiency in your organisation, and creating a workplace where the norm is to strive for continuous improvement. Organisations that can effectively and efficiently attract, hire, and retain qualified candidates set themselves up for the greatest success.