Spotlight on Recruiting: Five Things to Focus on Now

John Hancock, Capital H Group
May 14, 2008 | COMMENTS

“There is no security on this earth, there is only opportunity.”

--General Douglas MacArthur

Many would argue that the best time to seize the opportunity to bolster your organization's talent ranks is now.

For one thing, economic uncertainty means that exceptionally skilled and talented people working for your competitors may be more open to changing jobs today than even six months ago. Secondly, given that the average duration of an economic contraction, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research, is only ten months, now is the perfect time to add to your pipeline of potential candidates who will help grow your company in the future.

Companies wanting to seize this opportunity need to focus on five recruiting-related initiatives:

1. Have the ability to approach "passive" candidates from your competitors, know who they are, and know how to open a dialog. While these star performers may still be "safe" in their jobs, a more uncertain economy may mean they are more willing to speak with your recruiters about a "plan B" in case things do get worse.

2. Tighten up your selection/assessment processes so you do a better job hiring the right people. While it is never a good time to select the wrong people, now is definitely the worst time to make expensive hiring mistakes. Plus, in a downturn, you can afford to be more selective.

3. Get your (recruiting) house in order by focusing more effective processes, including automation. The job market has been hot for the last couple of years so many in-house recruiting functions have had little time to "fix" inefficient or outdated processes. For example, examine your applicant tracking systems. New software developed in the last couple of years has helped many of our clients become much more proficient.

4. Get better at recruiting from within your organization. Hiring from within is almost always more cost-efficient—and typically a safer bet—than hiring from the outside. Now is a good time to button up the process, especially if internal cost-cutting involves layoffs in some divisions while hiring still needs to happen in others.

5. Consider whether your business would benefit from working with a partner to help you identify and manage recruitment risk. The right partner should work proactively on your behalf without increasing your overall costs. Sourcing—finding and screening good candidates that match job requisitions—is probably one of the most time-consuming and specialized areas of the recruitment process. Ask yourself whether this needs to continue in-house or whether you can buy such services on an as-needed basis from an outside company. If you anticipate that your hiring will fluctuate greatly over the next few months, outsourcing sourcing may make more sense than doing the work internally.

John Hancock is a human resources specialist with Capital H Group, a human resources consulting group based in Chicago, Illinois. Learn more at www.capitalhgroup.com.