How to shorten the IT recruitment process?

How to shorten the recruitment time in IT?

Recruitment in IT itself is governed by slightly different rules than other recruitments, e.g. in sales or marketing. This is influenced by a number of factors, including awareness of hiring managers that programmers and people from the IT world are extremely sought after and sought after on the labor market, awareness of the candidates themselves, who more and more often dictate the conditions and the specificity of the industry - time is of the essence in IT, if not us, someone else (competition) can take advantage of long time of recruitment in our company as an advantage by coming out with an offer much earlier and encouraging a specific candidate to take up a job in your organization.

Recruitment processes, however, in most cases last a very long time - from several weeks to even several months. So how to shorten this process?

Firstly - making quick decisions at the selection stage

At the moment of the CV flow through the recruitment forms, we can see in our ATS system which of the candidates meets our expectations, and which one we should thank at this moment. At this stage of the process, we should quickly decide to reject a given candidacy (and provide specific feedback to the candidate) or to accept it and move it to the next stage. Thanks to this, we show rejected candidates that we respect their time even though we refuse.

Secondly - influencing Hiring Managers

As a recruiter, you have the perfect advantage - you should talk to the Hiring Manager as often as possible, "push" him so that the feedback flows to you as soon as possible. In recruitment, you need to invest recruitment time as a long-term investment - the sooner the candidate receives feedback, the more willingly he will take part in your recruitment process again. Talking to the Hiring Manager and making him aware that time in IT is extremely valuable will make your words echo and the candidate will receive feedback quickly. Of course, this does not have to happen - you have the right power of persuasion, talks with the Hiring Manager in your hands.

Thirdly, ask questions already at the stage of collecting CVs

If you know that a given recruitment process has certain assumptions and requires answers to certain questions asked to candidates, make sure that these questions are answered by the applicants already at the stage of submitting a CV through the recruitment form. Try to avoid a situation where you have to e-mail/call the candidate about a matter that could have been "settled" through simple fields in the form. This saves a lot of time and is less irritating to candidates, regardless of the position.

Fourth, don't give up hope

Often, especially novice recruiters have a problem with assertiveness and factual presentation of the problem to the applicant candidates. If you know that the candidate is too inexperienced, does not fit your organization due to the projects in which he participated - you will do much better, assertively and classy, to refuse such a person than to create unnecessary hopes. When looking for people for a given position, do not deviate from the course you have chosen (candidate profile) and be guided by assertiveness. When looking for a Mid Developer, do not give a chance to all Juniors who would like to apply for such a position - of course, while maintaining common sense because there are Juniors who would do great in mid and higher positions, but they are special candidates and require proper intuition from you.

Fifthly - exhaust the topic already at the offer stage

Follow the principle - less with the possibility of seeing more. The principle of operation is very simple - when sending a message to the candidate in social media or via e-mail - focus on specifics and bold the most interesting features of the offer. However, do not let all the details not be included in the additional link to the PDF, in which you will present all the assumptions of the offer and exhaust the topic as much as possible. The more information about the company, projects, strengths and weaknesses (yes, it is very important to mention the minuses too!) of the offer pages you include in such a file, the less chance of additional questions from the candidate, which means saving time in the long run.

Sixth – reach only candidates who meet the assumptions of your offer

Based on direct search and looking for the perfect candidate, e.g. via Linkedin, address your offer only to carefully selected candidates who meet (at least at first glance) the assumptions of your offer. Pay attention to professional experience, frequency of job changes in recent years, possessed "skills", certificates or completed projects. In the case of Linkedin, also read the summary of the profile of the so-called. Summary profile – thanks to this you will find out if the candidate is really looking for a job and if he is interested in offers from you.

Summary:

In order to save time and shorten the recruitment process, it is often necessary to take care of the technical and substantive side of the recruitment process itself. Starting with quick decision making, conversations with Hiring Managers, strategic recruitment forms, good presentation of the offer, and ending with a good selection of candidates. Remember the most important thing - time is money. If not us, then someone else. The market creates opportunities quickly, but takes them away just as quickly.