Category: Recruitment

How to sell your company’s brand and ethos to attract the best candidates

When it comes to recruiting quality employees to your business, it’s a busy marketplace. With employment figures remaining at a record high, candidates now have more control of their careers and where they want to be.

With this much competition, it is crucial that your company is known, respected and has a positive image to attract the best talent. If projected well, your corporate brand can be a powerful recruitment tool.

 

Think about your potential candidates as customers

When recruiting for a new role, rather than rushing out a standard job spec and hoping that the right person applies, it can help to take a step back and think about exactly who you want to apply.

Treating your potential candidates like a marketeer would think about their potential customers is good starting point. If your company undertakes any marketing activities, have a look – whether that it is social media, offline ads or your website – what are the key messages, what is the overall look and feel, and who are they trying to attract?

The best brand advocates for your business are your employees, so it seems natural to recruit from your company’s target audience.

Building your employer brand

To understand how your business is perceived as an employer, it may be worth talking to your current employees – what do they like about working for your company? and how they would sell their job to others?

If you are recruiting now, this could be undertaken as a one-off survey or a less structured approach. But if as a business you are looking to grow in the future, it may be worth implementing an ongoing employee satisfaction strategy.

To build a robust brand, you want to focus on the following:

• What are your brand values? These show what your company believes in and sets out your organisation’s priorities. By including them in your recruitment process you can attract like-minded people as candidates can see what you believe in and whether these values are aligned with their own.
•  What is the employee culture? This defines the environment in which employees work – this varies hugely depending on the type of business you are. Some have a team-based culture with employee participation on all levels, while others have a more traditional and formal management style. Other companies may have a more casual workplace without many rules and regulations. It is important to be honest about yours – different candidates will respond to different approaches.
•  What are the benefits, perks and work-life balance? Obviously, salary and holiday entitlements do come into the mix, but try to differentiate your business so you’re not competing solely on the basics. Are there additional employee benefits? Do you offer free breakfast for staff, regular away days, training opportunities or good social events? Talk about the flexible working options available or your approach to a healthy work-life balance. Perks such as these may convince a candidate to choose your company over the competition.
•  What are the career paths advancement opportunities? A good candidate will usually already have an idea of where they want their career to go over the short and medium term. Rather than just focussing on the role available, it is worth talking about progression opportunities within the wider business too and the support your company gives to personal development and training.

Sharing your employer brand

So how do you get your employee brand values out there?

A good starting point is online. Making sure you are visible is essential –the best candidates will want to work for an organisation they’ve heard of and a name they trust. But that does not just mean your corporate website.

Now social media is just as important – if you are using social media platforms to screen candidates pre-interview, then they too will be online and consulting their networks to research your company as a future employer.

It is key to remember that employer branding through social media isn’t just about delivering your corporate message – it must be a conversation between you, your employees and the wider market. Encouraging interaction and participation is a must.

Pitching your brand during the interview

Don’t forget an interview is a two-way street. Although the candidates must impress you with their experiences, skills and capabilities, it can be easy to overlook the fact that your brand needs to impress them. If you don’t pitch your core values, ethos and vision to your candidates, your competitors will.

If a candidate leaves the interview feeling positive and enthused by your company, the role and people they have met, they are much more likely to accept an offer.

Helping you in the recruitment process.

At TN Recruits, we always take time to understand your business, your values and culture. We like to build a solid relationship with you, so we can be your brand advocates when helping you find the best candidates.

We have a wealth of experience recruiting office staff from trainee to board level in many sectors including financial services, law, marketing, insurance, accountancy and currently have a pool of 4,000 candidates which saves our clients time in finding suitable candidates.

Why not call us today on 01892 571105 for a free consultation.

The summer can be a challenging time for many businesses. A high proportion of staff taking annual leave in August often means long, busy days for those left in the office, and an urgent need for more pairs of hands.

Hiring temporary staff can be an efficient way to keep on top of things. A far cry from the ‘clerical dogsbody’ image of the past, temps can be some of the most specialist and skilled members of a team.

There are unexpected benefits, too: a change in energy around the office can invigorate your permanent staff, and the valuable outsider perspective that temps bring can shed fresh light on your organisation.

How can your organisation maximise the opportunities offered by temporary staff?

#1 Use an agency to reduce the admin headache

Hiring temporary staff involves a tangle of beaurocracy. A professional recruitment agency will take a lot of this paperwork off your hands. Agencies should be up to date with employment law, and will take responsibility for things like sick pay, tax and pensions. All of this will spare you considerable legwork, when time is at a premium.

#2 Save on overtime costs and safeguard morale

If your staff are working all hours to meet demand during a seasonal peak, then a temp can be a great solution. Not only do temporary workers take the pressure off your overworked team, they are often a more cost-effective option than paying existing staff overtime, even when agency fees are taken into account.

#3 Focus on time-saving measures

Recruitment from scratch takes a while, and during an overloaded period you may not have the luxury of time. Temps can usually start within a few days, and a good agency will have a stable of workers with different skills, ready to hit the ground running. Investing in a relationship with an agency will really speed things up down the line, saving you from embarking on a lengthy recruitment process whenever things get busy.

#4 Invest in the future

Finding a temp through a reputable agency is just the first step in a long-term strategy. Once the agency knows your organisation’s needs and seasonal patterns, future placements will be even faster and more finely tuned. Plus, with one third of managers starting out as temps, you may find your best seasonal staff eventually turn into a permanent fixture.

#5 Plan to grow expertise and confidence

Using specialist temporary staff can be a great way to boost the overall knowledge base of your company. For example, deploy a temporary IT hire with great communication skills, and you could well enjoy the long-term benefit of improved tech confidence across your permanent team.

#6 Experiment during quiet times

Many organisations change their offer to suit the season, and temporary staff can provide a useful low-pressure testbed for new ideas and strategies. If you’re curious to try a new marketing initiative, for example, but don’t have capacity within your existing team, a specialist temp could take on the project and feed their learnings back to your staff.

How we can help

Hiring a temp is a viable option for many businesses and can really help if you are left with a sudden vacancy or require a specialised skill set in the short term. Taking on temporary staff can keep  business productivity up when faced with employee issues and challenges.

At TN Recruits, we specialise in placing temporary staff within businesses at all levels and are always happy to talk through the possibilities available to your business. Why not give us a call now to speak to one our Recruitment Specialists on 01892 571105.

8 ways to avoid a long recruitment and selection process

An efficient hiring process is key to the smooth operation of any organisation. Whether you’ve identified a gap in your workforce for a new position or you need to fill an existing role, the process must be as fast and as effective as possible to minimise the impact on productivity.

So how can you avoid a long drawn out recruitment schedule and side-step the pitfalls that could ultimately lead to a ‘bad-hire’? Here are the top 8 areas to consider:

 

#1 Define The Hiring Need

Before you start the whole recruitment process it is important to work out why you are hiring someone – and this means working out what the role is, where it sits within the organisation and what you want the successful applicant’s output to be.

If you’re are replacing an existing employee’s position, you may want to change the role to better suit the ever-evolving needs of the business.

 

#2 A Good Job Description

It’s fundamental to the recruitment process to have a clear and accurate job description so you can attract the right candidates – a vague or unenthusiastic job description will result in unsatisfactory or unsuitable applicants and the process may have to be repeated, wasting your time and money.

Take time to highlight all of the key responsibilities of the job and be sure to describe the goal of this role and the purpose of this position in relation to the overall business.

 

#3 Widen Your Search

To widen the reach of your job ad you could try using a reputable recruitment consultancy like TN Recruits. We manage the complete recruitment process for you and use over 30 different methods of resourcing candidates. The methods TN Recruits have in place include; a database of circa 3,500 candidates, advertising, social media and much more.

 

#4 Set Up A Screening Process

By following the previous 3 tips, this should help towards a more effective screening process. If the Job Ad is clear and specific, and the recruitment is targeted you should receive relevant and suitable applicants.

Keep a checklist of which skills are mandatory and which are ‘nice to have’. Have a clear idea what experience and background you would prefer the candidate to have. Once you have this list and have prioritised the importance of each you can start sifting out only the most suitable applications.

If using a recruitment consultancy, they can manage the screening stage for you.

 

#5 Set A Schedule – And Keep It To The Minimum

The various steps of the recruitment process can be time consuming and, if not managed tightly, can be spread over a protracted time. This is not only costly to your business productivity but you may miss the ideal candidate as they could be snapped up by someone else before you get to the end of the process.

Setting out a clear schedule – and sticking to it is the best strategy to accelerate your hiring process. Set dates for key steps like deciding whom to call in for an interview, when you want to offer the position and a start date.

Be clear and be strict – set your standard response times for each point of recruitment, make it quick and stick to it. At every decision point, let each candidate know their status and inform them about the next steps promptly.

Block out time for the interview process in advance and commit to it, consolidating on-site meetings in one or two days, if possible.

After you have decided who the successful applicant is – make the offer within 24 hours.

 

#6 Get The Most From The Interview

Interviewing candidates can take up a lot of time, so optimise it by developing a smart interviewing protocol. Strip out the usual questions such as ‘What are your strengths/weaknesses?’ and work out what exactly you want to know based on the skills/experience requirements for the role.

You could consider adding in another interview step, like giving an assessment test or exercise to really ascertain how a candidate will behave in a given position – although this is adding time to the recruitment process, it will give a greater insight into the candidate’s capabilities thus avoiding a bad hire.

#7 Be Realistic

Make sure you do not create a job spec that very few people could be considered fully qualified for. Holding out for the perfect candidate in every way could delay the whole recruitment process.

Keep an open mind during selection and interviews – stay open to creative problem solvers and candidates from outside your industry that still have reputable skill sets, backgrounds and references.

 

#8 Make a Decision

In the ideal world, by the end of the recruitment process you are left with one clear winner that stands out. But this is not always the case. You could be left with 2 or 3 candidates who all have different skills and experiences to offer so a difficult decision has to made. Talk to your fellow stake-holders and maybe a few team members where the role is based.

But a decision has to be made – and relatively quickly to keep the enthusiasm of the successful applicant.

 

Taking away the stress of the recruitment process

Bringing on new members of staff can feel like a time-consuming process which only adds even more pressure to your already busy diary.

 

But leaving your business under-staffed can affect employee engagement and moral which, in turn, can lead to reduced productivity levels and ultimately impact on business profitability.

 

At TN Recruits, we can help by managing the recruitment process for you, effectively freeing up your time to focus on your business. Our experienced consultants can advise you on every step and help you get the best candidate for the job.

 

Call us now on 01892 571105 to talk through how we can help.