Vietnam Manpower
24

The process of recruitment and selection is one of the most important but challenging processes in any organization. To find those who shine out over others to be the best fit for your company is often really difficult. The corporate world has been changing a lot in the last few years though, most firms still stick to an outdated method of identifying and selecting candidates.

Below specify some creative methods to include in your recruitment process that will help you tremendously to get the best possible candidates among a large pool of those applying for your company’s job listings.



1. Use self-selection to find those who are really interested

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For better separating the wheat from the chaff, you can add another layer between the resume submission and the face-to-face job interview. One option is inviting all eligible candidates to an open group event. For example, out of over 1,000 applicants who were invited, only 300 actually came. Those who came are really interested in your job offer. It’s so easy to put in for a job, but often, only those who are really interested accept the invitation and join the event. This self-selection way helps speed up the screening process. The open group event strategy also helps you see how candidates interact in groups.

2. Request basic math to separate out thoughtless submissions

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Require a basic math in cover letter submission. That way, you can know whether your applicants are paying attention to details and not just mass mailing their cover letter. Viktor Nagornyy – founder of Viktorix, an event planning guide, applied this way when hiring freelancers. He required solution to the math 2*2+2 for every cover letter submission. Those that refused to answer or got it wrong fell into the rejection pile immediately.

3. Invite candidates to work for a day



Another great tactics for filtering good candidates is to invite a few of them to work for one day. This will allow you to have a glance at their working style, interaction with your team, etc. It also gives them chances to get an idea of your working environment and culture and see whether it’s something they desire to pursue further. This is a quick-but-effective way to find the best potential employees.

4. Require homework

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A good-looking resume and great interview, sometimes, don’t tell you how a potential recruit will do once they are working full time. If you want to know how your candidate will perform, ask them to do some homework. From that unpaid assignment, you will learn who are passionate, and who have been seriously thinking about your firm and the job they will need to carry out. You will be able to remove a bunch because many simply will not do the assignment or give an excuse why they can’t do it.

Also, homework will tell you a lot about such things as the candidate’s detail attention, creativity, ability to think critically, and how they communicate an idea.

5. Test integrity and stamina

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You can test your candidate’s integrity by asking them whether you can tell their former employer about things like their capability, etc. If they say they want to keep it quiet because they don’t want to bother their employer, this may be a fail. By contrast, if they agree or want to ask to speak to their former employer first to ensure their employer is Ok to talk with you, that is a win.

For their stamina, if your candidates can work consistently a full time job in the day time, and then turn up at your office and work there until midnight, you know they have the stamina to work long hours when required.

6. Ask candidates to interview your member team

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The interview process should involve the candidate selecting you, which is as much as you selecting the candidate. When you recruit someone that sincerely want to work for you, you will see higher productivity and devotion from that person. When a candidate interviews a member of your team on why he/ she should choose to work for your firm, you see the needs and goals of that candidate, and the candidate also better understand if/ how you can help him/ her with his/ her goals. If you feel that you can’t help the candidate to reach his/ her goal, you should move on to the next one.

7. Arrange group interaction

Interactive interview is a really effective way to see your potential candidates’ character, interest level, work knowledge and communication skills. This also enables you to decide whether they fit into the puzzle.

The interactive interview can be held in different fashions, but the basic feature is inviting select candidates in for the group session that you and current workers can engage with them. For example I Love Rewards Inc – a consulting firm in Wellesley, Mass., and Toronto, used the speed-dating interview to find the best candidates. In a few hours, over 30 employees arranged the two-story office. The first floor was intended for employees mingling with candidates. The second floor is the speed-dating area that the prospects took one-on-one contact with the company’s employees in a few minutes. This was perfectly systematic as everyone had a time slot. In just some minutes with some questions, you could see if the candidates were right for the role, enthusiastic enough to engage in the corporate tasks. For more creative approach, you can set up various activities that will give you a better idea of knowledge and passion of each individual for the industry and their personality alike.

8. Become a hirer of choice at select colleges

Recruiting fresh graduates is a powerful way to get workers that you can train to fit your needs. Often, younger talent brings much needed energy and innovation in the workplace. Center on building a relationship with a specific college that you see has the biggest pool of possible candidates. Engage in such activities as sponsoring events, offering free training, hosting competitions, to approach the right candidates.

9. Focus on more culture fit than skill set

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Focus more on culture fit than skills when evaluating candidates. A worker that is a better cultural fit is more likely to show better performance in your organization. While you can always train staff to help them hone the necessary skills, it is more challenging to find the right cultural fit.

10. Handpick your ideal candidates and show them you want them

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Passive candidates who are already hired and not actively hunting for job are most likely to be your dream recruits, but you will never attract them unless you let them know how much you want them.

Reaching out in a really personal fashion demonstrates that you are willing to try very hard to get their attention.

Red 5 Studios, Inc, a video game company based in Laguna Hills, California handpicked up to 100 ideal candidates and got to know them by researching their social media profiles and previous work. Then this company sent a personalized iPod equipped with a warm welcome from the CEO to each one. The result is that up to 90 recipients responded to that invitation, 3 left their jobs to join the company, and many more potential recruits discovered the firm through word-of-mouth buzz produced by the search.

11. Hunt for talent in unlikely places

Local retail stores and restaurants can be such unexpected places. Quicken Loans - America's largest online lender, once sent their employees out to such places to interact with workers and interview those that really shine out. This way helped hire fast and maintain its corporate culture at the same time. The company can find those with passion, urgency and willingness to make more effort than expected.

This way is the same as how entertainment companies find for future talent singers, actors. They, indeed, assign their employees to spot talent at school gate, restaurants, streets, or the like instead of just focusing on fixed recruitment periods.

12. Attend events that aren’t job fairs

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Job fair is sometimes really effective, but...

They sometimes turn out to be kinda useless because the best candidates perhaps already have a job. That’s why you should try looking for talent at other events that aren’t traditionally related to recruitment. For instance, if you need a graphic designer in New York City, you can partake in a graphic design focused meet-up in the area and find for potential candidates. You will already know they are enthusiastic about what they do, and you will now be able to get a feel for what they are like in person.

13. Shine out with non-traditional media

Instead of a written job description on a job search site, you can utilize a video or podcast to make your company’s job hiring a standout. Availing non-traditional recruitment media will also be a chance for you to convey things about your company culture to jobseekers.

Or you can think out of the box with the totally creative job recruitment ads like:

The creative job recruitment ads to inspire you

Source: 26 Surprisingly Creative Methods of Recruitment and Selection for 2015 (Part 1)

From Vietnam, Hanoi
Vietnam Manpower
24

14. Advertise in places that your ideal candidates visit often

You should focus your recruiting process in ways and places fitting with your dream hires.



A recruitment ad placed by Google in the San Francisco area to attract math savvy candidates.

A cost efficient suggestion is to buy keywords that you think prospects may be searching for online. For example, Rapleaf - a US-based marketing data and software company, always looks for people interested in Hadoop – an open-source software framework supporting applications that run across multiple, distributed computers. That’s why they buy ads that will appear when people search for keywords related to Hadoop.

Online communities are another great place to target your recruiting process at a particular demographic. For instance, if you are being in need of a developer, try searching such terms as ‘developer forum’, you will find many places just for developers that you can publicize that you are hiring.



15. Consider past candidates

Former rejections can make great recruits now.



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In the past, you may reject a good candidate for certain reason – maybe their wage requirements were too high, or they weren’t ideal for that position.

Whatever the reason was, if you think they would suit to this current position, it won’t hurt to get in touch with them and see if they are interested.



16. Make sure your employees like the candidate

For any new candidate, most of the staff will meet them, and they will be hired if everyone like them, or at least people they will work in team with like them. It is how you can get motivated people who enjoy spending time with the team. Indeed, keeping the whole team happy is seriously a mantra for recruitment and productivity. Make sure your employees are happy. If they are happy, they will make your company profitable.

You may be also interested in:

Creating a Happy Corporate Culture Isn’t That Difficult

Work productivity management tips: How is the weather today?



17. Host a contest

You can improve the hiring process by holding a contest to make your candidates fight for the post.

For example, when recruiting college talent that would represent their favorite brands on campus, Staci Hausch at UQ Marketing asked students to partake in a Youtube contest to demonstrate why they love the brand and why they should be the best candidate.



18. Don’t hire skilled people and motivate them

Simon Sinek in his book ‘Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action’ stated, “Great companies don’t hire skilled people and motivate them, they hire already motivated people and inspire them. People are either motivated or they are not. Unless you give motivated people something to believe in, something bigger than their job to work toward, they will motivate themselves to find a new job and you’ll be stuck with whoever’s left.”



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19. Find the best people first, train later

Always look for and be open to hiring the right people, not just when you have a vacancy to fill. Hiring only on occasion means you often get the best of a bad slot.

Also, hire based on values and abilities, and train for skills. While skills can be learned quite easily, it’s the key values and abilities of the candidate that ensure fit with the corporate culture and work performance.

Related reading:

Recruitment based on personality is gradually becoming a new trend?



20. Target hiring ads to your top fans



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The best people to recruit are those that have already shown a liking toward your brand. For example, Jayson Gaignard from TacketsCanada.com – a ticket reseller for music, sporting and cultural events, just serves up ads to those frequently ‘liked’ the site’s events on its Facebook page. That filtering option ensures that ads will just appear for true fans of TicketsCanada.com, thereby weeding out the unnecessary volume of applicants often plaguing the online talent scouting process.



21. Rewrite the dated job listing



Too many times, the recruiters pull out a set of job specs for a position that they have used for long. Take the time to understand what is required for the post, what is already outdated and not accurate.



22. State what you don’t want



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A job ad has 2 particular goals: to attract ideal candidates and to deter those unsuitable.

The success of a recruitment ad is associated with how many ideal candidates you attract, not with the total number of applications you receive. If you draw a large number of candidates, you have written a poor ad.

Make sure not to obscure essential details; otherwise, you are more likely to attract unsuitable ones. Just include such statements as ‘only apply if…’. Remember that it costs your money whenever you receive an application from someone that lacks the background knowledge and experience you want.

You may not want to miss it:

How to have an efficient and a cost-saving recruitment solution?



23. Contribute values to social networks

Add values and be part of the community, then you efforts will pay off. The talent will look for you because of the job advice and the like you provide in forums and other social networks.



24. Take phone calls instead of resumes

Don’t ask for written applications or resumes. This is one big cause of staff selection errors. You will be influenced by quality and professionalism of the written application or resume. Those things aren’t necessarily a reflection of your candidate’s capability and attitude because some may hire a person to write their resume as best or cook something nice to their resume. Considering resumes, your decision will be more related to what candidates have done for other companies in the past than to what they will do for you in the future. That’s why you are suggested to ask candidates to call you instead of sending a resume.



Employees may lie in the resume! If you ask candidates to call you, you can know more exactly about their capability, attitude and communication skills and save your interview time.

You may also like:

The obvious lies in the resume, what are recruiters going to do?



25. Probe candidates and find out what they want

One of the biggest mistake hirers make when trying to place candidate prospects is that they don’t ask to see what the candidate wants. The recruiter just tells the candidate what they want and try to place him based on their false assumptions.

To get what your candidate wants, ask him “What is your dream job?” This is one of the key questions at interviews. Also, you can probe deeper by using psychometric questionnaires to get better understanding of the candidate’s motivations and preferences. Accompanied with a follow-up interview, this helps ensure a correct fit between the candidate and your organization.



Psychometric tests are applied by employers to assess candidate’s aptitude and personality.



26. Ask the candidate to reflect their past

Ask questions to understand a candidate’s thought process about when he has made shifts in his career. For example, “How did you go about moving from this job to that job? What was going through your mind?”

This line of questioning unveils a lot. If they aren’t comfortable discussing a previous job, perhaps because they were dismissed, you will see the flight/ fight response with awkward pauses. Ultimately, what you learn from the career reflection is the degree of proactive thinking that your candidate utilizes when it comes to career management.

When asking a question, make sure it addresses 3 distinct criteria:

• Be related to things that have already established in the discussion.

• Invoke certain degree of creativity on the interviewee’s part.

• Demand that the interviews be reflective so as to answer.

Examples of good reflective questions

• When you chose to leave the job you have after university, how was the job different from what they told you it would be during the interview process?

• After you accepted a project, were there more times that you felt under-utilized, or would you say it was maybe at times over-demanding?



What is your most creative tip?

Those may be great methods of recruitment and selection, but I am sure you have some tips of your own to share. Don’t hesitate to share creative recruiting tips that you are carrying this year and will carry into the new year.

Source: career advice blog

From Vietnam, Hanoi
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