We’re now in the era of great acceleration, and that’s primarily because of COVID – the accelerator of change. It has turbocharged how we operate in the workplace. This also paves the way for more flexibility in work practices and digitization in recruitment – virtual hiring.
To adjust to this recruitment trend, hiring teams are adopting new and innovative remote hiring practices, which I’m discussing in this article.
These virtual hiring practices can significantly reduce time-to-hire, which has become more important during this pandemic, as operations are scaling up and filling in vacant positions.
A significant way to reduce time-to-hire is through using innovative recruitment tools and software, including that for automated scheduling. This will save the time of recruiters as well as give them more time to recruit rather than manually attend to interview scheduling.
After all, time is a valuable asset. When your talent acquisition team can free up their time for other important tasks, including strategic activities, they’ll be more productive.
With virtual hiring an automated interview scheduling, you can streamline your hiring process and reduce costs. For example, Global Workplace Analytics reveals that 6 out of 10 employers save cost – one of the benefits of remote work.
According to the same source, companies can significantly save in real estate costs because their workers don’t need office space – McKesson ($2 million), IBM ($50 million per year), and Sun Microsystems ($68 million per year).
Forty-seven percent of surveyed workers are also willing for a pay cut so that they can work more hours from home or remotely.
Why virtual hiring?
Automated interview scheduling
Automated scheduling: It’s a key element of remote hiring. With it, candidates can be invited to the next step of the application faster – can be a phone interview, pre-employment testing, a live video interview, or a new hire orientation.
This can streamline the job of your talent acquisition team, give them more flexibility, and improve their efficiency. It can optimize the process and make it easier for all the people involved – whether your recruiting team or candidates.
It also allows companies to meet talents faster, reduce time-to-hire, and eliminate candidate drop out due to the time-consuming and never-ending phone calls, emails, and SMS, to name some.
Thus, it can enhance a candidate’s experience with your company and give them a smooth one. Consequently, this can also build trust and eliminate communication barriers, which is a problem in candidate frustration.
Automated scheduling can also eliminate the back-and-forth of emails and other forms of communication, eventually empowering candidates to choose the time of interview that will work best for them.
It can also streamline the experience of hiring managers and the entire recruitment team, especially after receiving plenty of applications from a hiring event. An app for interview scheduling makes it easy to schedule the time of interviews.
Scheduling issues, which slow down the hiring process, can be eliminated by an automated scheduling app. It allows candidates to select an interview time that suits them. In addition, recruiters can spend less time on administrative emails and phone calls; thus, they can focus instead on sourcing candidates.
Automated scheduling apps also allow candidates to reschedule interviews if they want to. This process also removes one or two of your recruitment team in the process. As there will be no middleman involved, this also lessens any interruptions. It can let candidates know of the available slots that they can choose from based on their availability and preferred time.
ATS integration
Applicant tracking systems are another key element of virtual hiring. It can streamline the talent acquisition process. They can help in prescreening assessments, give you insights, and more depending on the ATS you have selected for your organization.
Some can let you work with different systems, allowing you to simply add candidates to the app seamlessly. But aside from an ATS, your team can also use an automated scheduling system to further smoothen the hiring process.
An applicant tracking system also ensures that your candidates can move through the application process faster and avoid communication delays or its lack. Without even saying, both parties can decide better and save time. Your recruitment team can also hire the right person or people because you also gain analytics as you proceed with the recruitment and selection process.
For example, you’ll be able to find ATS with onboarding integration, which is another key in a streamlined recruitment process. Onboarding allows for a successful hire, who needs the training and tools to help them with it.
You’ll find applicant tracking systems that you can combine with employee training services, allowing you to monitor the progress of the candidates in the hiring process – what has been done and what needs to be done.
By connecting both hiring and onboarding, your recruitment team can get a clearer view of what the process looks like and if there are areas that need improvement to speed it up.
In virtual hiring, data integration is also important to reduce the time going back and forth and looking from one platform to another to find information. You’ll find applicant tracking systems together with their supporting systems that allow combining them with different job portals.
With this kind of setup, hiring teams can look forward to the acceleration of searchable application delivery, reducing the needed time to search for and study the data of different candidates.
Engagement and time are very essential once the job seekers start with the application process. It is a challenge for HR teams to keep the candidates invested in the application process.
With ATS integration, hiring teams can expect feedback from some stakeholders. This can be recorded in a different platform and then correctly integrated and managed in the ATS.
With an ATS combined with multiple platforms to streamline the application process, candidates can remain engaged in the application and eliminate any frustration due to the lack of communication.
Calendar integration
There are recruitment systems like Coordinate. This is fully integrated with other platforms, such as Microsoft Exchange and Microsoft 365. It can also work with any calendar supporting the format of the .ics universal calendar. Such integration with calendars allows both recruiters and candidates to automate interview scheduling.
Branding
Using automated tools in virtual hiring, you can improve branding, which is your brand’s unique and distinct voice – and one of those messages you can convey to them is your organization, professionalism, and excellent communication.
It can help in keeping your voice consistent in every recruitment channel. Candidates can get an idea of what to expect from you as an employer, and one of the factors affecting this is a consistent messaging voice or tone on your advertising, video content, and interviews with your recruiters.
Recruitment can also have an impact in conveying the type of culture your company has. A smooth and streamlined application process can send a message that you have a caring culture – a kind of culture that respects the time of the applicants and understands their frustrations and expectations.
Even in virtual hiring, candidates also expect a good company culture, like an inclusive one, and using automated tools can improve your recruitment process and make it inclusive.
Improving your hiring process with innovative virtual recruitment tools, you’ll allow candidates to understand your brand and allow you to establish your brand’s advocacy. For example, as more candidates share their positive experience in the recruitment on their social media, you’ll also develop trust among other future applicants.
And when it comes to building your brand, technology can help, and one way to do that is through the integration of automated recruitment. It will eventually improve candidate experience because applicants will be able to navigate through the process and move from one stage to another smoothly and without delays, from their initial contact to the onboarding.
There’s no wonder because technology can help in streamlining the engagement of candidates as well as applications, job search, selection process, and assessment. Not to forget, it can also automate scheduling and provide real-time feedback and report. Now, recruitment teams can provide a positive applicant experience, enhancing the overall company brand.
Self-scheduling
Candidate self-scheduling allows for easy candidate scheduling or even rescheduling. Some automated scheduling platforms are also app-less. They can work even without an online account or app. They can help in many ways. One of its benefits, again, is an improved candidate experience, especially in the interview stage.
According to this LinkedIn, 83% of candidates that their negative interview experience with a company can change their minds, not only in the company but also in the roles they once liked to apply. This is why recruitment teams should consider a self-scheduling tool in the hiring process.
Automated scheduling can reduce back-and-forth and long email exchanges, which can also be time-consuming and frustrating for applicants who might have questions or want to reschedule. Using a self-scheduling system, they can book interviews and later get them rescheduled if needed. This gives them control over the screening process.
And using automated reminders, hiring teams do not have to follow up manually to remind their applicants about upcoming schedules. In the process, such can also reduce a no-show or candidate loss. Your recruitment team will also have more time for valuable tasks, including keeping in touch with your talent pipeline.
A self-scheduling feature also ensures that errors are minimized and even avoided. It can also reduce the chance of overlapping interview times and human errors. So instead of minding the scheduling, you and your team can focus on improving the hiring process.
This can reduce the time-to-hire and eventually speed up the recruitment cycle because both parties can save time in the process. Thanks to automated scheduling systems that can speed up the interview booking and confirmation process. It will also enhance the interview process because it lets your HR conduct collective scheduling for on-site, remote, panel, or individual interviews.
And through accelerating the hiring funnel, teams can use their time in other recruitment and talent acquisition areas, such as improving training plans.
A good tool can also help with automated reporting, empowering everyone in the recruitment department to check data more strategically and accurately. For example, they can check for upcoming and past interviews, as well as allow them to monitor the progress of recruitment. Thus, HR teams can correctly track the metrics for conversion rates, time-to-hire, and other important recruitment metrics.
Virtual hiring processes amid the pandemic
Eighty-six percent of organizations are using new virtual technologies to screen and interview candidates based on a poll of 334 HR leaders in April 2020, according to Gartner, Inc.
Hiring leaders are evaluating different hiring and recruitment methods, especially since there is a decline and slowing down in hiring. To adapt, they need to use virtual hiring processes.
As the virus is pushing more businesses to apply large-scale recruitment and interviewing efforts, HR teams should collaborate and join forces with recruiting leaders to utilize available recruiting technology for a good candidate experience.
Based on the same source, 85 percent of companies are using new technologies for onboarding employees. Virtual interviewing might also be the new standard even after COVID. This can be successful provided that the organization would offer candidates with connection and information in the same manner they would have with a face-to-face interview or onboarding.
Virtual Hiring: HireNest Makes Recruitment Easier and Smoother for Candidates and HR Teams
It has an intuitive and easy-to-use dashboard that gives human resources teams a quick glance of the information they need to know, and these include but not limited to the number of new candidates, invited for interview, and waiting for feedback, as well as metrics like the ratio of male to female applicants and applicant location.
HIRENEST streamlines the hiring process by giving your HR teams the tools they need in speeding up the recruitment and selection process and making good hiring decisions. Using it, teams can make custom assessments based on their industry and other factors that matter most for them.
This tool can also connect with applicants seamlessly through links, emails, or your applicant tracking system. And as importantly, it helps you select the right candidates for its reports and analytics that display the most useful insights.
Recruitment stats hiring managers should know in 2022
- Poor onboarding can make new employees twice likely to look for other companies or opportunities.
- New hire retention can be improved with an excellent onboarding process by 82 percent and productivity by 70 percent.
- Only about 10 percent of employees agree that onboarding new employees was excellent in their organization.
- Remote job offerings increase by 135 percent due to the pandemic.
- Unfortunately, only 16 percent of hiring professionals in the USA are ready for virtual recruitment and hiring.
- The majority of 78 percent of organizations have frozen or slowed down hiring and recruitment.
Tips for remote hiring
Before you get started, communicate the entire hiring process with your team to ensure that they are updated. They would also know exactly what your process would look like. Discuss what steps are included and not included in the hiring process. Ensuring that everyone is on the same page, you can avoid internal conflicts and confusion.
In the remote recruitment environment, communication is the essence. It keeps everyone updated and aware of what’s going on. It can also keep the applicants comfortable and at ease in the hiring process. Give applicants a rundown of everything they need to know about each step.
For example, you must be able to provide them with clear instructions on who will make the call or facilitate the video conference. And if there is an error or glitch in the technology, what is the backup phone number to contact.
You must also tell them about your expectations for the interview. Do they have to share their entire experience background when interviewing with the members of the recruitment panel?
Additionally, you must prepare and test the technology you’re using in virtual interviews. These may include Skype or Zoom. Ensure that each member of your hiring team understands the system and knows how to use it.
Use compelling job advertisements, which are precise and clear. Be able to enumerate all your requirements and give employees a picture of what they’re applying for. In addition, customize the advertisements and check that it reflects your values and culture.
There is no perfect formula in remote recruitment and what it should look like. Every organization is different. What works for others might not work for you. Even so, hiring the perfect candidates for your company is possible.
Virtual hiring is here to stay. That’s why companies should learn how to adapt and embrace new technologies that will streamline and make the recruitment and hiring process smoother and easier for all parties, including hiring teams and candidates.
Which remote hiring strategies are you currently using in recruiting new employees? Tell us in the comments. Finally, spread the word and share this article on social media today!
