Speeding up your hiring process means that you won't miss out on the best talent.
To put it bluntly: The average hiring process is too long. In fact, the average time to hire a new employee in 2016 was 39 days. In addition, 46% of recruiters report that the time between the first interview and a declined offer is between five and eight weeks.
That's a big problem, considering that the best candidates are off the market within 10 days. So if you need high-quality, in-demand talent, you need to act fast and accelerate your hiring processes.
Of course, you still need to give each candidate the attention they need to make sure they are a perfect fit for the job and, sometimes more importantly, that they'll fit your company culture. And you can achieve this balance by taking the right approach, which includes proper planning and continuous improvement of your approach to make your hiring processes more efficient.
If you do that, you will reap several benefits. In this post, we will go into more detail about some of those benefits and why faster hiring is hiring better.
Saves costs and other resources
Did you know that the average cost per hire for businesses is $4,129? You could also be wasting nearly $13,000 per recruiter each year. Those are big numbers we are talking about here.
So it stands to reason that shortening your hiring process will save you money and resources that you can use elsewhere. It's simply because your recruiters and HR spend less time recruiting, researching and vetting candidates. Once a candidate is selected, recruiters and team members also need to spend less time interviewing the candidate.
And what about the time in between when the position is not filled? Then you have to increase the workload of other employees, hire freelancers to do the work, or even postpone the release dates of products or projects. That then costs you revenue and money..
Access to better talent
If you speed up your hiring process, you will not miss out on the best talent. In fact, in 2016, 56% of hiring managers believed they were unable to hire good talent because of lengthy hiring processes.
So it's important to shorten your hiring process to get the best talent. A common problem is that by the time the decision is made and the candidate is fully screened and approved, the candidate is no longer interested or available, usually because better opportunities have arisen in the meantime.
In other words, you need to streamline your interview process and limit it to a few days or a few weeks at most to ensure that the highly qualified talent is still available when you are done.
Better response rates
66% of applicants said they would wait only two weeks for a callback, then look for other opportunities. This means that if you speed up your hiring process, you'll get far higher response rates.
This way, you retain applicants and avoid losing them to other jobs.
Higher acceptance rates
Think about it. The longer someone has time to make a decision, the more time they have to reconsider and change their mind. If you shorten the time from interview to offer, candidates have less time to think it over and are less likely to look elsewhere. According to recruiters, 32% of job offers are rejected because the candidate accepted another offer.
While a longer hiring process gives recruiters and other decision makers in your company more time to agree on a hire, it could also lead to a longer back-and-forth between the hiring team and the candidate in terms of negotiations. This could ultimately lead to a rejected job offer. Therefore, you should strike the perfect balance between getting your team to agree and taking the time to hire.
Getting better talent quicker
Remember that you should not leave an open area open for too long. As we said before, an open position will cost you extra money and revenue because you will have to increase the workload of your other team members or hire freelancers to do the work.
Also, if you hire faster, you'll get high-quality, in-demand talent as soon as you need it, rather than months after the position becomes available. This is especially important when you are filling positions that have deadlines that leave no room for delay.
Improved candidate experience
Put yourself in the shoes of an applicant for a moment. Would you prefer to wait forever for feedback and be called back several times for interviews, or would you prefer an efficient and streamlined hiring process where decisions are made quickly and decisively?
It stands to reason that applicants would prefer the latter. So when you take a decisive approach to hiring candidates, you not only improve the candidate experience, but you also set yourself apart from your competitors who still use slow and archaic hiring processes. This ultimately increases the likelihood that the applicant will accept your job offer.
Recruiters and hiring managers like it
Not only would applicants prefer a shorter hiring process, but so would your recruiters and hiring managers.
Recruiters like it because unlike a lengthy hiring process that takes up a lot of their valuable time scheduling interviews and making calls, a faster hiring process helps them handle more inquiries, meet their goals, and be more productive overall.
Faster hiring also means your recruiters spend less time interviewing and negotiating, which increases your company's hiring efficiency. It also means recruiters get the best talent when they need it, rather than months later.
I hope this post has shown you the benefits you can enjoy when you speed up your hiring process. So it makes sense to develop a process that is much faster than the current state of affairs.
Remember, you do not have to implement the perfect process all at once. You can start in small steps, plan what you want to do, use it as a trial-hire for a candidate, and solicit feedback to improve the process. That way, you can gradually develop an efficient and streamlined hiring process that gets you the best talent every time.
Now we want to know from you which of these benefits appeal to you the most? Let us know, we'd love to hear from you.
