The best candidates won't tolerate disrespect and uncertainty
Kathleen Quinn Votaw //April 25, 2019//
The best candidates won't tolerate disrespect and uncertainty
Kathleen Quinn Votaw //April 25, 2019//
What’s it like to apply for a job at your company? Despite our current fierce competition for top talent, nearly 60 percent of job seekers say they have a poor candidate experience. Typically, it feels like their resume and carefully crafted cover letter went into a black hole. They’re usually told “no phone calls” and email inquiries about their status get no response. Are applicants being considered or have they been rejected, and why? They often never find out.
Just how much uncertainty and disrespect should a candidate put up with? I can tell you this: top talent won’t put up with it at all. They’ll be accepting positions at companies that provide an engaging candidate experience from beginning to end. Creating that kind of experience, along with a focus on employer branding, are “by far” the top recruiting initiatives for employers in 2019, according to Talent Board research.
For many reasons, you should care a great deal about how candidates experience your company, no matter how brief their encounter. A major reason is that candidates talk and their bad experience can ruin your reputation and employer brand. A few negative comments over the neighborhood fence or on rating sites like Glassdoor can mean top talent won’t even bother to apply for your jobs. And there goes your competitive edge … Not only that, negative experiences moved candidates to stop buying a company’s products and services, so you not only lose out on top talent, you lose customers at the same time.
But let’s focus on the positive side. The reverse is true when you have a strategy in place to create a positive and respectful candidate experience. This experience may begin with interactions that happen with your company even before candidates decide to apply, and continue to be positive even if they don’t get the job. Regardless of whether they get an offer, satisfied candidates are more than twice as likely to recommend you and become your customer compared to those who were dissatisfied with their experience (according to IBM Workforce Institute research). A great candidate experience helps grow your talent pipeline, customer base, and profits. You need a strategic candidate plan in order to be competitive.
The job market has become something to reckon with now that open positions outnumber available talent. Companies of every size across industries now understand the critical importance of attracting and engaging quality candidates and the competitive advantage of developing an effective process to do it. The hiring process should be easy for candidates to understand and follow, and communication about the job and company must be honest.
The Talent Board offers a number of best talent acquisition practices from winners of their 2019 Candidate Experience Awards. The feedback is based on what candidates say they want from organizations and from the organizations themselves. Among their findings, which can become the foundation to develop or update your strategies, are:
If you treat candidates like your best customers or your future boss, you’ll naturally treat them right. And if you think of the candidate experience in terms of “do unto others as you would have them do unto you,” your process will improve significantly. It’s really that simple.