11 Steps to Streamline and Enhance Your Hiring Process

Recruiting is arguably the lifeblood of any efficient, effective and productive business. If you fail to hire the right people for the right jobs, your business will undoubtedly struggle to achieve its goals. Improve your recruitment process and you will find that you can hire better people, hire faster and achieve your goals more easily.

The labour market conditions facing UK businesses are tough, however. Almost two-fifths (38%) of employers have hard-to-fill roles, according to the CIPD Labour Market Outlook Autumn 2023. They are particularly common in sectors such as education (51%) and healthcare (42%). These challenges are reflected in the time it takes companies to fill vacancies; according to TotalJobs Hiring Trends Index Q3 2023, it takes an average of over six weeks to fill a role in the UK.

And these are just some of the external recruitment challenges that HR, people and talent teams are struggling with. Skills shortages, the cost of living crisis, global economic uncertainty and increased candidate expectations for flexible working are making it increasingly difficult to hire the right people.

The good news, however, is that there are many factors that your team can influence. You can improve your recruitment process so that every step of the hiring process is optimized, streamlined and effective. In this article, we'll share with you the 11-step process that IceHrm - a leading UK HR software provider - used to overhaul its hiring process to ensure its long-term success.

How to improve your recruitment process:
An 11-step plan

1.Build a dedicated talent acquisition team

Not every company will be able to build its own internal talent acquisition team, but if you don't already have one, you should regularly review the business case for having one and decide whether it's time to bring recruitment in-house (if you currently rely on external recruiters) or invest in a dedicated recruitment team if recruitment currently falls under the purview of an HR generalist.

Remember, the first person in your company a candidate is likely to talk to is someone on your HR or hiring team. Do you want this to be a stressed-out, overwhelmed HR generalist? Or do you want this to be a talent specialist who has the time, energy and expertise to properly qualify candidates, source passive talent and act as a brand ambassador? The decision is yours.

2.Analyze current metrics and processes

Now that your team is in place, it's time to take stock of the situation. Current and historical data can help you determine where you're underperforming and what you're doing well. You need cold, hard facts about your hiring process if you want to improve. How long does it take you to hire people? How much does it cost to fill each position? What is the retention rate after 90 days, 6 months, and 12 months? Using the analytics tools in your HR and hiring software, you should be able to report on all of these and many more key HR metrics.

If you haven't tracked these metrics in the past, consider establishing a baseline reporting period of, say, six months. Then you can start to identify seasonal trends and fluctuations and figure out whether results are improving or worsening due to the improvements you're making to your hiring process.

3.Clarify your goals

Now you can set goals and a timeline for achieving them. For example, this could include reducing the average time to hire from 45 days to 30 days within six months. Or you could be aiming to fill 10% of vacancies with internal candidates within a year. Whatever you measure, set a SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, time-bound) goal to work toward.

Don't be too hard on yourself, though. Those external challenges we mentioned earlier? They'll always be there to derail your best-laid plans. All you can do is control what you can—and take the rest in stride.

4.Involve key stakeholders

So your goals are set. But you can't improve your hiring process alone; managers and leaders all have a role to play in making your company a well-functioning hiring machine. They're the glue that holds the process together. Without them, your plan is just that: a plan. It's important that everyone involved in recruiting knows why you want to improve your hiring process and what role they play in achieving those goals.

Talk to your stakeholders and get them excited about the changes you want to make - and the benefits those improvements will bring to them, their teams and the company. People are often hesitant to embrace change, so make them understand what they'll get out of it.

5.Re-evaluate job profiles

If you want to hire the right people for the right job, you need to clearly define what the job is that you're looking to fill. And that's where job profiles come in. You should have an accurate, one-page description of the expected goals, deliverables and outcomes of each role, as well as the knowledge, skills and attributes the job holder needs. It will also outline what success in that role looks like.

Putting all of this on paper will be a tedious task - you'll need the full buy-in of the leaders in your company to be successful - but the result will be worth it. You'll have a much clearer picture of who to target when recruiting externally, and you'll also be able to create clearer pathways for internal talent mobility.

6.Train hiring managers

By now, your managers should be aware of and accepting the changes you're making to improve your hiring process. Now it's time to take it a step further and train them to hire better. The workshops IceHrm ran for its own group of managers covered everything from candidate sourcing to unconscious bias and conducting fair, consistent and effective interviews. We followed that up by creating guides, sample interview questions and interview assessment templates that are stored in a common place that everyone can access.

After training, make sure hiring managers are following best practices and taking advantage of all the tools you've provided. And if they're not using the techniques you've taught them, don't be afraid to call out bad practices and offer additional support.

7.Review sourcing and selection strategies

If you've been using the same job board for years, it can be easy to just extend the contract for another six or 12 months. But when you look at the data, you may find that some sources just aren't working for you - they may be providing a large number of candidates, but most aren't suitable for your needs, for example.

IceHrm has also invested in screening tools that allow candidates to be assessed in different ways for different types of roles. While a video interview is fine for a sales rep, an online coding test would be more appropriate for a software development role. Consider what screening tools you could introduce to assess candidates more comprehensively.

8.Improve the candidate experience

Any self-respecting HR professional knows that improving the candidate experience is the secret to improving your hiring process. So what about communication? Can you be even more transparent with candidates? Do you always get back to them within the promised timeframe?

Look at your application process: How can you make your ATS more intuitive and user-friendly? Your hiring software provider and their team of implementation experts should be able to help you streamline and improve your hiring process.

It's also important to make sure every candidate who interviews receives feedback on their performance - whether they get hired or not. Incorporate this into your interviews and manager training, and monitor managers to make sure they're giving candidates consistent and timely feedback.

9.Improve your onboarding process

Successful recruiting doesn't end when you make an offer to a candidate. If you want to improve your hiring process, you should also analyze your onboarding program to find areas for improvement. For example, we found that the percentage of new hires who left within the first 12 months was higher than desired.

So we developed a new onboarding program - IceHrm VIP - delivered through our learning management system. The training explains the roles of all our teams, the systems we use, our goals and objectives, key HR policies and benefits, and more. With this self-directed learning journey (see image below), new hires get everything they need to be successful in their first weeks at IceHrm. Could you pull off something similar? Or are there other pitfalls in your onboarding process that need to be eliminated?

10.Build your employer brand

With all the internal changes, it's easy to forget that it's an employer brand. The way your company is represented on social networks like LinkedIn and job search platforms like IceHrm and Indeed is critical to attracting quality candidates. A strong, positive employer brand also gives you an advantage when a candidate is considering competing job opportunities.

Take advantage of the free tools, training, and insights these platforms offer to learn more about the candidate pool you attract. You can also include these metrics in your ongoing performance monitoring (see step 11) if these measures are relevant to your overall goals.

11.Continuously monitor and refine performance

If you've completed all of the steps just described, congratulations! Now it's time to review the metrics you defined earlier and measure how your improved hiring process compares to those goals. Only by reporting on these metrics regularly - at least monthly - can you find out whether the changes you've made are having a positive or negative impact.

With this foundation, you'll be well positioned to continue refining your processes and strategies.

Optimizing your hiring process involves continuous improvement and strategic changes. By implementing these 11 steps and leveraging IceHrm's HR software solutions, you can streamline recruitment, enhance candidate experience, and build a stronger team.