A consistent hiring process maintains efficiency and excellence in employers' recruitment process. Lamees Abourahma of RPOA spoke with Curtis Grajeda, Founder & Chief Executive Officer at LevelUP Human Capital Solutions (HCS), about hiring and how employers can stay consistent throughout the recruitment lifecycle.
Grajeda discussed the significance of consistent hiring, factors causing inconsistency, and methods employers can apply to ensure a consistent hiring process. Additionally, he delved into how Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO) helps employers maintain consistency. The following is an edited version of the first part of this Talent Leader Council interview.
RPOA: Why is consistent hiring important for employers?
Curtis Grajeda: Consistent hiring helps set standards and best practices. But if you're an employer, consistency is typically everything but what you experience. Every employer hires at different moments, but they're going to experience peaks and valleys throughout the year. Employers should embrace inconsistency in volumes and prioritize uniform, scalable processes to ensure consistent outcomes.
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The key to being a consistent organization that values the hiring process is not necessarily about the volumes of hires but about maintaining a consistent candidate experience and a consistent process for hiring managers from recruitment through to onboarding.
In today’s corporate environment, peak hiring periods often reveal bottlenecks and inefficiencies, prompting a scramble to address these issues. While these issues may be temporarily resolved, the manual processes often fall apart when hiring volumes decrease, particularly if key personnel who once managed these processes leave the organization.
Q. What factors cause inconsistent hiring?
Grajeda: Several simple, easily addressable issues often cause inconsistency in the hiring process. One major factor is the lack of education or understanding among hiring managers about the process. This is especially true for new hiring managers who haven’t yet experienced the full recruitment cycle. Providing education and advisory services to these managers is crucial.
Inconsistency can arise when hiring managers lack understanding of their roles, responsibilities, and accountability throughout the hiring process. More importantly, the overall recruitment process in the organization may lack consistency from top to bottom. That's one of the key things that happens within organizations at the department level; each particular division manager may have their own process, which creates a hybrid or hodgepodge environment, yielding inefficiencies.
In addition to that, there's always going to be attrition in the marketplace. We typically find in highly manual environments, which is typical of HR and talent acquisition, that the individual driving recruitment may bring their own inconsistencies. They may not have been with the company long enough to understand established processes, or may leave before fully integrating them. Ensuring you have a team that is well-trained is vital throughout that recruitment process.
Q: How can employers ensure a consistent hiring process throughout the recruitment lifecycle?
Grajeda: A consistent hiring process starts with the EVP and ensuring consistent brand messaging about why you're an employer of choice. Recruiters must consistently communicate this EVP into the marketplace, making sure candidates hear it, recognize its value, and are attracted to it. This can be challenging to maintain, especially with turnover, peaks, and valleys in hiring needs.
As I mentioned earlier, inconsistency in the hiring experience can be detrimental. Employers need to create an interview matrix to qualify candidates and help candidates understand the experience of why they should join this company in this particular position. In addition, consistency must be embedded in every part of the process—from the search and interview stages to reporting and the tech systems used, ultimately leading to onboarding.
As an employer, a consistent hiring practice should be one of the key investments for leaders and talent acquisition teams, whether in a good market or even a down market.
Q. How does recruitment process outsourcing (RPO) help employers stay consistent throughout the recruitment lifecycle?
Grajeda: The value proposition of an RPO solution is its ability to offer stability and agility in an unpredictable corporate environment that changes direction on a monthly, weekly, and daily basis.
An RPO serves as both an advisor and a partner, ensuring consistency in the hiring process. This includes everything from sourcing candidates to managing the hiring manager's expectations and the overall talent acquisition system. RPO providers ensure that candidates perceive the employer, our client and partner, as a best-in-class organization. We achieve this by streamlining the entire recruitment lifecycle, from the initial intake to onboarding the new hire. By creating efficiencies at every step, we help our clients present themselves as attractive and efficient employers.
In Conclusion
Consistent hiring practices ensure efficiency, excellence, and long-term success in employers' recruitment process. Employers can significantly improve their hiring outcomes and overall organizational effectiveness by addressing the factors causing inconsistency and implementing methods to ensure consistent hiring. Incorporating RPO can further aid in maintaining a consistent hiring process, providing valuable support and expertise. Ultimately, embracing and prioritizing consistency in hiring practices can lead to enhanced employer branding, reduced inefficiencies, and a streamlined recruitment lifecycle, contributing to a robust and successful organization.
Want to know more about recruitment process outsourcing? Read this 8-minute ultimate guide on RPO.
