5 Tips for Volume Hiring
Too often in an organizations growth cycle there is need to ramp up or hire a large number of people quickly in a short span of time. This can be to meet aggressive growth targets or may be a seasonal requirement to push a product in the market . This hiring can be at one location as in case of BPO or spread over a large territory in case of FMCG or Consumer durable company . In case of former there may be added complexity of language and different geographical aspects of territory . it is important for an organization to have a strategy to meet the various challenges here are our 5 tips to meet this challenges Head On :
- Internal Hiring : First post these requirements internally and drive internal hiring and employee referrals . See if there are people interested in taking up the positions you are going to hire aggressively from outside . it could even be shopfloor worker looking to move to field sales . Such movements should be encouraged as a person who has been with an organization for some time brings in a lot of institutional memory which can help other new joiners .
Another great source is referrals do have a rewarding Employee referral scheme in place ideally referrals should bring in from 20-40 % of your hiring intake . Try to keep referral rewards simpler and easy to understand for everyone involved . Referral schemes score highly on almost all recruitment efficiency parameters like cost per hire , new hire retention and even interview to hire ratio.
- The good , bad & ugly :
Purpose of volume hiring is to push your product and services end customers in the shortest possible time this can be done only if you are able to hire good quality candidates . One of the problem facing recruiters in high volume environment like retail , BPO & even manufacturing sector is that candidates think they know all about the work environment and expectations from it . Once they are on the job they realize the job is not what they expected and soon quit .
This can be avoided if all facts and conditions related to jo are presented upfront to candidates this could include shift working , transport , reporting time , meal availability on work place, uniform etc. One should also highlight aspects like double shift to cover co worker absence in sectors like Hospitality, and working in confined and often non Air conditioned spaces in logistics sector .
- Robust applicant tacking system :
Regardless of volume of hiring a robust applicant tracking system is a must . an online system will help you sort through a large pool o applicants fairly efficiently and quickly An interactive on line Job applicant system can engage candidates and also provide them relevant job related features . Most of the HRMS system have Candidates Gateways of Applicant Tracking system Modules which can be used . In absence of these one can use the Candidates Management Systems from some of the Job Boards . Another interesting feature from job Sites is Screening questions. Some of the job sites provide you a feature of adding a few questions typically 3-5 which can be used as Pre – Screening questions . For example
- Are you willing to work in night shifts
- Our job involves travelling thru interior areas are you willing to do this .
However job boards may not be suitable specially when hiring for Unskilled or Semi Skilled employees in this case one will have to revert to good old excel sheets to keep track of candidates .
Candidates job applicant form should be so designed to take minimal time for candidates to fill and help you in identifying which candidate to take forward for next round of screening process . One always has an option of doing a detailed data collection at the time of final round .
- Screening process which is fair & consistent :
When hiring large number of candidates too often objectivity & consistency is difficult to maintain this results in candidate hiring which is way off the mark . it is important before kicking off any such exercise that Hiring Managers & other stakeholders get together to understand what questions to ask and what criterions to adopt. There could be multiple interviewers and it shall help if a standard note is prepared which can act as reference for all involved . Typically this should involve :
- Set of minimum necessary knowledge to go by
- Important behavioral patterns one is looking for
One can always improve depending on the situation but a standard reference and boot camp for interviewers can dramatically improve the throughput of entire process .
- Assessing for Job Fit :
While hiring in large volumes too often the criterion of Job Fit or assessing a candidates behavioral aptitude to perform a particular job is given a go by . This can lead to high attrition post joining or even n shows at the time of joining . This can put additional pressure on recruiting teams . Important to ask simple open ended behavioral questions about his likes , dislikes and preferences . much more you can measure motivational fit by asking various questions on willing ness to travel , time scheduling etc.
If feasible try interviewing candidates at their actual place of work like a logistics company interviewing candidates at the ware house to give a feel of actual work place .
Conclusion :
With economic scenario and job market being difficult one can easily get swamped under an overload of candidates which may be looking for job but may not be best fit for you . It is important to understand the candidates applying to you are not just job seekers but may also be future customer of your products and services this makes it important for an organization to provide a good experience to all its candidates pool.
We hope this has been useful to you please write into us for more information .