Prologue: This article is the last of a series focused on displaying the problems we identified in tech recruitment processes. Together they led us to create a movement that aims to improve the state of the industry, which you can join here.
7.4 seconds: that’s the average time recruiters spend the first time they go through a pile of applications to filter out candidates that might have potential from those that (they think) don’t. That’s the result of this Eye-Tracking experiment released in late 2018. 7.4 seconds isn’t a long time.
Considering that, according to the latest research, job openings get an average of 250 applications, it is easy to understand that professionals develop ways to go through as many applications as they can as quickly as they can before they focus on a handful that caught their eye.
The problem is that many recruiters, having decided at the end of those 7.4 seconds that a candidate isn’t suitable for the job, won’t spend any extra time on them. There isn’t a definite number of how many applications get replies, but our experience working with tech professionals around the world is that unanswered applications is one of their greatest frustrations.
Be engaging.
It’s “a lack of respect,” one job-searcher we interviewed said, when “companies don’t even answer at all.” Many of the Tech Talent we talk to daily echo this sentiment. And while that doesn’t necessarily mean recruiters don’t respect candidates, we think it’s pertinent and insightful for recruiters to understand how those on the other side of the process perceive it.
“I know we’re just humans and tech recruitment is not an easy and smooth task on many occasions but still…” another person interviewed during our research for the Make Tech Recruitment Better manifesto said. But, in his words, putting in the effort to be more empathetic, understanding how the person on the other side thinks and feels, helps recruiters “become better professionals.”
The fact is: being engaging is not just good for you, and better for the candidates: it’s great for your business too. The average job seeker will only wait two weeks to hear back from a company. If a company takes too long to engage or doesn’t engage at all, applicants don’t wait very long to try something else, somewhere else instead. (Quick reminder then that being fast when recruiting tech talent is important.)
But it’s not just at the first stage that engagement helps keep good candidates on track and motivated: it’s along every point of the process.
It might help to define for yourself deadlines to get back to candidates with feedback and to try to make that feedback as relevant and insightful as you can. And in the interest of transparency — but also to help you stick to those deadlines — we recommend you share those deadlines with candidates.
Establishing deadlines for yourself, of course, also allows you to hold the other side to a similar standard. It allows you to set a deadline for candidates to give a final decision on whether to take the job or not and to expect them to fulfill it.
Similarly, just as recruiters should try to make their feedback personalised, relevant, interesting and important, it is very helpful for candidates to do the same. If they find a fault with the recruitment process or have suggestions for the recruiter, a clear, level-headed reply is way more appreciated than not saying anything and just complaining about it to peers at the next networking event.
Candidates who expect transparency, need to understand that transparency is equally important on their part. If a candidate rejects an offer, for example, that rejection should be as honest as possible. Critically, it should say why the offer was rejected: was it the salary? Or lack of clear growth plan? Was it for personal reasons? Is the candidate just holding out for something better?
Providing this kind of input paves the road for the colleagues that will follow: the more constructive feedback employers and recruiters get, the more room they’ll have to improve. The whole process will feel fairer, smoother, clearer. In other words: better.
The truth is, the recruitment process will only evolve when both sides engage in it. Commit to it. That’s the whole point of the Manifesto: it’s not a solution, but an attempt to set the foundations for collaboration to improve recruitment. To make it more fulfilling for employers and potential employees alike.
None of this will just happen on its own: everybody involved has to roll up their sleeves and put a little effort to make it come true.
But if we can get enough people to commit to this, to work for this, to fight for this, we can get there. We know it. We think you know it too.
So tell me:
Will you commit to making Tech recruitment better?
Will you work for it? Will you fight for it?
If you do: welcome to our movement.
It’s good to have you on board.
Sebastian Paepke
Business Lead DE @ Landing.jobs
PS: You can check the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Blog Post of this series here, here and here, respectively.
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