In today’s world, when you can fly around the world in less than a day, order your groceries or a new pair of shoes and have it delivered same day, and communicate with anyone, anywhere at anytime, having a sense of urgency when hiring is more important than ever. Just a few years ago, a hiring manager could interview a candidate one day, and make then an offer weeks later and have that offer accepted. Today, if you wait even a few days, what seemed to be your ‘next hire’ and ‘ideal candidate’ is gone, out of your grasp, already signed and committed to the next VC-backed, ping-pong-playing tech startup.
It’s once you lose that candidate, you realize just how perfect they were. Today, there are more companies hiring than there are candidates to fill those roles. Due to the grand amount of private funding that is given away each day and the mass media surrounding startup culture (think Vince Vaughn’s ‘The Intern”), it’s a very competitive market for the top candidates.
In the hiring world of today, it is crucial to have a great sense of urgency. Here are a few tips to guarantee you can have your offers accepted and top talent hired onto your team:
Show the love
Candidates can be willing to wait for a company if they know that the level of interest is high and they feel wanted. If you find a great candidate but must wait for your CEO to get back to town and meet her before making an offer, tell your candidate. Check in daily – let them know you are doing everything you can to expedite the process and you aren’t ‘shopping’ around.
Eliminate extra meetings
When you sit down and meet with a candidate and realize they could be an excellent fit for your team, see who else is free at that time to meet him or her. Will he need to meet the VP Sales? Stop by his office. Does the CEO need to give approval? Check in with the EA and see if he has wiggle room. The point is: don’t prolong the process – try to have as many colleagues meet your candidate as you can.
Block out time – Just do it
Sure – spending an entire day interviewing candidates can be exhausting, but once the day is over and you’ve taken notes on each candidate, you will be able to compare them and realize the top performers from the rest of the pack. To do this easily, let your Betts Recruiting point of contact know you’ve blocked off this Friday to meet as many qualified candidates – get it booked up so that you can have a decision made before the weekend.
Close more quickly
When you’re interested in a candidate, ask their level of interest at the end of each interview. If they have hesitations, you can address them immediately. If they aren’t interested, you’ll know and can focus on the candidates that are. When you meet a great candidate, don’t be afraid to ask the hard question: as we all know, its just as important to get to a ‘no’ as it is to get to a ‘yes’.
Now that you know how to be a time-sensitive hiring manager, you can leave it to Betts to find you the high quality candidates with whom you’ll have your sense of urgency. Remember – the average candidate gets multiple offers; you want yours to be the one that they accept!
Stephanie Wood is a New Business Manager at Betts Recruiting and one of the more senior employees at Betts Recruiting. She is the point of contact at Betts for new companies looking to hire sales or marketing. Her role in the company is to give a new hiring manager an idea of the candidate market, help streamline a plan for hiring, and initiate the process with the recruiting team at Betts. If you are looking to utilize Betts Recruiting for your hiring needs, you can reach Stephanie at [email protected] or 415-318-7404.