This post is sponsored by MightyRecruiter. Be sure to check out their latest eBook, 2017 Hiring Trends & Predictions: Industry Experts Weigh In. It’s available now!
If the experts are correct, 2017 is going to be an extraordinary year in the world of recruiting and hiring. Recently, MightyRecruiter interviewed a group of seven thought leaders to glean their major predictions for 2017, and their expectations are quite interesting.
Be forewarned, though – 2017 won’t be a walk in the park for recruiters and hiring managers. Fifty-six percent of companies indicate their hiring volumes will increase this year, but only 35 percent of companies anticipate adding recruiting staff to manage the extra workload. That means it’s going to be a very busy year for us all.
Some trends will carry on, including the current technological evolution involving recruiting automation, candidate relationship management, data analytics, and business intelligence. But 2017 will also see a harkening back to the more human elements of recruiting in the form of higher-touch relationships between recruiters and candidates.
Five major takeaways were identified by our experts. Read on to learn what you should be watching for in 2017.
1. Candidate quality.
This year will see a push toward improving candidate and new hire quality through a variety of strategies. All our experts predicted changes in recruitment, screening, and interviewing, and many think that changes to how job descriptions – and job ads – are written will be crucial to this. Changing how candidate resumes are read could also impact quality, according to Steve Levy, principal of Recruiting Inferno Consulting.
“Traditional job descriptions are what I call compensation documents,” he said. “These need to change to reflect the job’s true performance objectives. In the project-based economy, performance will be the key. This is one reason that I read resumes from the bottom up. Recruiters who read resumes from the top down are more inclined to miss something about a candidate and reject them. A bottom-up reading offers unique perspectives about a person’s ability to perform.”
2. Human element.
The influencers all agree that the importance of human interaction cannot be ignored – regardless of technological advances. Like in sales, the relationships recruiters build with candidates play a pivotal role in attracting the right candidates.
“The first thing a sales person does is create a relationship with their prospect,” said Bill Kutik, host and managing editor of Firing Line with Bill Kutik®, an HCM HD video series. “Good recruiters have always created relationships with candidates. Previously, it was done with the phone. Now, it is being done with email and content marketing; just as marketing tracks open rates and click-through rates, so does recruitment marketing.”
Laurie Ruettimann, founder and principal of LFR LLC and Glitchpath, Inc. agrees, and takes it a step further. She believes that the most successful recruiters and hiring managers will be those that use a more intuitive approach to hiring.
“You can’t use technology to do the work that humans do,” she said. “Recruiting must have the right blend of technology and human interaction …. You must bring in your candidates and spend some time with them. You need to get to know them, and they need to get to know you. I think those recruiters and HR professionals who do well in 2017 will be the ones who have a high EQ (emotional quotient) and who are able to make a case to the human heart.”
3. Talent communities.
The idea of a strong employer brand is becoming more and more important to building talent communities, according to Kyle Lagunas, research manager of emerging trends and technologies at IDC.
“We’ve been moving away from the reactionary recruiting model, what many call the post and pray approach,” he said. “But it really gained significant traction in 2016. Organizations embraced a more proactive recruiting model that is rooted in strong employer brand and robust recruitment marketing strategies.”
As a result of this increased employer branding, heartier private talent pools will emerge. Social media will also play a critical role in building these communities, according to Stephanie Tan, head of talent for the Samsung Strategy and Innovation Center.
“As we head into 2017, employer brand and how to engage employees in making it real, will remain pivotal. Social media is also becoming an increasingly important channel to promote job openings and build awareness of our employer brand.”
4. On-demand workforce.
There isn’t complete consensus as to how the on-demand workforce is going to affect recruitment and hiring. However, experts agree that some of the same factors that apply for the full-time, permanent workforce will also apply to the on-demand workforce moving forward, though the approach to managing these talent pools may be different.
“The similarities and dissimilarities between full-time and on-demand workers require totally different approaches from a cost point of view,” said Gerry Crispin, principal and founder of CareerXRoads. “Today, most on-demand workers come without any involvement from corporate recruiting; they come through third-party technology platforms and placement agencies that have made deals with purchasing agents. HR and talent acquisition professionals have not been heavily involved. On-demand hiring is going to have a big technology play; downstream, it will require an integrated recruiting approach.”
5. Employee Brand.
There’s been a lot of buzz about employer brand over the past couple years. In 2017, be prepared to hear a lot more about “employee branding” as well, as organizations realize that they can amplify their employer brand by tapping into their employees’ use of social media to help propel their recruiting and hiring efforts. However, one expert predicts that employers may need to do some hand holding in the beginning to assuage concerns.
“A lot of employees [say], ‘… You’ve been telling me for the last 10 years that I cannot use Facebook at work, and now you want me to share content on Facebook,’ said Katrina Collier of The Searchologist. “To counteract this prevailing belief system, a lot of reeducation needs to take place.” She believes companies should start by identifying their most content employees, or those that are most likely to send out positive messages about the company via social and then let them do their thing.
“Trust your employee advocates to use the networks they’re comfortable with to share information,” she said. “It’s most likely where your future recruits are anyway.”
Don’t forget to grab a copy of MightyRecruiter’s newest eBook, 2017 Hiring Trends & Predictions: Industry Experts Weigh In, to learn more about what recruiters and hiring managers can expect this year.
