Recruitment Sucks

46 applications. 6 weeks. 2 responses.

That’s been my personal candidate experience in the last several weeks as I search for an HR role in the city I’m relocating to - Austin.

90 applicants. 6 weeks. 90 responses.

That’s been the candidate experience for those applying to be my replacement here in Colorado.

As an applicant and a hiring manager the world of recruitment has become a bitter, exhausting, sometimes fruitless endeavor that can start a company’s reputations off on the worst foot.

A friend of mine outside of the HR profession recently texted me this photo knowing about the 44 companies that did not even respond to my application:

My friend said she found this while scrolling through Facebook. It stung a little, knowing this is such a normal experience for applicants.

It stung because we’re better than this, HR. We’re better than ghosting, and so many other horrible experience candidates are having on a daily basis.

Here’s how we as a workforce can make recruiting a better experience for the humans trying to join our teams:

1. Stop Using Applications

   1. It’s erroneous and tedious to ask candidates to create a creative and informative resume as well as spend a significant amount of time taking what’s on that resume and putting it into your online application. There is no reason to expect candidates to find your job, create a login for your ATS, fill out a profile, upload a resume and give you their work history. If you’re looking to screen quickly, utilize knock out questions and cut down the time it takes for qualified applicants to jump through your hoops. Applying for a job should not feel like a trip to the DMV.

2. Minimum Qualifications Must Be Reasonable

   1. During a local Employer’s Summit Conference two recruiters discussed the completely logical idea that “minimum years in the field” are increasingly more ridiculous. The premise of their argument was simply that what happens in one person’s career in five years may be completely different than another’s, and measuring just the length of service can be a disservice to your candidate pool. I couldn’t agree more. In 5 years I have completed 25 internal investigations, some of which have gone to mediation and litigation. There are HR professionals that go through a 30 year career only managing one of those investigations. The fact is this: our minimum qualifications must be reasonable. We must stop trying to plow through applicants numerically and get into the trenches of their careers to truly determine the suitability for the job.

3. No More Disrespect

   1. Not responding to a human being that took time out of their lives to consider your organization as a space to spend their career is flat out disrespectful. If you don’t have the bandwidth to respond to each candidate, let’s budget an FTE or ATS. If an FTE or ATS isn’t in the budget, then it’s long hours combing through your applicant pool and giving them the respect every person deserves. Recruitment has become a disingenuous corporation and as HR professionals we cannot allow humanity to expect this type of treatment. Let’s be wholly unsettled with a lack of communication.

4. They’re Interviewing Us, Too

   1. There’s a palpable feeling when you’re a candidate that you are under a microscope. It’s becoming alarmingly clear that organizations do not have that same feeling. The reality is both parties are interviewing the other, and to adopt an attitude of indifference to the opinions the candidates have of you is a big mistake. Our candidates are interviewing us and as such our responses should be best forward every time. Your tenth phone interview should feel the same smile in your voice as the first. An in person interview should feel like a first date; some nerves, excitement, and time for both people to talk. Candidates that took off work, drove to your location in their best clothes and put themselves on display for your company should leave not just feeling exhausted but invigorated. They brought their whole selves…what did you bring?

5. Hiring Managers Are Nightmares

   1. We’ve all had them - the hiring manager with too high expectations, the one that won’t clear their calendar for interviews, and the one that micromanages the recruitment. Listen closely friends: if they are nightmares for us, they’re nightmares for the candidates, too. It’s unacceptable to put a human being in a room with a hiring manager that isn’t on the same page as your recruitment strategy. If your hiring manager can’t be on time, courteous, kind, and calming to an applicant, they shouldn’t be allowed in the room. We must think of interview training beyond the scope of compliance and truly commit to training interview panels on the crucial elements of interview manners. HR professionals are advocates for the humans on both sides of the table.

Recruitment sucks, but it doesn’t have to. We have to be willing to keep the Human element in recruitment at every stage of the process, and commit to doing so with every single candidate interested in our companies.