40 Recruiting Ideas to Shake Up Your Hiring Process

14, Mar, 2024

Summary

Many companies today are struggling to hire and retain talent, but more often than not the problem is self-inflicted: They’re simply not using a broad enough array of tools, sometimes because they don’t even know the tools exist. In this article, the authors list 40 tools — some familiar but underutilized, others unfamiliar and innovative — that can help companies find and keep the people they need to succeed in both the short-term and the long-term.

Despite challenging economic conditions, companies are still finding it difficult to attract and retain the right talent. That’s one of the takeaways from the most recent U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics report, which showed that job vacancies still remain above 10 million as of November 2022. We’ve confirmed that trend in our own work: Last August, when we surveyed 800 senior business leaders, more than 95% of them told us that hiring and retaining talent was one of their top three priorities as they strive to deliver on their strategies. However, those needs are not constrained to the short-term: More than two-thirds of the leaders we surveyed reported that filling positions for lower and higher wage workers is critical for their organization’s ability to compete, both in the next 12 to 18 months and in the next three to five years.

But business leaders are doing very little that’s innovative to tackle the talent challenge. When it comes to higher-wage workers, they’re relying primarily on two basic strategies: increasing compensation (a fairly obvious approach) and implementing remote/hybrid work models (an unsurprising approach, given the effects of Covid-19). They’re doing even less for lower-wage workers: In our survey, fewer than half of respondents reported using even basic levers, such as health care benefits and compensation increases, to attract and retain lower-wage workers.

Much of this is due to a lack of awareness of innovative talent practices. Many of the leaders we surveyed were unaware of the other options available to them. This, they recognized, was a problem: Less than 20% of them reported their organizations had very mature talent strategies.

So how can you enable more talent innovation and measure its impact? Based on our survey findings, organizations need to adopt a more comprehensive portfolio of practices to enhance their ability to recruit and retain talent. To help, we’ve identified nearly 40 strategies, which we’ve organized into seven categories that either strengthen the hiring process or help enhance a company’s offer. Some of these practices are familiar but underutilized, and others are newer and more innovative.

Strengthening the Hiring Process, Hiring campaign, and selection

Many companies rely on traditional recruiting strategies to identify candidates who fulfill a long list of requirements. Finding candidates who tick off every box on the list is not easy — and those few who do are often actually not the right people for the job. By embracing more expansive hiring and selection processes, companies can do a better job of finding the talent that’s right for them. Here are some innovative practices to consider:

Figure out what work really needs to get done, and rewrite job descriptions to focus on the skills and specs that matter the most for that work, instead of relying on generic education or experience requirements.
Seek candidates who match 70% to 80% of the most critical skills for the role — and develop learning curricula to equip them with the remainder.
Offer “micro-internships” (short-term paid projects) or apprenticeships that reach new candidate pools and allow employers and candidates to assess fit before committing to a full-time hire.
Host open hackathons to assess talent and facilitate the hiring of candidates in batches.
Consider candidates simultaneously for multiple open roles if they have a high degree of overlapping skills.
Leverage tech-based and AI-based talent assessments to screen for technical or interpersonal skills.
Employ inclusive, gender-neutral language in job descriptions to attract more diverse candidates.