Your business, your company name, your culture and what you stand for as an employer. All of these things have a spotlight on them when advertising a job to market.

In times of tight budgets and cost cutting, businesses often think they will start by pulling back on recruitment. Obviously I’m biased, but cutting your recruitment budget can end up costing you more in the long term. I think businesses forget a good recruitment process can ensure you find, and retain, great talent. From lost productivity to an impact on team culture, bringing the wrong person on board can result in a range of challenges for a manager, their team and ultimately the business.

When you create a job advert, you are advertising (and selling!) much more than a collection of words on a job board. The advert is a reflection of your business, your values and your culture. It’s important to be transparent and honest, and to do what you say you will.

So many candidates I meet with have, somewhere along the line, had an experience with a company who performed poorly during the recruitment process, which left them with a negative feeling about that organisation. It’s really important to be on your game when managing your external image as an employer.

So, what are the most common mistakes that employers make during the recruitment process?

Not acknowledging each person’s application (yes, I mean every single application that comes through)
Taking someone through ANY part of the process (phone interview, face to face interview, testing, anything at all) and then “falling off the face of the earth”
Not being contactable for feedback
And the worst of all, not giving an outcome to the candidate

If you want to be able to say you’re an amazing company with great values, a positive culture, and an awesome team (and really mean it), start with your recruitment process. Even if someone applies to your organisation and they don’t get the job, you want them to be able to look back and think “OK, I didn’t get the job, but that process was really smooth and I have nothing bad to say about the company – the time I invested in applying was worth it”.

Don’t underestimate what a recruitment process can say about your business. On average for business support and customer service-based roles our Christchurch team get approximately 200-400 applications for each role we advertise, and a huge part of what’s important to us is making sure to the best of our ability that everyone gets an acknowledgement and an outcome. It’s a part of our vision to make the candidate experience as positive as possible for each application we receive. When you work with Madison you can be confident that we are upholding your brand to the highest possible standard.

If you want to learn more about how Madison can improve your recruitment process, get in touch, I would be happy to speak with you! India Bell – 03 366 6226 | india.bell@madison.co.nz