Tuesday, September 5, 2017

Strategizing Recruitment. (5*Sep-2017)




For any organization, hiring the right talent is one of the most important and extremely critical exercise for the overall performance and growth of the organization. Modern Business environment requires greater competitive advantage from HR activities and processes. HR department of the organization has two roles to play

1)      Operational
2)      Strategic

HR adds strategic value to the organization either by becoming ‘reactive’ or ‘proactive’ function. In reactive strategy mode, HR defines its Recruitment strategy by assuming and embracing the existence of overall business strategy and strategizing accordingly in line with organizational strategies. Most of the recruitment strategies are reactive in nature and need a constant review on workability, though developing LDPs (Leadership development programs) are must. In this VUCA (Volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous) world, no strategy is forever or for very long-term, keep updating yourself is the key to the success.

Things to remember before strategizing Recruitment process

Every organization has different needs in general and different manpower requirements. It is important to consider below-mentioned factors before getting into strategizing Recruitment process.

·         Internal Factors
o   Overall objectives of the organization
o   Need, size, nature of the organization
o   Impacting Interconnected policies
o   Cost, financial budget analysis
o   Attrition analysis
·         External Factors
o   Demand and supply scenario
o   PESTEL (Political, economic, social, technological, environmental, and legal) scenario
o   Competitors
o   Organization Image (EVP – Employee Value Proposition)

Prerequisites for defining recruitment strategy.


It is important to standardize every part of recruitment process before drafting recruitment strategy. Following exercises and tools play an important role to standardize recruitment process and overall strategy.

  • o   Creating Job descriptions.
  • o   Designing organizational and departmental Organogram.
  • o   Compensation Benchmarking.
  • o   Manpower Histogram (Phase wise recruitment needs)
  • o   Career paths and development programs.


Recruitment Strategy

Recruitment strategy should be dealing with
·         Lateral Hiring (Experienced)
·         Graduate Hiring (Freshers)

Graduate Hiring Process

Graduate / Fresher hiring is an extremely important task for the organization. Fresh graduates bring new ideas, innovation to the organization and are more likeable to adapt organizational culture. if we want to attract the best available young resources, we should have well defined career paths for young graduates along with ample learning opportunities.
Organisations should be hiring fresh graduates for different roles either by Campus Recruitment or by Walk-in-Interviews of freshers. Though hiring from top institutions has been a norm but focus on the quality of individuals rather than institutions pays off more.

Interview Panel for Campus Hiring
·         Technical Interviewer
·         HR for behavioral skills assessment
                Interviewing Process for Campus Hiring  
o   Company Induction session at Campus

o   Written Test
o   English skills
o   General Knowledge
o   Psychometric Testing
o   Case Studies
 


o   Group Discussion or Presentation on given topic
 



o   Personal Interview

Lateral Hiring
First task is to divide manpower requirements into categories based on seniority and place in Organization chart. Manpower could be defined in three ways

o   Senior Level
o   Mid-Level
o   Entry Level

  • ·     Senior Level Recruitments – To be hired from competitor organizations
  • ·     Mid-Level Recruitments – To be hired from competitor organizations or from similar industries.
  • ·   Entry- Level Recruitments -  Highly Energetic, Smart, preferably someone with some relevant experience.

o   From Campus Recruitment
o   From other sources

Recruitment Sources –

Following sources are to be used considering level of mandate open, urgency and cost-effectiveness.

Ø  Existing Database – To create a pipeline of relevant prospective candidates is an important task. Recruitment team should prepare database of the candidates based on following factors.

o   Relevant but Passive candidates
o   Relevant but position don’t exist

There are number of ways to create database, most important being active networking of company recruiters through online or offline resources. Organization’s Recruitment team should be easy to reach and the moment HR gets to know about new requirement, existing database search should always be first thing to source Candidatures. Implementing HR database Management system with HRIS, i.e. taleo, is a costly affair but necessary for long term.
Ø  IJPs (Internal Job Postings) & Networking – IJP is one of the most underrated tool for Recruitment by most of the organizations. If implemented properly this is one of the fastest, trustworthy, and cost-effective way of recruiting manpower. It is about creating a channel for existing employees to refer candidates they know. References should be rewarded by incentives based on level of position closed.
Ø  Headhunting– is an excellent tool for filling Senior Level requirements. Using this for junior positions is not recommended because it is a time-consuming exercise if targeted individual is passive about a job change.
Ø  Job portals -  Naukri.com is the best resource available in India for Recruitment solutions and extremely cost effective in the case of large number of recruitments. Mass mailing feature is quite beneficial for conducting Walk in Interviews. Monster.com, timesjobs.com, Linkedin.com are other alternatives for attracting manpower and online advertisement of the jobs.
Ø  Manpower Consultants – Empaneling recruitment consultants is another excellent way of recruitments specially when companies want to maintain confidentiality while recruiting. Though I would rather look for strengthening in-house recruitment team instead of using consultants frequently.
Ø  Advertisement – Offline advertisement used to be an effective medium of attracting quality candidates, but rise of internet has replaced this with advertisements on Online Platforms.

Recruitment Process

The steps involved in recruitment process are as follows.

·         New Manpower requisition as per Manpower Planning and budgeting.
·         Sourcing of CVs. (By Above mentioned sources)
·         Initial filtering and Initial Telephonic screening.
·         Psychometric, behavioral, and other testing.
·         Interview with Hiring Manager and HR.
·         Filter down to 3 candidates from the lot.
·         Final Interview with the Authority (if required)
·         Reference checks
·         Negotiations
·         Offer release
·         Follow up for joining
·         Joining and Induction.

Testing and assessment.

We can have different assessment methods and techniques for the recruitment processes. These assessments should be based on following things.

o   Seniority of the position
o   Nature of the Role (Technical, Non-technical)
o   Cost of the Test
o   Time Consuming
o   Urgency of the role.

Nature of assessments

o   Face to Face Interview (Technical or behavioral)
o   Language proficiency
o   Technical written tests
o   Behavioral, psychometric written tests
o   Case study solution
o   Presentation on the topic.
o   Online tests (Mettle, Belbin etc.)
o   Group assignment or assessment at work

Vendor Management

Vendor Management is an underestimated domain in most of the organizations, but if managed properly, it could be extremely helpful in making Recruitment process cost effective, faster, smoother and could enhance overall effectiveness of the function.
Following factors and exercises make vendor management effective

Ø  Standardization of contracts and terms
Ø  Articulation of Vendor Management Policy.
Ø  Classification of vendors – Some vendors are good in Fresher recruitments and some are specialized in Senior level recruitment.
Ø  Overall Evaluation and assessment before contract.
Ø  Timely performance and services review.
Ø  Retain performers but add new vendors as well.
Ø  Maintaining relationships even if collaboration is less.
Ø  Gap identifying exercises with vendors.
Ø  Rewards for high performers.
Ø  Terms review and renegotiations every year.

Conclusive words -  Recruitment is no doubt one of the most important activity to decide the success of the organization. Having the right person at the right time at the right cost, makes a Recruitment strategy successful. Organization needs to consider Recruitment and overall HR function as profit center rather than a cost center.  Recruitment strategy of any organization should be based on overall business plans and it should be flexible enough in case overall business strategy changes.
I am a firm believer of a strong Internal recruitment team instead of outsourcing the process. Recruiters are face of the company, they work as Brand ambassadors instead of Jobs sellers. A strong Recruitment team enhances the EVP (Employee Value Proposition) hence Brand Image of the company.

“I am convinced that nothing we do is more important than hiring and developing people. At the end of the day, you bet on the people not strategies”

Anupam Sharma

9560516535

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