Employee Engagement starts even before you want to recruit them
This is the time of the year where everyone is hiring, now that hiring plans have been approved and bonuses have been paid out. It is critical that our company and career opportunities stand out from the crowd and succeed in getting the right attention from the right crowd.
We have spoken about numerous “sexy” HR issues such as the War for Talent, Globalization, Employee Engagement, Motivating and Employee Retention etc. for a long time. And there are countless articles and research surrounding all these. A recent discussion topic links customer experience with the employee experience (Employee Retention, Engagement, and Ambassadorship Go Hand-in-Hand-in-Hand At Successful Companies and New Generation of Business: Connecting Employee Loyalty with Customer Loyalty). And we are not purely talking about hiring the right people, getting them to work in the right environment, or paying them the right amount (although obviously these are part and parcel of the bigger picture).
Throughout my career, I have had the pleasure of working with career-seekers across different generations, nationality, age, skill set, aspirations and expectations. Through these interactions, I hope to share some observations that withstood the passage of time and continue to shape job seekers’ decision-making process. Hopefully, some of these may prove to be key differentiators during the hunt for talent.
It all starts with the Recruitment process!
And we are not even talking about the interviews. Thanks to social media, technology and mobile devices, would-be employees are researching about companies, news, values and everything else even before clicking on the “Apply NOW” button. Sometimes, they are assessing you before you decide to hire them! Taking time to carve out a good and informative job description (I seriously think we should rename this to “Your Achievement Board”, as a way to show would-be employees what Achievement looks like when they join) is the first step to showcase your company’s strengths, and is one of the first employee experience.
While a precise and well-written job description may not necessarily means that everything will be smooth-sailing thereafter, a sloppy and haphazard job description certainly tells would-be employee that the organization really couldn’t care less about the hiring. What impression are you leaving behind through your online presence and job ads?