What’s more stressful to a recruiter than posting an open requisition when a vacancy becomes open and chattering their teeth as they wait for candidates to apply? This is the old way of recruiting that induces stress on a company, hindering their operational efficiency while being understaffed.
Instead, implementing proactive hiring strategies by developing an evergreen talent pool is the new way to onboard professionals. Take these 7 steps to institute evergreen hiring that can change how your company sources and onboard candidates.
1. Define Your Evergreen Talent Needs
The evergreen recruiting approach builds a substantial talent pool of multiple candidates with diverse backgrounds. To get the most out of this hiring method, it’s best to define your company’s evergreen talent needs first.
Recruiters should ask themselves, “What are the roles that require continuous hiring?” For retail, cashiers are in high demand while expediters are in high demand for quick-service restaurants in the hospitality industry.
Defining the skills, qualifications, and experience required for these evergreen roles can help you develop a talent pool strategy accordingly. From there, recruiters and hiring managers can tailor recruitment efforts to develop a talent pipeline that aligns with the company’s long-term goals.
2. Build a Strong Employer Brand
Attracting top talent can be done more than by creating engaging job descriptions. How you present your company to potential employees will determine how positively or negatively they perceive your business.
Recruitment can build a strong employer brand by:
- Posting blogs, social media updates, and videos to highlight workplace culture, success stories, and potential career growth opportunities within the company.
- Engaging with potential candidates on LinkedIn, industry forums, and recruitment platforms to enhance company awareness.
- Publishing employee testimonials so upcoming candidates can see positive experiences.
3. Leverage Multiple Sourcing Channels
An important part of the talent pool development strategy is leveraging a variety of candidate sourcing strategies. This tactic refines a higher candidate quality as applicants can come from various backgrounds and help enhance diverse teams. Many effective sourcing strategies can reach the right candidates such as:
- Job boards.
- Career sites.
- Employee referrals.
- University partnerships.
- Networking events.
- Job fairs.
- Social media recruiting.
Employee Referral Programs
Employee referral programs have undergone numerous studies to show that talent from this sourcing channel. Onboard higher-quality candidates than those sourced from other traditional methods. New hires from referral programs are 40% more likely to stay with a company for the long term than other new hires from other sourcing channels.
Social Media Recruiting
Make a post on your social media handles with a link to your job posting. For example, it can read:
Looking for a job? We are accepting applications for (insert job title) at our (insert location, if applicable or mention it’s a remote position).
Apply now! (insert link).
4. Implement a Candidate Relationship Management (CRM) System
Cadient’s candidate relationship management (CRM) system can help you manage a wide array of applicants within your evergreen talent pool. Store candidate information, track their progress through the application process, and engage with them effectively.
Benefits of a CRM System
- Streamlined candidate tracking across different hiring stages.
- Automated communication to maintain consistent engagement with candidates.
- Data-driven insights to refine recruitment strategies.
Cadient’s Text Notify can automate communications with candidates to remind them about upcoming interviews during the active hiring stage or company-based events happening even when you aren’t hiring. Cadient’s analytics allows recruiters to collect historical data from past hiring campaigns to gain data-driven insights to apply to future evergreen recruitment strategies.
5. Continually Engage with Candidates
Enhancing engagement with applicants contributes to a positive candidate experience, which is important for a successful hiring campaign.
Engagement Tactics
Email newsletters: Send updates about company news, industry trends, and other information to engage candidates.
Webinars and virtual events: Have company leaders discuss career growth opportunities and industry insights.
Personalized outreach: Ask candidates about their goals and aspirations through a personal text or email.
Talent community groups: Create exclusive forums or social media groups where interested candidates can interact with the employer even when they are not actively hiring.
6. Develop an Efficient Screening and Prequalification Process
Quantity doesn’t always mean quality. Not every candidate in the pool will be a quality fit. Efficient screening can be achieved with Cadient’s resume parsing and application screening utilizing keywords related to predefined criteria. This could be skills, qualifications, and experience factors related to the position.
The Prequalification Procedure
- Use automated skills assessments to filter high-potential candidates.
- Conduct structured interviews to evaluate top-tier candidates.
- Categorize by readiness level (immediate, near-future, long-term) to streamline final hiring decisions.
7. Measure and Optimize Your Evergreen Hiring Strategy
Tracking the effectiveness of developing an evergreen talent pool ensures it’s going the right way your company wants it to progress.
Key Metrics to Watch
- Time-to-hire.
- Candidate engagement rate.
- Source effectiveness.
- Conversion rates.
