Finding quality candidates for open positions has always been a challenge for hiring managers. From sourcing adequate qualified applications to screening, evaluating, and interviewing them, a recruiter needs to be efficient in every stage. For this reason, recruitment challenges remain one of the top priorities of many Human Resources (HR) departments.

Especially now that the world is still reeling from the social and economic impacts of a global health crisis, companies are undergoing extreme changes in how employees work and take on new opportunities. What used to be acceptable prior to 2020 is now a hindrance in terms of the way employers hire. To cope with the changes, more and more businesses are now considering outsourcing HR services in Singapore.

However, despite all their efforts, certain challenges to recruitment remain. In this article, we look into some of the biggest recruitment challenges that many hiring managers face today and the possible solutions to overcome them.

1. Making use of a data-driven approach 

Recruitment should always be data-driven. Essentially, data-driven recruiting means that a recruiter uses tangible statistics and facts to inform their hiring decisions, from choosing candidates to creating hiring plans. However, there are numerous challenges that come with enforcing a data-driven approach to one’s recruitment efforts. Perhaps you are not able to obtain timely and accurate data, or you have no appropriate system in place to automate the gathering and evaluation of data.

To solve this common recruitment challenge, it is highly advisable that you put the right HR systems in place to help you easily gather and evaluate data for recruiting purposes. Some of the critical systems all HR professionals should use are ATS, HRIS, and an HR Analytics Dashboard. Once you have already acquired the necessary HR systems, be sure to train your team on how to use these systems every day.

2. Attracting the right talent 

Regardless of how many job seekers apply, finding the right candidate for the open role is always going to be hard. You may have more than 50 job applications, but if the talent does not match what is required of the position, the likelihood of hiring the right person is low. In recruitment, it is not enough to attract so many job applicants. What is more important is to attract talents that perfectly fit the job requirements and the company culture.

To overcome the difficulty of attracting the right job candidates, be sure to advertise the open positions effectively. Promoting a job opening is almost the same as advertising the products and services of your company. You need to establish your company as a reputable authority in your industry through effective marketing, such as writing blog posts, speaking on webinars, and staying relevant on social media. This will surely attract quality talents to your company.

3. Providing a good candidate experience

The experience of finding a job is universally disliked. As a matter of fact, in a recent study conducted by Ideal, only 32% of job applicants rated their latest job search experience as ‘very good,’ while around 73% rated job searching as one of their most stressful experiences in life – even more stressful than doing taxes, speaking in front of the public, or getting a root canal!

If you do not want job applicants to your company to feel the same way and consequently diminish your company’s reputation, set yourself apart from the rest by investing in recruitment process enhancements. It is also best to include post-interview surveys in your recruitment process to ensure that you can measure your candidate experience and optimise your hiring procedures in accordance with the insights gathered from the data.

4. Bridging the skills gap

Many recruiters believe that the impending skills gap is their hardest recruitment challenge today. Essentially, the existence of a skills gap means that there is an inadequate number of qualified candidates out there to fill the positions required. As a consequence, recruitment ends up wasting so much resources and time sifting and screening unqualified applications.

One simple way to prevent this is to spend extra time clarifying and being concise with your job descriptions. Narrow down on the skills indispensable for the open position and establish hard pre-requisites. Doing so will most likely save you plenty of time down the road. Recruiters who search for broad skillsets usually shoot themselves in the foot with irrelevant applicants who are not actually compatible with the role.

Conclusion

Recruitment is undoubtedly a challenging part of HR. It is a process that requires time, resources, and dedication from both the candidates and the recruiter. As such, it comes as no surprise that many HR professionals are having a hard time streamlining their recruitment procedures. That said, with the right tools and strategies in place, recruitment and hiring can become much more efficient and smoother. Fortunately, many HR outsourcing companies in Singapore now offer services aimed at making recruitment relatively easy.

For the most comprehensive and reliable HR services to help optimise your company’s HR processes, Enable Consulting is the expert you can rely upon. As a leading HR outsourcing firm in Singapore and Asia, we deliver a variety of excellent HR services that cover everything your business needs, from recruitment and talent acquisition to payroll management and HR consultancy. With the aid of our services, you can surely overcome any HR challenge that comes your way.

To learn more about our trusted services, please do not hesitate to contact us today.