The Future of Hiring – Top Trends to Expect in 2023

As a top-rated virtual hiring event platform, we hear the challenges from the organizations and employers that host events on our platform every day.  

 

The future of hiring is expected to continue evolving and becoming increasingly digital and data-driven.  Here are some of the trends shaping the future of hiring:

Virtual and remote hiring– The trend of remote work will likely increase the demand for virtual hiring processes, including virtual interviews and assessments. 

Artificial Intelligence (AI) – AI will play a larger role in the hiring process, from resume screening to candidate matching and predictive analytics.

Diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) – Companies will continue to prioritize DEI in their hiring processes, including using technology to address bias in recruitment and increasing outreach to diverse candidate pools.

Employee experience – The focus will shift from traditional HR practices to creating a positive employee experience, from the hiring process to onboarding and beyond.

Talent communities – Companies will create and engage with talent communities to build relationships with potential candidates, improving their ability to attract and retain top talent. 

Overall, the future of hiring will likely prioritize technology, flexibility and candidate experience in order to attract and retain top talent in a highly competitive job market. 

Let’s drill down to some of the top trends we see as 2023 kicks off.

Smart Hiring and Retention Challenges –  The ‘Great Resignation’ spurred on by Covid might be behind us, but workers continue to leave the workforce in larger than expected numbers.  October of 2022 saw 4 million Americans quit their jobs, which left 10.3 million open positions.  The gap between available jobs and available workers continues to grow, meaning retention is the best strategy to avoid the competition for new hires. 

Limiting turnover has become more important than ever.  The days of ‘letting an employee go’ because so many others were ready to fill that role are gone.  Creating a workplace culture that builds trust and helps employees grow in their careers has always been a smart strategy, but now it has become a necessity.

No matter how much you limit turnover, adding new employees will always be part of a growing company’s needs.  Smart hiring includes tactics that are non-traditional like hosting virtual career fairs, and virtual hiring events. These events open your organization to anyone who is interested, and not limit yourself to a pool of candidates in your area.   Virtual hiring events became mainstream during the pandemic and now, nearly 80% of recruiters prefer virtual to in-person.  The same can be said for busy job candidates who most likely have a full-time job but are weighing their options and can more-readily attend a virtual event.  Make sure you have a virtual hiring event platform as part of your hiring strategy to attract and hire the best talent possible.

The Need for Flexibility – another Covid influenced dynamic is the new remote workforce.  Employers toyed with the idea of letting employees ‘work from home’, but it never took hold.  Post pandemic, it remains a very common and viable option as many workplaces have roles that are as productive and effective from home as in office.

The latest report shows that 48% of the workforce will continue to work remotely or in a hybrid fashion.  Being able to offer this type of work will be a great competitive advantage over the 52% of the workforce that requires workers to be in the office.  A great strategy is to support a remote or hybrid workplace now, so that you can attract the best available talent and be prepared in the event of another disruption.

Skill Gaps and Shortage of Talent – as difficult as finding the right hire already is, shortages in skills and talent are increasing the challenges.  Skills like construction and tech are having an extremely difficult time finding qualified candidates, and the pipeline is not filling up anytime soon.

The answer is internal training and dedicating resources for employee development and growth.  The days of finding skilled and experienced workers are few and far between.  Your best strategy is to hire based on the character traits and work ethic you are looking for and build on the employees skills by training them for your organization.  Offering this type of opportunity will create another strong competitive advantage over employers that do not offer this.

This ‘growth-mindset’ replaces the days of a person working in the same department their entire lives.  Give employees opportunities to learn, mentor, be mentored and apply their skills in other positions.  You may take an average employee and turn them into a star, simply by giving them the support to grow and find their best fit in the organization.

Employee Well-Being – along the lines of creating a great work culture is focusing on the well-being of employees.  The term ‘Quiet-Quitting’ relates directly to the pervasive attitude workers have that they are only going to give so much to their jobs.  This can be a larger problem in workplaces that don’t provide genuine support for their employee’s well-being. 

Make sure your employees know that you appreciate their effort and are vested in their personal well-being.  Flexible work schedules, childcare support, mental health support, physical and emotional well-being programs are all part of the mix.  The more you can invest in the employee’s well-being, the better they will feel about themselves, the company and the more likely they will want to stay with your company.  

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion or DEI – is not a trend, it is a way of the workforce that is here to stay, and rightly so.  Companies can no longer avoid the topic or force employees to adapt to a ‘my way or the highway’ mentality.  From the smallest companies to the largest corporations, those that embrace individuality will attract and hire the best available talent, since everyone wants to be accepted and appreciated.

This can’t be done without a concerted effort, taking time every day to communicate the company’s policy, to encourage team building events, to celebrate the diversity that exists within your organization.  If your attempts are seen as superficial, it will do more damage than good.  Make sure you have a sincere and consistent message, and that your employees know your company is there for them.

Greater use of Virtual, AI and Automation – technology is always evolving, and another product of the pandemic is how quickly employers and employees had to adjust and adapt to new technology.   Software like Zoom and Microsoft Teams is now an everyday event, and the best companies continue to evolve and add virtual platforms that improve communication, efficiency, productivity and workflows.

When it comes to hiring, virtual events have proven to be much more efficient and, in many ways, more effective than in-person events.  The new trend is moving towards hybrid events, that offer in-person and virtual access.  Clearly the employers that embrace and invest in the best technology and automation will have the best chance for success.  A virtual hiring event platform like Premier Virtual completely automates the follow-up process to be able to track hires from your events.  It’s innovation like this that separates the best from the rest and position your company to attract the best talent.

Holistic Digital Transformation – taking the last point one step further, building profiles of the ideal customer, worker, workflow and expected results will create a very clear picture of what they company stands for, and how they will deliver that to their customers.  A holistic approach will never lead to a fixed rigid business model, but rather one that can adapt to change, and creates value through different kinds of partnerships.

By approaching your business in this way, your employees have a greater sense of what is expected of them, and that makes it easier to define the kind of employees you need to keep that going.  When a company can support this transformation with digital tools, data and supporting infrastructure, the vision and mission will be pervasive, and the culture will attract and retain the best talent.

Transforming HR through Tech and Data – as we’ve touched on through AI and Virtual, HR needs to come out of the stone age and embrace today’s technology.  There are many excellent platforms that help in every phase of hiring, and many employers continue to resist and prefer to do things’ the old way’ or sticking with the status-quo.

When it comes to tech, companies are turning to cloud computing, virtual platforms, collaboration technologies, and digitization to improve HR operations and the employee experience, according to the Society for Human Resource Management.  Don’t wait until the right time because it will cost you another competent new hire. The time to upgrade your technology is now, at all costs!

The challenges in hiring will remain extremely high in 2023 due mostly to the labor shortage, but if you can work on getting ahead of these 8 trends, you will create a competitive advantage that can be the difference between meeting your staffing challenges, or not.

Tech Tuesday: Top-10 Recruiting Trends in 2022!

While some recruiters have faced hiring freezes and work has slowed significantly, many are busier than ever as the economy rebounds, and unemployment hits a new record low.  We have not seen unemployment records this low since 1969.  While the data might not be 100% accurate, it reports a jobless rate of 4.2% in November 2021.  At the same time, there are 11 million job openings and Americans quitting their jobs at near-record rates, so what gives in 2022?  Here are the top 10 recruitment trends you should consider as you put together your 2022 hiring strategy plan.

  1. It’s a Labor Driven Market – The bottom line is that candidates now hold all of the power. There are more available jobs than candidates, and that crunch becomes even more significant when you drill down further to high-skill jobs.  Candidates are no longer jumping to that first open position or offer, but they are willing to jump much faster if they get a better offer or more flexibility with remote work.
  2. Improve the Quality of the Candidate Pool – Over 52% of recruiters polled said that improving the quality of hires is their most important goal in 2022. Achieving this goal is a slight shift from simply increasing the number of applicants in the talent pipeline to increasing the quality of that talent.  Typically, the better the talent, the better the fit, which leads to higher retention rates.  The goal is a better hire, with a higher likelihood of staying and producing at the new job over the long term.
  3. Balancing Talent Acquisition Technology with Traditional Methods– Amidst changes in the HR space and the disruptions brought about by the COVID-19 Pandemic, technology has given birth to a new breed of recruiters. These technology-empowered headhunters are pro-active, savvy, and highly strategic in hunting down the right talent for the job.

Nowadays, recruiters use social media posts, web-based job boards, and online job portals to tout their company’s culture. However, some traditional recruiting methods continue to be effective today, such as referrals and job fairs. Yes, we’re now in an age where AI, augmented reality, and ATS machine learning rule. But finding the right balance between digital and traditional channels is key to accomplishing recruitment priorities such as improving quality of hire (52%) and time-to-hire (23%)  (HRD America, 2020, 2021).  Virtual hiring event platforms like www.PremierVirtual.com have dramatically improved candidate and recruiter experiences at virtual hiring events, resulting in better results in both of these metrics.

  1. Increased Outreach Through Social Media and Employee Referral Programs – Many companies have recognized that the opportunity to find the right candidate outside of the company is becoming more complex. Hiring for soft skills and training for hard skills means you can grow more people within your organization.  This strategy is being promoted in company social media networks and reinforced in their internal referral programs, making growth within the company take priority.
  2. Compete on Non-Traditional Benefits. There are too many jobs and not enough qualified candidates.  The competition for small business owners with giants like Facebook and Amazon only makes it more difficult.  Amazon alone was hiring a record-shattering 2,800 employees per day at the start of 2020, and that has only continued in 2021.  These large corporations immediately take top candidates, leaving smaller companies to pick from an even smaller pool.  You can’t compete on name and prestige, so you have to compete on flexibility and the ability to engage with employees on a more personal, one on one level.  Being smaller might mean employees have more responsibility and decision-making.  Make it clear from day 1, that performance is valued and there is a clear path to grow.  Foster opportunities for employees to provide ideas and give feedback.  Offer remote work and hire remotely whenever possible.  Today’s job seeker is looking for more than money.  They want to have a purpose at their job and understand their worth.  Smaller companies that focus on this will be able to provide that culture that will attract more candidates.
  3. Remote Recruiting will Continue to Grow – We see virtual hiring events platforms, like award-winning Premier Virtual, continue to be a vital asset in every company. This technology is not just for the large it becomes a way for smaller companies to compete for top-rated talent.  The trend to remote hiring, video interview, and virtual job fairs continues to grow.  61% of recruiters believe it will be the default interview and pre-screening mode moving forward.

While some platforms position themselves as ‘Virtual Hiring Event’ platforms, very few deliver on the key features recruiters are looking for.  Premier Virtual continues to stand out by providing hi-tech that is easy to use.  They continue to win awards at G2 and Capterra for their ease of use.  The platform accomplishes this in many ways, including its setup wizard, one-on-one chat and video interview technology, and easy-to-download post-event reports.  We also see companies using the Premier Virtual platform to host ‘Virtual Career Days’ and ‘Open Houses’ to meet and greet potential new hires without the pressure of scheduling interviews or hiring on the spot. It’s a great way to get your company in front of employed candidates who keep their options open and want to see what you have to offer without committing to an interview upfront.

  1. Attract, Hire and Retain! – Write these 3 pillars down (yes again!) and make a checklist under each one.  There should be a strategy in place so that each pillar of recruiting is sufficiently supported.  As we already mentioned, the workforce has always wanted a quality of life balance. Still, it has never been a better time than now to deliver! Your competitive advantage to attract more candidates can easily be to offer remote work where your competitor does not and offer health benefits that include mental health.  Times are complex, and the Pandemic has raised stress levels to new heights.  These two benefits in combination can be the difference between hiring or not.  Yes, wages and health benefits are always an essential part of hiring, but remote work and mental health continue to be the top reasons candidates state their decision to accept an offer or not.  The 48 hours after a hire is made are probably the most crucial.  Don’t let your new hire sit for hours in an empty cubicle.  Have a full-blown onboarding plan, throw a new hire party, give them the royal treatment and let everyone know about it after all isn’t this what you worked so hard for and invested so much in?
  2. AI is your Friend! There is no stopping tech, and the more you can embrace it and leverage it, the better you will be.  Ultimately nothing replaces a hiring manager’s understanding of the job at hand and their ability to spot talent beyond the resume but getting that right candidate in front of you is increasingly becoming the role of your tech tools.

AI is best for job candidate matching, candidate screening, and recommendation for job descriptions.  Now Smart ATS is increasingly being used to get suitable candidates in front of the recruiters.  The caveat is that these systems can also kick out plenty of qualified candidates, which is why hosting virtual job fairs is so essential.  Adding virtual to the AI means your company will continue to offer access to candidates that might not have reached your desk if you only used an ATS system.

  1. The Rise of Recruitment Marketing. With top graduates quickly getting gobbled up by the largest corporations, keeping your brand’ top of mind’ with passive job seekers is critical.  These employed job seekers casually look around, waiting for the right opportunity to come their way.  Using platforms like Premier Virtual to host and ‘Open House’ or ‘Career Day’ is a great way to offer this audience an opportunity to get to know you on a casual basis.  Customize your lobby with a booth for your Sales Department, Marketing Department, IT Department, etc., and give visitors an opportunity to get to know the culture and who they might be working with.  Provide them an opportunity to sign up for a ‘Company Culture’ newsletter that keeps you in touch with them, highlighting all of the great things your company offers and is accomplishing throughout the year.  You can build your relationship with this potential candidate until they decide it’s time to take the next step, and you’ll be their first option.  Make sure to share these experiences on social media, newsletters, and your website.  Share your culture as much as you can, and you will build genuine interest in your workplace.
  2. Retention, Retention, Retention. In the past, if an employee left, there might be another 100 ready to apply, but that is no longer the case.  While you should always do everything in your power to retain and cultivate the talent you have, you can no longer get away by ‘winging’ it.  If you don’t have fundamental procedures to engage and empower your people, it will likely result in higher turnover, and those losses take much longer to fill.  Your best bet is a phenomenal employee retention program, invest in your people, and the benefits will include lower turnover, higher referrals, and increased productivity – but you already knew that!!!

If you have other trends to share or are interested in integrating a virtual hiring event platform into your recruiting strategy, please contact us for a free demo.

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