The IT recruitment process is long and expensive. It involves a systematic design of utilizing human resources to find suitable candidates, evaluate and select the right person, and closing with recruitment and appraisal.

A great way to streamline the IT recruitment process is by creating an organization-specific model that aims to help find skilled individuals for their projects.

The past few years have also made us familiar with the benefits of the gig workforce, also known as the contingent workforce. It is undoubtedly the future of work and there is no way around it. To keep up with the rapid digital transformations, it is imperative for organizations to incorporate on-demand talent into their business strategy.

Here is a detailed look at the main aspects of an effective recruitment strategy.

Critical Steps Involved In IT Recruitment Process

Many things can impact the recruitment process, like the nation’s economy at the time of hiring, the size of the organization, recruitment trends, the attrition and retention rate of employees, and the work culture inherent within a company. However, job vacancies can be filled with the help of a few specific steps.

Identify Your Detailed Hiring Requirements

The first step is to identify resource requirements in every department. For example, there may have been sudden resignations that have caused a gap in one or more departments.

Consider communicating with team managers to understand if upskilling existing employees could help fill the existing gap. Understand why there have been attritions in the company or department. There may also have been onboarding of new projects that require skilled candidates.

Collate the job specifications and the skills or qualifications needed to fill the gap. Then, create an appealing job description that will attract the right talent to the company.

Ensure you highlight the skills and requirements to ensure the right candidates respond to the job opportunity. Things to include in the JD include the company’s vision, its goals, the job requirements, a few words about the company’s work culture, the qualifications and experience needed,

Promote The Vacancy

You need to advertise the vacancy if you want more people to apply for the job. One way is to send an internal message highlighting the vacancy and the job requirements. This allows existing employees to apply for the position or lets them refer their qualified friends and acquaintances for the position.

Simultaneously the HR department can advertise for the vacancy on job boards, job search portals, and even on social media. However, advertising on external platforms would require a dedicated HR resource to monitor all the platforms to ensure that the announcement for job vacancies reaches the target audience and that they are getting a good response.

Screen CVs and Resumes

Once you have received a good number of resumes from various sources, you must start evaluating and screening them. This will help you shortlist the most talented and experienced candidates.

Look at resumes with the right educational qualifications and skill set for the job. Make sure that in the case of senior positions, the resume holds the relevant experience required for the vacant position. In case of a massive number of resumes, you can opt for the use of Applicant tracking systems to filter the most qualified candidates. Once you have a good number of resumes, you should contact the applicants. This can be done by sending personalized emails informing the candidates that they have been shortlisted for the job vacancy. You can also ask them for their preferred date and time for the first interview. Allowing the flexibility of choosing their time for the meeting establishes a positive vibe between the organization and the candidate.

Ensure that you keep rejected profiles. Keep the communication channels open. For example, send emails saying that at the current time, their profile did not fit the requirement, but they would be contacted in case a vacancy fitting the skills opens up.

Conduct Interviews in Preferred Modes

The interview process starts with a phone or video interview. HR employees or hiring managers usually conduct the first round of virtual interviews. This allows you to is the chance to understand the candidate’s candidate’s personality and know their communication style. This first round is essential to comprehend the candidate’s perspective regarding their qualifications and previous experience in the field. In addition, the first interview is a great way to showcase the professionalism the organization commands.

Assess Technical Skills

Once a candidate has cleared the first interview, in the case of IT recruitment, candidates are usually given tests to assess their technical skills. This step is essential to ensure that the candidates possess the skills mentioned in their resumes and know their proficiency level in a particular system. In addition, at this stage, you can also conduct various psychometric tests to determine if the candidate has the critical thinking abilities and logical reasoning to problem solve in case of emergencies.

Conduct On-site Interview (For On-site Job)

An onsite interview is the last step in the interview process. The last face-to-face interviews are usually conducted between selected candidates and the top management. Depending on the organization, the interview could be with only one manager, or a panel of top-level employees could conduct it.

Face-to-Face interviews are open to only a tiny pool of qualified candidates. However, they are one of the crucial steps in the IT recruitment process. If the candidates are not available for physical interviews, there are multiple video conferencing software in the market that allow for virtual conversations. In-person interviews tend to be longer than phone or skill assessments, as this is the last evaluation of a candidate. This last round allows the top management to ask specific questions and probe further into a candidate’s candidate’s specific skill sets. At the same time, it also allows a candidate to ask a question regarding company values, job-related queries or any other question they may have.

Send Out Offers

An offer letter is sent once a candidate has cleared all rounds of the recruitment interviews. The offer letter should contain, at minimum, the following:

● The salary and benefits associated with the job.
● The perquisites and other benefits the candidate would receive.
● The leave policies.
● The start date.
● The terms of employment with the organization.

If the candidate has any objection to anything mentioned in the offer letter, they are welcome to negotiate. There is no requirement that a candidate should accept the offer letter as is. However, you need to make sure the limits are clear on how much the organisation is willing to compromise on negotiations.

Employee Induction

The IT recruitment process does not end with sending the selected candidate an offer letter. Onboarding an employee and helping him settle into the position is the last leg of the recruitment process. How well you welcome an employee and how he fits into his team impacts employee satisfaction levels and his future in the organization. There should be no delay in generating ID cards, login credentials, and procurement of devices to get the employee started on his job. Ensure that a senior member of the team is assigned as a “buddy” to guide the new employee into settling into the job correctly.

Bonus: Leverage on-demand workforce

The rapid growth of the on-demand economy means a new way of IT recruitment process where goods and services are ordered online and delivered promptly. With the proliferation of the digital business landscape companies are demanding highly skilled talent to help traverse the changing business environment. This is where the need for online talent platforms comes in, offering a skilled on-demand workforce with niche expertise that helps businesses thrive in today’s new, rapidly changing economy.

Let us have a look at the advantages of hiring a highly skilled on-demand workforce.

A quick solution to the talent problem: A rapidly evolving business environment also means changing requirements in terms of the kind of talent needed for the business to thrive. We are living in times where professions are born and die in a matter of years. By switching gears to on-demand talent organizations can navigate the challenges of finding the right talent at the right time without any commitments for the longer term. Gone are the days when companies had to realign their strategies to hire resources that would stick to their companies for years.

Flexible project management: With platforms providing on-demand talent, organizations can hire resources based on their projects, for specific durations of time, with specialized skill sets, and with any kind of structure. Such resources can work solo and even as part of an existing team.

Access to employees at all levels: People at senior management and CXO levels have also turned heads to the gig economy. These people may be hired as consultants for specific lengths of time to realign your strategies and provide the much-needed impetus to your organization.
Stay updated: Onboarding freelance talent can help companies outsource such tasks that cannot be handled in-house, or which require a specific skill set. This not only gives them a fresh perspective on doing things but also helps them stay up to date with the ever-evolving digital economy. Turning to an on-demand workforce and stepping into the gig economy can help companies stay relevant and agile.

Let us also have a look at the strategies to hire an on-demand workforce. To ensure that businesses remain relevant, organizations need to overcome their resistance to integrating an on-demand workforce into their strategic core. A few ways how this can be done are listed below:
Educate your existing employees: Freelancers are often perceived as a threat by the existing employees of the company. Educating employees about the benefits of on-demand talent platforms is key to bringing in-house staff to the realization that on-demand talent brings new energy to the work and helps make everyone’s job easier.

Realign policies and processes: From due diligence to intellectual property, from payment processes to technology risk, contracts and processes need to be updated and adapted to the modern landscape. Organizations need to realign their policies and strategies to imbibe this new workforce model into the company.

Reassess in-house talent: Before hiring on-demand talent, organizations must reassess their in-house talent to find out what skills they already have and what tasks need to be outsourced. Once the internal abilities are mapped, organizations can strike a balance between handling tasks in-house and outsourcing.

Unquestionably, hiring on-demand talent presents undeniable advantages that are impossible to dismiss. It not only allows easier hiring for hard-to-fill jobs, but also offers access to wide special skills, reduces headcount, and provides high levels of flexibility.

Outsourcing The IT Recruitment Process

Over the years there has been a slow change among job-seekers to look for short- or long-term services contractually. Contractual work allows workers more freedom and control over choosing different projects and time for learning new skills.

Many organizations are also gradually opening up to hiring employees on a project basis, as the cost and regulations involved are comparatively less. However, the IT recruitment process remains the same. You want to hire qualified candidates who will ensure that your project succeeds.

Most big organizations prefer to handle the entire recruitment process independently since they have a robust human resources department. If you do not have a well-staffed HR department, you may get lost in the recruitment process and miss a few steps.

In such cases, it would be preferable to outsource the recruiting efforts towards a hiring manager who looks after the entire end-to-end process of hiring. Organizations may also prefer to partner with HR consultancy firms that may be able to hire the right people for the job. After all, following a streamlined process for IT recruitment is preferable to running helter-skelter searching for skilled candidates.

Conclusion

TalentOnLease is an online platform that brings together organizations with urgent requirements for skilled personnel and qualified job seekers looking for work.

The team at TalentOnLease has a thorough vetting process to choose only the best IT leaders for their platform. If you have any questions about our processes, contact us, and we will be in touch as soon as possible.