What year is it?
For many of us this image is probably a little too familiar.
Beard Check.
Overuse of comfy clothes, with questionable holes. Well yes if we're honest.
Does the shower even still work who knows.
But as we start to face the ever-growing prospect that we might just have to start going back to the real world, and see people face to face without the ability to simply mute them (cue the penguins of Madagascar), when we feel the need. It's probably a good time to look at how recruitment has or will change as we all start go to re-adjust to the new normal that will inevitably be.
Virtual Recruiting creates a new hybrid model
That's right according to LinkedIn, 81% of talent professionals believe that virtual recruiting is here to stay. I know, zoom interviews will never beat the personal touch a face-to-face meeting can bring when building those special recruiter client/candidate relationships, but COVID has shown us that there can be a strong use case for virtual meetings, including but not limited to, the fact they are a far more cost-effective method of conducting multiple interviews in a day, as opposed to driving around between meetings and paying for all those coffees.
Additionally, they allow us recruiters to be a little more productive, meaning we can fill our day with way more zoom calls than physical meetings, allowing us to effectively motor through way more of the first stage interviews for most of our entry level roles, freeing up time to go and personally meet our more experienced clients/candidates for a round of golf yeah like that ever actually happens.
However, we feel that it is not so much that virtual recruiting is the only way of doing things, let's be clear, it's only good when used as tools to make life easier, physical meetings and office environments will remain the best approach to ensuring that all important relationship building is at the epicentre of all that we do.
Employer Branding is going to be key
Previously we could have gotten away with just selling the dream to our candidates and telling them how great and forward thinking the brand is, and although the last 5-10 years we have seen a huge increase in the need for a great website to back up what we say to candidates, it's now even more important to add brand to that. More and more of the newer generations are ethically conscious, they are looking for more than just a role, they want a career with a brand they believe in.
What this means for us recruiters is that we need to be making sure our clients in their recruitment strategy post-COVID, are really making their brand pop and scream all about their values, culture and ethics.
This doesn't stop with our clients, as recruiters and agencies, we also need to be making that extra effort and building both the company brand and also our personal ones as recruiters, as fundamentally we are in a relationship business, and if you can't relate to your target audience, well it's game over.
There are in reality many ways in which the future of our industry will change, but in many ways it won't. No matter what new technology is invented, or physical social restrictions put in place, we are fundamentally at our core a people focused industry, our job is quite simply to build bridges and connect people, so as long as you remember this, no matter what the future holds, you'll always win.
