Biggest challenges while hiring online

Biggest challenges while hiring online

The fear of contracting the virus even when vaccinated, having to take care of children at home as some schools remain closed or partially opened, the practicality that offers working from home and how it increases productivity and sense of belonging towards the companies and their culture; are aspects that determine why virtual hiring is here to stay and that will take on more strength in this new reality.

The pandemic, social distancing, and connectivity are some of the factors that are significantly changing the competitiveness in the market; making companies modify and adjust their workflow and increasing the demand of innovative and qualified talent capable to overcome these challenges.

Hiring online is a very complex process, despite the ongoing development in tools that facilitate it nowadays. Headhunting companies and human resources departments have had to become more creative and resourceful in order to find the perfect candidate for the right position, facing these "5 main challenges":

1. Very long and unstructured selection processes: If the online recruitment process takes a lot of time to be completed, the company is at risk of losing the perfect candidate for the position. In order to prevent this:

· Establish short selection processes, which allows to make the final decision within a maximum period of 10 days.

· Be clear about the ideal candidate's profile, requirements and benefits of the position, skills, salary range, estimated start date, evaluation criteria, the roles, and responsibilities of each of the members in the selection team.

2. On offer of candidates: The number of applicants for a vacancy is overwhelming; there are so many profiles that it is impossible to take them all into consideration to start the selection process. In this case, prioritize quality over quantity.

It is preferable to post your vacancy on specialized professional platforms, which lets you address the target audience easily, avoiding ads or phishing, and giving you the facility of screening the candidates' curriculums based on skills, experience, knowledge, location, etc.

3. Unskilled profiles: The arrival of the pandemic and the massive cuts in personnel have made workers rethink their salary and professional projection expectations. This has led them to be overqualified or unqualified for the positions for which they are applying.

Be very specific when setting expectations regarding requirements and experience; this way, you will establish an initial filter that will allow candidates to reject the offer if they do not meet the expected requirements.

4. Lack of local talent: If the talent you require is not physically located in the city where the company is, consider opening remote positions that allow you attract the talent you require, leaving aside geographic limitations.

If there is one thing the pandemic has shown, it is that workers’ productivity increased by working from home.

5. Weak brand as an employer: One of the biggest challenges for companies is to position themselves as a solid brand to attract new and better talent. In addition to providing a good candidate experience, the company must promote a strong organizational culture.

This ensures not only a good number of applications to vacancies, but that the best professionals wanting to apply to work on them.

Conclusion:

Although the modality of remote work has been gradually increasing since 2010, the arrival of the pandemic exponentially accelerated the recruitment and incorporation of the remote workforce even more. It is necessary for companies to consider the challenges they face when carrying out remote hiring processes, in order to find not only the best and most qualified talents, but also those talents that are identified and projected into the future with the company. 
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