Changing the Concept of Recruitment Techniques

by Joe Bloggs on Wednesday, 16 Feburay 2011 at 10:02

The primary online processes used to recruit and screen a candidate has not really changed for the last decade.

Most, if not all recruitment consultancies and agencies will post their vacancies via the many job boards for candidates to submit their CV's. 

Another option to recruitment businesses is to search through the ever mounting pile of harvested curriculum vitas which candidates have submitted in the past. 

I have often wondered how else we could screen candidates without the CVs?

Modis international, a recruitment business boasts a database of 290,000 screened Europe-wide candidates and can delivery branded or anonymous mail shots to internal and external databases. 

Currently in the United Kingdom the recruitment market there is an abundance of applicants for each role. Currently recruitment businesses receive between 100-500 applicants for each role advertised.

Over time databases will become out of date and nobody knows if the individuals contained within are seeking new employment. More importantly somebody has to search for the CV’s and match them to the job specification. 

So somebody has to read through all the CVs within the database? Which is never going to happen and because of this the “keyword search” process was created or in some cases the more sophisticated approach of using SQL database queries.

Keywords Searches do not interpret the context of the true meaning of the word and in practice are unpredictable and arbitrary. Keyword searches does not, and cannot, find or match work skills/experience.

The minority will manual review and skill code each candidate within their database and skill codes can be reviewed every time the candidate provides an updated CV or informs of a change in their role. This is time consuming, but maybe a good investment of time, as you do not rely on "Keyword" searches or other algorithmic searches of CVs.  Searches become based on qualitative data rather than quantitative data.

We know the recruitment sector is very competitive and timescales are a big driver on locating the best applicant with the CV that matches the client’s specifications in the shortest possible time. Currently Recruitment consultants receive between 100-500 applicants for each role advertised and have access to hundreds of thousands of CVs within their databases.

It is conceivable that they would more likely review or search 100 to 500 applicants as we have established they are looking for new employment as they have responded to the job advertising, and more increasingly less likely to search the antiquated database. 

“Likely to scan or glance the CVs”

Recruitment consultants are becoming more likely to scan or glance the CVs.  In my experience they do not read, study, examine, interpret, understand, consider, research, analyse or investigate. This could be because of time scales and they are becoming more prone to not possess any work experience in the sector they are recruiting. This is a great example of where experiences and knowledge of older employees could be of great advantage to the recruitment sector.

Personally I do not believe that reviewing CVs can be completed constructively or objectively to assess individuals. Also at interviews people's personality, demeanour and persona are contributing factors to the recruiter's decision.

“Overwhelmed with the quantity of responses”

Recruitment consultants are becoming overwhelmed with the quantity of responses to vacancies and the current methods used are not constructive towards screening processes. 

Contained within the candidate sourcing suite are other techniques such as develop relationships with niche groups to source hard to reach/executive candidates, employ vertical networks to improve exposure to a client and host networking events including roundtables, seminars and recruitment days.

Currently within the marketplace it could be perceived that recruitment consultancies and businesses are not interested in “transferable skills”.

Quote from a leading recruitment consultant "We only get paid if we place a candidate so, why I am going to try and convince my client that they should appoint a candidate with transferable skills when my competitor has three candidates with the matching skills requested by the client".

Also it could be said that recruitment consultancies are only interested in candidates with a similar sector experience to the vacancy.

For example, if you apply for a position outside the sector experience detailed within your CV then you may not be put forward for the position as apparently you do not possess the relative experience needed. "I have worked in the IT sector for mainly health and pharmaceutical companies over the last six years, therefore when I try and apply for other IT positions within other sectors like retail, banking, finance, automotive and the public sector I am told that I do not have the correct sector experience. It’s astonishing as working for pharmaceuticals meant I had access to most up-to-date, expensive IT infrastructure, applications and developed experience/skills other sectors could only dream to have because they lack the financial ability of the pharmaceuticals”

Therefore candidates can only apply for positions where they have direct skills and direct sector experience? 

Which means if you have worked for most of your career within the public sector or finance you’re unlikely to secure a position outside of your work experience, regardless of your skills.

This limits the number of opportunities you can apply for and therefore impact on the likelihood of unemployment for the masses of our society.

“Advertised for more than 36 hours as its highly unlikely that your CV will ever be seen”

It is common knowledge within the long term unemployed that it is pointless to apply for vacancies which has been advertised for more than 36 hours as it’s highly unlikely that your CV will ever be seen due to the other 450 CVs which have been submitted before yours.

Having spoken to a number of long term unemployed senior directors, managers and technical consultants the general consensus within the group is pretty damning “due to be way we have been treated and our experiences as candidates by recruitment companies we will not use them in the future and in some cases indefinitely, when we return to full employment”.

It is best practice that candidates should be matched to the job specification and not compared or judged against one another.

When recruiting in best practice we require the selected candidate to be the individual who is the best match to the job specification. Therefore in the early stages of selection we need to remove our prejudices from the process so we could start utilising psychometric, aptitude testing and customised sector assessments which will measure, evaluate the candidates’ experience/skills and compare it to the requirements in the job specification. 

Psychometric, aptitude tests and the Sector assessments are only going to be of benefit if they are set up correctly in the first instance and each role is there for accurately profiled to create the right balance. This is something that cannot be achieved without sector knowledge and experience.

Analysis above shows the limitations of using CVs to try and discover the person. The use of psychometric testing could add a new dimension to the recruitment process. We know psychometric tests have been around for a long time, but I believe there is a quantum leap that can be made by recruiters in finding the most cost efficient way to use psychometric testing in the selection and screening processes used. The CV shows only skills and experience but says nothing about the person behind the CV. 

It seems there may be great potential for explaining to recruiters the limitations of the CV approach. There is no doubt a CV and discussions are essential parts of the process, but the psychometric test tells us about the behaviours needed to fit into a team and make a success of the job. For those that have been unsuccessful you can provide constructive specific feedback which will highlight the areas and criteria which they did not meet, instead of a standard generic auto generated impersonal e-mail which contains no feedback. 

By using the job specification to create the psychometric, aptitude tests and the "Sector assessments"   we will be able to create screening charts which enables the results to mark which candidate meets the criteria. It allows a score by each key criterion. 

You will be able to quickly see which candidates best meets the job without needing to refer to the candidates CV. This will be a benchmark, where we can determine who will be accepted and continue within the interview process. 

“Business intelligence”

All candidate tests and assessment data could be kept for future use and within time this data will replace the current "keyword search" technique. Good business intelligence databases should be able to monitor and record the future career of the candidates by utilising synchronisation tools with social media for example LinkedIn. 

Techniques of behaviour modification should be used to bring the candidate back to you if they are seeking a new position or looking to hire/recruit for themselves. This can be done by creating an environment which holds their employment history, experience, test results, skills matrix, career achievements, awards, qualifications, business contacts, references and CV. With this data, business intelligent opportunities will be more sophisticated and the ability to find the candidate with the correct skills and experience should be easier.