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It's never too late to improve your recruiting process. Follow these 8 tips and best practices to improve your recruitment and hiring decisions. 

The methods and means used for recruitment differ from one company to another. However, most HR professionals agree that mistakes in the recruitment and hiring process can have serious negative effects on the organization. Recruitment issues should therefore not be underestimated in terms of work climate, motivation, productivity and financial impact. To help you limit the risks and find the right candidate, let's define bad recruiting practices and explore our top tips for successful recruitment.

What is bad recruiting?

For various reasons, recruiters sometimes make recruitment errors: incomplete job description, imprecise missions in the job offer, etc. Sometimes it's the candidate's profile that does not correspond to expectations: lack of skills, or conversely, too qualified. Another scenario is recruiting an employee without having formally assessed their soft skills: here, the recruiter relies on their intuition and somehow skips the different stages.

What are the consequences for the company?

The consequences of bad recruiting are sometimes not felt until a couple months after a hire has been made. An employee who does not share the values ​​of the company can become a disruptive element in a team and be a source of demotivation over time. Moreover, their lack of involvement can negatively impact the productivity of the team and organizaiton.

The direct consequences of poor recruitment are also an increase in turnover, or even an increase in work stoppages. In the long term, the cost for the company is significant: cost of another recruitment process for the same role, cost of possible replacement and training of the new employee, drop in productivity, consequences on the rest of the team if certain tasks are to be distributed, etc.

8 Tips for an Effective Recruitment Process

It's never too late to improve your talent acquisition and recruitment processes. Here are a few tips:

1. Create an Accurate Job Description

One of the reasons for poor recruitment is the lack of clarity about the responsibilties and the skills required for a position. As you write the job description for an open role, be sure it includes the precise responsibilities, the environment and the working relations within the team and organization, the candidate profile sought (level of training, experience, background, skills, etc.), and the relevant success metrics for the role. An accurate job description defines the ideal candidate profile for both hiring managers and recruiters, simplifying sourcing and improving communication between the entire hiring team.

2. Write a Transparent Job Post

Now that you've written an accurate job description, it's time to post and promote the open position. In addition to the responsibilities, skills, and experience required, it's best practice to also include work location (in-person, hybrid, fully remote), type of employment contract (part-time, full-time, contractor), and the expected salary range for the position. To further improve the candidates experience, you can also include detailed information about the stages of the recruitment and hiring process at your organization. Once you have all that information, promote the job internally on your company's intranet, as well as externally on popular job boards such as LinkedIn, Indeed, and Glassdoor.

3. Don't Overlook the Importance of Your Employer Brand

Now more than ever, emplyees want to work at organization that share similar values as them. To help attrach the right profile of candidates, companies should promote their values and culture across the various channels that make up the candidate lifecycle, including the careers website and social media. Portraying corporate/social values, business projects, team outings, employee testimonials showcases the attractiveness of your employer brand and contributes to a positive candidate experience.

4. Prepare for Job Interviews

Besides the interviewer not showing up, nothing is more frustrating for a candidate than facing redundant questions from different interviewers. Interview preparation ensures a shared understanding of the ideal candidate profile. A well-prepared interview team builds trust and encourages candidates to share their experiences and motivations. To implement this best practice, develop interview guides that specify the attributes or skills each interviewer should assess, include useful questions, and incorporate a standardized scoring rubric.

5. Assess All Skills

Before making a hiring decision, it's essential to assess all their skills. This includes soft skills, hard skills, as well as attributes like personality and learning style preferences that impact individual and team culture and productivity. To do this, use tools like psychometric assessments to measure cognitive, behavioral, and interpersonal skills. You can use separate assessments to measure each area.

6. Make Objective Hiring Decisions

Your recruitment process and the tools you employ throughout the candidate journey should improve decision-making for hiring managers by gathering objective data. By using precise job descriptions, pre-employment and psychometric tests, well-informed interviews, and standardized candidate scoring criteria, you can identify the candidate who aligns best with the role and the organization. Additionally, this approach helps reduce biases that may emerge when making judgments based on intuition or interview interactions.

7. Reply to All Applicants

HR should promptly inform all candidates of their application status. Failing to respond, even to candidates who were not selected for interviews, can damage the company's image and employer reputation. Encourage interested applicants to consider future roles within the company and wish them luck in their job search. For candidates who were interviewed but not selected, consider providing constructive feedback that could benefit them in their future interviews.

8. Refine Your Onboarding Process

The initial days and weeks within the organization can significantly impact the employee's overall experience. Effective onboarding should encompass various activities and topics to ensure a seamless transition into the new role. These elements include orientation, introduction to the company history and culture, access to essential resources, familiarity with policies and procedures, clear role definition, mentorship and buddy systems, open feedback and communication, performance expectations, and focused training. A well-structured onboarding process not only helps new hires feel appreciated and engaged but also equips them for success in their roles, benefiting both the individual and the organization. It lays the groundwork for a positive and productive working relationship.

Optimize Your Recruitment Process with Pearson TalentLens

Learn how Pearson TalentLens pre-employment and psychometric assessments can help empower your recruiting and hiring teams with the right talent insights.   

Like the World Wide Web at one time, AI (Artificial Intelligence) is developing more and more in the business world. All areas of business are impacted, and its powerful technology is revolutionizing the world of work. For some of us, AI is seen as a threat, while others, on the contrary, view it as a great opportunity to transform our work "for the better". 

One thing is certain: AI is changing us. To take full advantage of AI in your business sector, there's one golden rule: anticipate the skills you'll need to evolve your job and use your role as a human being as added value. 86% of respondents to a BCG X study believe they will need training to upgrade their skills [1]. What impact does AI have on professional skills? How can we best prepare for the growing integration of AI into the world of work? Here's how.t

The potential impact of AI on professional skills 

1. Automation of routine tasks: AI automates many routines, low value-added tasks, often characterized by repetitive, predictable and structured actions, freeing up workers' time to concentrate on more complex, creative and strategic tasks, where their human skills are required. 
2. Strengthening analytical and cognitive skills: Professionals need to develop analytical skills to take advantage of AI's capabilities, interpreting the many results it generates. In an increasingly data-driven business environment, AI helps professionals develop critical thinking and problem-solving skills to make better decisions. Listening, humility, curiosity, open-mindedness and the ability to take a step back are personal qualities in high demand in this sense. 
3. Increasing demand for social and emotional skills: The ability to collaborate with, understand and interact effectively with intelligent systems specific to AI requires professionals to have social skills such as communication, collaboration and understanding of mutual needs for better teamwork and conflict resolution. In addition, workers need to adapt quickly to new technologies and accept change. Emotional skills such as resilience, flexibility and stress management are expected for this.

Key skills to develop for the new world of work 

1. Analytical and problem-solving skills: It has become essential to be able to analyze data, identify trends and find innovative solutions to problems. 
2. Creative and critical thinking skills: Developing original thinking skills to encourage innovation and critical thinking skills to step back and manage complex and novel situations is a priority. 
3. Communication and collaboration skills: Perfecting written and oral communication skills, as well as the ability to work effectively in a team and manage constructive interpersonal relationships, is key. This can only benefit collective intelligence and better performance at work. 
4. Adaptability and lifelong learning skills: It's important to be well prepared to adapt to technological changes and evolutions in the job market by adopting a lifelong learning approach. 

Strategies to prepare for AI in the workplace

1. Keep abreast of technological trends: It's vital to keep abreast of advances in AI and the fields likely to be impacted by this technology. 
2. Develop transferable skills: Investing in general and transversal skills that can be updated and applied to different professional contexts can only be beneficial. 
3. Take training courses and obtain new certifications: It's a good idea to strengthen your skills by taking specific training courses, obtain certifications and benefit from practical experience in the field of AI. 
4. Network and learn from experienced professionals: Exchanging with experts in the field of AI to gather valuable advice and information is also recommended. 

The world of work is undergoing a paradigm shift with the increasing arrival of AI in many industries. To take advantage of this, it's important to understand its scope and prepare optimally for its integration within the company. The human skills required for a job are not necessarily the same as before. Everyone can make the most of this changing environment by developing new key skills, useful for adapting to the evolution of their profession. The rapid progress of AI also requires a culture of continuous adaptation. In this sense, it's important for human resources (HR) managers to support employees in developing their skills throughout their professional careers and encourage continuous learning. In this way, employees will feel better supported in this ongoing transformation and the impact it has on their jobs.

[1] Study by BCG X, BCG's tech entity, on the impact of AI on jobs among employees in 18 countries across all industries and statuses https://www.bcg.com/publications/2023/what-people-are-saying-about-ai-at-work

Employability is a central issue in the workforce market. With soft skills a central component of this concept, the question of how to reliably measure these skills arises. Psychometric tools provide an appropriate method of reporting a skills profile, Guillaume Demery, Doctor of Psychology and Designer and Developer of Psychometric Tools at Pearson TalentLens, sheds some light on the subject.

Employability: an HR issue placing the individual at the heart of the labour market

A concept studied for several decades; employability has been the subject of several definitions. Thus, for Hillage and Pollard (1998): “In simple terms, employability consists of being able to obtain and keep a job. More generally, employability is the ability to move independently in the labour market to realise one's potential through sustainable employment”. This very general definition makes it possible to understand the importance of the concept as a possibility of adapting to a constantly changing labour market.

However, it is interesting to know and understand the existing levers that allow access to this employability. A definition from Hinchcliffe (2001) states: “Employability is defined as having a set of skills, knowledge, and personal attributes that make a person more likely to be secure and successful in their chosen occupation”. Thanks to this definition, we understand that the individual is at the heart of employability, whether through his knowledge, the skills he has acquired and certain attributes that are specific to him, such as motivation or interests (Fenouillet, 2016).

Soft skills: essential skills to remain employable

It is possible to model the factors influencing employability. Thus, Pool and Sewell (2007) consider that experience, levels of knowledge, soft skills, emotional intelligence as well as development and training throughout the career are key factors, working together to improve employability.

As a result, it is an important issue both for new graduates entering the job market and for professionals in transition and looking either for retraining or career development within their company. (Harvey, 2001; Guilbert et al., 2016). While experience and training within a company are factors that favour professionals over young graduates, soft skills are essential and useful skills upon graduation (Andrew & Higson, 2008).

The essential soft skills to boost your employability

Behavioural skills can be generalised to most trades offered on the labour market and are essential for good employability. Beyond hard skills, namely business skills, we understand that employability is essentially based on the ability of individuals to be able to integrate and adapt to a rapidly changing labour market.

A non-exhaustive list of expected soft skills:

• Professionalism
• Reliability
• Ability to cope with uncertainty
• Ability to work under pressure
• Ability to plan and think strategically
• Ability to communicate and interact with others, either in a team or through networking
• Skills in written and oral communication
• Skills in information and communication technologies
• Creativity and self-confidence
• Good self-management and time management skills
• A willingness to learn and take responsibility (Elias & Purcell, 2004).

Motivation: another factor to consider

Motivation referred to as “the reasons underlying behavior” (Guay et al., 2010, p. 712), and the “the attribute that moves us to do or not to do something” (Gredler, Broussard and Garrison., 2004, p. 106) is a non-negligible factor of employability, allowing, beyond the capacities of the individual, to understand the probability that he adheres and puts in place the appropriate behaviours to remain effective in his profession. It is therefore advisable to know the motivations and interests (Schiefele, 1991).

How to measure soft skills in order to support employability for individuals and companies?

Knowing the importance of employability in the labour market, it is necessary that reliable measures are put in place to help individuals, whether they are new graduates seeking to enter the labour market, professionals looking for retraining or development within their organisations, or companies looking for the best employability profiles in order to have long-term prospects with new recruits.

The advantage of psychometric tests

The evaluation of soft skills requires statistically valid and reliable tools, capable of measuring concepts that are sometimes difficult to observe (for example, the individual's ability to work under pressure). Psychometrics, which is concerned with the theoretical and practical aspects of psychological measurement (Chadha, 2009), is at this stage the most advanced discipline in the creation of such measures.

Several types of tools exist to measure these skills. For example, assessment tests are specifically constructed to measure work styles, those aspects of personality most important to success. Work styles can be thought of as an individual's typical patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaviour that can positively influence success in the world of work, and therefore employability, according to database studies. These working styles are organised around four major themes:

• The relationship to people, such as cooperation or leadership
• Managing emotions, such as stress tolerance or self-control
• Approach to work, such as initiative or reliability
• Thinking style, such as innovative or analytical thinking.

Aptitude tests for a good measure of adaptability

Aptitude tests also make it possible to understand the adaptability of the individual in the world of work, to measure essential skills such as the ability to solve problems, verbal comprehension, the ability to correctly interpret data in order to place entrepreneurial strategies, or the ability to evaluate arguments and issue unbiased conclusions.

These psychometric tests based either on the classical test theory or, thanks to the digital evolution of these solutions, on the item response theory based on a probabilistic reasoning of the calculation of the level of aptitude (Edelen & Reeve, 2007), make it possible to have statistically valid and reliable measurements of these soft skills, or even of the motivations and interests of the individual.

Thanks to these methods, it is possible to establish an employability profile of the individual, so that they understand their levers on the labour market while recognising the skills that they can improve, guaranteeing the establishment of a training circuit adapted to the needs of the user.