In the talent acquisition field, recruitment trends for HR professionals, agencies, and companies are always changing. As the recruitment industry is constantly in a state of flux, recruitment trends provide viable opportunities for growth and greater efficiency when it comes to discovering talents and filling them in open positions.
However, if you’re stuck with outdated tools and traditional approaches, trends might make little difference to you. In fact, it is highly likely that the latest recruitment trends for HR professionals might be seen as challenges instead of opportunities to work faster with less effort.
Let’s take a look at some of the significant recruitment trends in 2023 that have brought changes to the talent acquisition game. Also, let’s understand the new challenges in the recruitment process and what you can do to overcome the obstacles with the help of the Applicant Tracking System.
Trends in Recruitment for 2023
Employees’ Well-Being Is Key
After the worldwide battle with COVID-19, the well-being of employees is no longer a ‘nice-to-have’ benefit that comes with the job. It is a clear expectation from employers, especially in the post-pandemic world. Employee well-being has risen to become one of the top recruitment trends and the number one factor when it comes to candidates wanting to join an organization, especially for Millenials and young talents like Gen Zs.
Employees’ well-being does not only cover the physical and mental health of workers, as it now extends towards the emotional, financial, social, as well as the career wellness of employees.’
In the post-pandemic world such as today, many companies across several industries have adapted to this recruitment trend and leveraged it to attract high-quality talents by extending well-being benefits not only to their employees but also to their families.
For example, Hewlett Packard or HP initiated its ‘Spirit Program,’ in which the company provides employees with benefits and resources for the well-being of working parents struggling to manage homeschooling for their children during and after the pandemic phase.
Hybrid and Remote Work is What Candidates Want
As the workforce returns to physical spaces, expectations of the way we work have also changed. With the pandemic putting on display the effects of prolonged remote work, more candidates are now looking for a good mix to their work arrangements.
Enter hybrid work, which has become increasingly popular as the new way of working. And it is here to stay. An article from Havard Business Review discusses that workers see the ability to work from anywhere as one of the important benefits of their jobs. Moreover, a survey from Accenture reveals that 83% of workers prefer to operate with a hybrid work model, while 63% of high-growth organizations have already adopted this work method.
At the same time, countries are considering remote work as part of their policy. A clear example is the Netherlands which plans to have remote work as a legal right.
In other parts of the world, a large number of companies across multiple industries, especially IT, are now creating policies that let their employees work and collaborate from wherever they are. One of these companies is a tech unicorn, GitLab. The software company is providing its workforce with remote work training aiming to ensure that the remote employees are operating with the proper collaboration tools.
Skills-Based Hiring
Adapting to the evolved recruitment market, Recruiters and HR professionals have shifted their trajectory towards skills-based hiring. Essentially, it is a hiring practice that focuses on candidates’ skills and performance over formal qualifications such as their educational degrees and diplomas.
This approach helps recruiters locate candidates who possess the right fit skills and can perform well at the jobs as well as discover candidates who can be nurtured via upskilling. Striding along with the trend, many leading business entities from several industries like Google and Hilton are offering well-paying positions to individuals who possess in-demand skills without considering their degrees or credentials.
Riding along the same train, the rising popularity of AI has created a wave of requirements for new in-demand skill sets. According to Harvard Business Review’s 21 HR Jobs of the Future research, the recruitment industry will take HR professionals to a new range of jobs from today to 2030. A large number of titles among these jobs will heavily focus on the collaboration between human workers and machines, like Algorithm Bias Officer and Human Machine Teaming Manager.
Take note that the ability to present competency in these new in-demand skills has become the ticket for talent mobility. Traditional academic degrees and credentials, on the other hand, have become less important than they used to be when it comes to searching for qualified candidates.
The Challenges
Poor Well-Being Is Increasing the Turnover Rate
Raising salaries is one of the recruitment strategies that help companies attract candidates while retaining existing employees. However, a great number of candidates and workers are looking at well-being benefits as one of the key factors in deciding whether to apply for a job or not.
Over 67% of the workforce address that mental health services offered by employers are beneficial, especially to Millenials, working parents with young children under 18, and remote workers. In addition, research from Mckinsey reveals that working parents are more likely to have left their jobs during the past couple of years than non-parent workers.
There are a number of reasons for this, including exhaustion from the pressures of working from home while minding childcare responsibilities, struggling to find consistent childcare after they are called back into the office, and re-evaluating their work-life balance.
Turning away from candidates’ and employees’ needs for their well-being and work-life balance will only increase the risk of higher turnover. Focus on making an effort to keep up with the trends and the current needs of candidates and employees.
However, should you decide to implement a good employees’ well-being program but have no channels to communicate with the audience, you will likely waste your resources and time for nothing at all.
The Solution
Recruiters and HR leaders should pay close attention to the needs and demands of candidates today while letting them know that their well-being is on top of their priority list. In order to do so, you can start by implementing employees’ benefits into your employer’s branding strategy and promote your employees’ well-being package via existing channels like social media or career portals.
To help candidates visualize your company as an entity that puts its employees’ well-being first, publish inspiring videos or a set of images showing your staff enjoying their work or being happy from receiving a good employees’ well-being program. You can even take it to the next level by publishing interview videos of your employees telling the audience how they feel about your well-being benefits and the results after receiving them.
With help from ATS like Manatal, recruitment for HR professionals who aim at reinforcing their employer’s brand while acquiring high-quality talents can be done within a few clicks. You will be able to promote your employee’s well-being through your social media and a fully customizable career page.
The ability to design a career site however you imagine to best complement your brand will rest upon your hand. You can upload multiple types of files and content, including high-quality videos, images, special graphics, or icons within a heartbeat.
Moreover, you can address your company’s focus on the well-being of the staff on job advertisements and share them across over 2,500 job posting sites like Indeed, LinkedIn, Monster, CareerJet, and JobStreet, all in a single click.
Inconsistent and Disconnected Collaboration
The hybrid and remote work methods set team members apart from each other. Without a proper tool that helps you and your teammates manage the collaboration and ensure seamless communication, an issue will likely arise and delay the work progress.
Especially in the recruitment field, where hiring managers must be in close communication and collaboration with recruiters, all stakeholders must be on the page throughout the pipeline. Relying on the traditional method, it is impossible to organize efficient recruitment under remote work conditions.
High-quality candidates or individuals who possess the skill sets that fit the roles are likely to fall through the cracks during the process. At the same time, meetings and interviews will surely be overlapped. The chances of successfully identifying and discovering the right talents for your organization are as close to zero.
The Solution
Embracing and implementing advanced recruitment technology like ATS is an effective way to ensure consistency of communication and collaboration throughout the recruitment process. ATS like Manatal comes with a collaboration feature that enables recruiters and hiring managers to march at the same pace while keeping track of each progress, obstacle-free.
Manatal’s easy-to-read dashboard consolidates every process into a single portal, while its team chats feature grants users the ability to communicate with all stakeholders regardless of where they are 24/7. Recruiters will also be capable of providing access to hiring managers, allowing them to leave notes or give feedback on every candidate on the shortlist.
At the same time, overlapped appointments will be no more as Manatals’ calendar feature allows you to easily manage your schedule within a few clicks.
Can’t Find the Right Talent for the Job
As candidates’ skill sets have become the number one factor in recruitment for HR professionals over other factors like diplomas and credentials, recruiters need to shift their focus on the skill of each candidate in order to identify the right fit for open roles.
Considering the ever-competitive job market today, it’s no surprise that hundreds and thousands of applicants are crashing on recruiters’ desks daily. Swimming through an ocean of CVs without a proper tool not only consumes most of their valuable time and prevents them from engaging in other important tasks, but it also provides a low possibility of discovering candidates who possess in-demand skills for the jobs.
Without an efficient tool, you might find yourself looking at a poor shortlist that is filled with underqualified candidates or individuals with skill sets that are irrelevant to the job.
The Solution
ATS like Manatal is able to help you make sure that the right candidates will be quickly identified and selected for the shortlist. Manatal scans job descriptions and extracts the core skills and requirements needed for candidates to perform well in the roles. Then, it cross-references the results with your candidate database to match individuals who possess in-demand skill sets and qualities that are the perfect fit for the jobs you have.
Driven by an AI processing system, Manatal’s recommendation feature compares the candidates’ skills, location, positions, and education to the requirements of the job and scores candidates based on your criteria.
Final Thoughts
Trends come and go, and every time new trends arrive, they change the trajectory of industries around the world. In the talent acquisition field, recruitment trends change the role of HR professionals as well as the needs of candidates and employees.
Running alongside new recruitment trends are obstacles and challenges. While trying to maintain the momentum of their businesses, recruiters and HR professionals are forced to adapt and find new approaches in their search for the perfect candidates.
To ensure success over competitors in the ever-competitive market, it is very important for recruiters and HR professionals to keep up with the latest trends while keeping an eye on the horizon for the next batch of trends to come. A tool like Applicant Tracking System is an essential piece of recruitment today. It eases users’ workload by automating them, making the process run faster and more smoothly.
ATS like Manatal is specifically designed to help recruiters and HR professionals overcome challenges that tail lighting the latest recruitment trends effortlessly.
With features like a fully customizable career page that allows you to promote your employees’ well-being package, a calendar and team chat that ensure that you minimize overlapping appointments, identify candidates who possess in-demand skills, and rest assured that your open jobs will be efficiently filled with high-quality talents within a few clicks!
Start your 14-day Free Trial with Manatal now to explore our additional innovative features and find out how it can transform your recruitment while allowing you to always catch up with the latest trends.