Understanding Recruitment: Definition and Tips for Success in 2024
Recruitment can feel like speed dating—trying to find the right match in a sea of possibilities, often in record time.
Ever felt like you're swiping left on endless resumes or juggling interview schedules like a circus act? You're not alone! Hiring can be chaotic, but with a little guidance, it doesn’t have to be. I’ve helped businesses transform their recruitment chaos into a smooth, successful process.
I'll help you understand recruitment from the ground up, making it easy to land your ideal hire without the hassle.
Just starting out? Recruiter certification gives a strong foundation in understanding recruitment trends and applying them effectively.
What is Recruitment?
Recruitment is the process of attracting, identifying, and engaging potential candidates to build a pool of qualified applicants for a job opening.
Whether through traditional job boards or advanced recruiting CRM software, recruitment streamlines the identification and invitation of potential candidates. Candidate selection, on the other hand, is concerned with selecting the best applicant from the applicant pool which was formed during the recruitment process.
Selection is often handled outside the HR function by the hiring manager of the company or department, though your HR team may help with screening, contracts, and onboarding considerations.
How to Find People to Recruit
The fundamentals of recruitment are actually pretty easy, to inform potential applicants of the vacancy, encouraging them to apply for the advertised role. So how is this done?
Firstly you need to determine where your potential applicants are, is there an association, website or location where potential applicants frequent? Here are my top suggestions:
Local Professional Bodies
If you were seeking an HR Professional, then you might look to the local professional bodies and inquire about advertising with them.
Examples, depending on your geographical location, might include: AHRI (Australian Human Resources Institute), Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), Human Resources Institute of New Zealand (HRINZ), Canadian Council of Human Resources Associations (CCHRA), etc.
The easy way to find these associations is to simply google the country, the professional and ‘association’. For example, googling ‘US Tax Accountants Association’ gives the result of the American Accounting Association (aaahq.org).
Local Training Providers
Depending also on the level of experience or qualifications that you are after, consider too your local university or training provider. Often these providers are very happy to pass along job advertisements that are specific to their student’s studies.
This process is simply a matter of doing a search on their website, finding the right area and sending them an email asking if they would be able to pass the attached advertisement along to their students. I’ve had success with this approach in the past advertising for Graduate Programs within HR, I simply emailed a Professor of Management, and also a Professor of Psychology at three universities and they were more than happy to pass the opportunity onto their students.
Professional programs such as MBA’s offer really great opportunities to advertise directly to potential applications.
Leveraging Your Current Staff
Too often employees find out about a vacancy from the local newspaper, employers are missing an important opportunity when this happens.
On the day that the advertising for the vacancy starts, send out a company-wide email or if you have an internal job board use that, and ensure your employees know that a vacancy is being advertised. Even better, ask them to share the vacancy with their network (most employees use Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or one of the various other social networks – as well as simply telling their friends about the vacancy).
The important aspect with this is twofold, you’re current employees will be able to tell potential applicants relevant details about the wider workplace (i.e. it’s a good place to work, good benefits, etc) and the cost is very small for the potential number of people that are informed about the vacancy.
Job Boards And Newspapers
I’ve left these till almost last as they’re the most obvious and also something that should really be used in many cases as a last resort after exhausting the above methods.
Job boards and newspapers are very general, even though job boards especially may have categories such as Legal Jobs, or Accounting Jobs, etc, they are still general. The more general the approach that you take with your advertising the larger the applicant pool will become – and often it’s not an increase in quality but one of quantity.
As an example, if I want an experienced Tax Lawyer, that’s what I need – not a bookkeeper or Lawyer that did one tax paper at university five years ago. Hence my best bet is to advertise to specific markets. Job boards and newspapers do have their place most certainly, the more general or lower entry roles are what job boards and newspapers are designed for, if you want an Office Junior, entry-level salesperson, etc then they are your best bet.
There are exceptions to this, however, when advertising for a role with very specific requirements (such as qualifications or membership to professional bodies (such as a registered Psychologist), use newspapers and job board advertising as a coverall or backup to the specific marketing you’re doing.
LinkedIn is the exception in job boards, their membership (somewhere north of 200 million) coupled with the way the site encourages the formation of professional groups, means that they are very effective as a targeted advertising source for vacancies – from the very general to the very specific.
The tools are available for businesses big and small to carry out their own recruitment in a cost-effective manner. And the most important aspect of recruitment I’ve left-right to the end, for many people your recruitment activity will be their first interaction with your organization, make sure they have a fantastic experience – and they can have a fantastic experience regardless of whether they get the role or not. Building a fantastic experience is mostly about communication, ensure they know what’s happening.
Perhaps the best way to understand recruitment though is to hear straight from minds and mouths of people facing these challenges every day by attending a recruiting conference. You can hear from leading thinkers in the field and network with innovative professionals.
Related Read: 10 Best Pre-Employment Testing Software for Evaluating Potential Staff
Outsource to a Recruiter
Some companies may choose to stop doing their own recruiting because it can take a lot of time and effort. They might find it easier to outsource hiring to an agency that specializes in finding the right candidates quickly.
Many organizations turn to recruitment process outsourcing companies to better manage the complexities of their hiring workflows. This way, they can focus on running the business while experts handle the recruiting process. Plus, agencies often have wider networks and access to better talent, making it a faster and more efficient option for filling open roles.
8 Recruitment Best Practices from an Expert
Recruiting isn’t just about filling positions—it’s about finding the perfect fit for your team. Hiring process compliance ensures your recruitment strategy is aligned with both industry standards and legal requirements.
Here are 8 expert-backed best practices to level up your recruitment game:
- Get Clear on Your Ideal Candidate: Don’t just list generic skills. Be specific about what success looks like in the role. Think beyond qualifications—what traits will help someone thrive in your unique work environment?
- Craft Job Descriptions that Attract, Not Repel: Job descriptions shouldn’t read like a grocery list of demands. Highlight what’s exciting about the role and your company. Make sure candidates see what’s in it for them.
- Leverage Employee Networks: Your employees know your company best. Encourage them to spread the word about job openings within their networks. Referrals often lead to higher quality candidates who are a cultural fit.
- Use Structured Interviews: Ditch the free-form, ‘winging it’ style interviews. Structured interviews with standardized questions ensure consistency, reduce bias, and help you compare candidates more objectively.
- Invest in Recruiting Technology: Applicant tracking systems (ATS) and recruiting database solutions can streamline your hiring process, saving time and keeping candidate communications seamless. Automation also helps prevent good candidates from slipping through the cracks.
- Be Transparent in Communication: Ghosting candidates or leaving them in the dark reflects poorly on your brand. Keep candidates informed throughout the process, even if it’s just a quick email update.
- Diversify Your Talent Pools: Relying on the same sources for every role limits your options. Consider non-traditional sources, like community groups, professional organizations, and social media platforms like LinkedIn, to attract a wider range of candidates.
- Create a Great Candidate Experience: Remember, your recruitment process is often a candidate's first impression of your company. Make it a good one by ensuring every interaction—whether they get the job or not—leaves them with a positive experience.
By following these best practices, you’ll not only fill positions faster, but you'll also build a stronger, more cohesive team that fits your company’s culture and goals. Happy hiring!
Your Best Recruitment Tools
To make recruiting organized, easy, and pleasant for all involves, you'll probably need some software solutions to help you out. Here are my suggestions.
What Next?
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