How long does it take for you to respond to a job application or CV submission? Typically, how long does it take you to provide interview feedback (good or bad)? Or how long after an interview does it take you to offer a job?

There is no simple answer to any of these questions as the hiring process will vary from employer to employer. However, our latest research makes clear that if you’re not engaging with candidates throughout the process and responding quickly at each stage, you risk losing high-quality candidates.

Time to hire measures the number of days between the moment a job is advertised to the moment the candidate accepts the job.

Alarmingly, our research has identified the average time from when a job advert is placed to when a candidate is interviewed is 63 days. Furthermore, over 66% of respondents cited a lack of response from the employer and an overly lengthy or complicated process as reasons for withdrawing from a job application process.

Reducing candidate drop out

So, you’ve been working through the recruitment process for weeks, trying to find the perfect match for your vacancy. Finally, you’ve found the ideal candidate; but confusingly, they drop out. 

This may sound a familiar albeit extremely frustrating thing to happen.

One of the key aspects of a successful recruitment process is understanding, managing, and appealing to the expectations of your potential applicants. When a job seeker applies for a role, they have a specific set of expectations in mind. If these expectations aren’t met, they often lose interest in the role.

Top quality candidates are likely to be in demand and therefore won’t remain on the market for long. So, if your application process is too long, and/or there is too much time between each stage or in providing feedback, you are far more likely to see that candidate drop out as our research confirms. 

Providing a short and simple application process for candidates will help ensure they have a positive view of your business from the outset. In addition, providing feedback as soon as possible after each stage of the process will help keep a candidate updated and engaged with you.

How to improve your hiring timeline

It’s vital to balance recruiting quality employees within a reasonable time period. Making decisions too quickly could unintentionally lead to bad appointments, whilst taking too risks losing quality candidates who are likely to get offers elsewhere. So, it’s important to have the right recruitment strategies and tools for getting this balance right. These include:

• Keeping in contact

It’s vital to keep in contact with your applicants throughout the process, to ensure nobody moves on to other opportunities. Making a good first impression is vital including sending a confirmation email acknowledging their job application. Frequent communication after every stage of the process will help keep quality applicants engaged and willing to stay part of the process.

• Setting aside dedicated time for interviews in advance

Busy diaries can often have a major impact on the job application process in terms of the availability of multiple interviewers at the same time. This can therefore elongate the whole process, leading to significant candidate frustration, as they are usually flexible in terms of their availability.

• Build talent pipelines

Talent pipelines are engaging with top quality candidates of the future for roles that may not even exist yet. By tracking and keeping in touch with possible future candidates, they are already bought in to your brand and engaged with you before a position even becomes available. When you have a vacancy, you can immediately contact these candidates without having to wait for applications and conduct screening calls, shortening the hiring timeline considerably as well as significantly reducing your recruitment costs.

• Use an Applicant Tracking System (ATS)

An ATS supports easy communication between candidates, recruiters and hiring teams. You can use built in templates and calendar scheduling options that will assist you with keeping candidates engaged throughout the process.

Summary

Top quality candidates won’t stay on the job market for long so it’s really important to keep them engaged throughout your recruitment process. Reducing the number of hoops they have to jump through will significantly help, as well as ensuring they are kept well updated at every stage.

About Us

At Hiring Wizard, we have years of experience in helping organisations recruit the best talent in an engaging way. We have a state-of-the-art proprietary Applicant Tracking System which helps ensure candidates are kept informed and frequently communicated to at every stage of the job application process. We are also experts at providing fully branded and optimised advertising campaigns across all the major UK job boards and delivering significant cost savings for our clients.

If you want to improve the quality of candidates you receive, give us a call on 0161 696 8899 or email us on info@hiringwizard.co.uk.