The Smart Recruiter’s Guide to Filling Hard-To-Fill Openings

Filling some positions can keep recruiters sleepless at night. The problem could be finding someone with the necessary skills or someone agreeable to work out of certain locations. This kind of recruitment becomes nightmarish in a situation where the pandemic and macroeconomic trends are making almost all roles hard to fill. According to Forbes, attracting and retaining talent is increasingly becoming harder for employers. Some insights for recruiters on how to deal with the tight labor market, especially for filling hard-to-fill positions:

Understanding What Positions Are Hard to Fill

The COVID-19 pandemic has transformed the labor market. Even as the economy is again opening up, some parents are still finding it difficult to work out of home due to hardships in arranging for childcare in daycare centers and schools. Moreover, some recruiters find it hard to fill some positions due to the requirement of a specific skill set or experience, while at other times, candidates prefer to stay away due to the heavy demands or risks associated with the role.

Strategies for Recruiting for Hard-to-Fill Positions

Focus on local and global: For in-person roles, recruiters and employers need to pay attention to local issues like transportation and implement geographically-targeted recruitment campaigns for local talent. On the other hand, for remote-working roles, the target talent pool can be in geographically diverse zones, especially in traditionally untapped or unserved areas, observes corporateresources.com, a leading recruiting agency.

Make the workplace commute easier: With an increasing number of people resettling outside the city during the pandemic, recruiters may find it difficult to attract talent unless they compensate for the extra costs of commuting. For remote workers or those working on a hybrid attendance model, the solution could be accommodating the necessities of a home office and allowing for flexible work schedules to enable them to cater to family needs and the job role.

Pay living wages: It may seem strange many employers have not recalibrated their remuneration package for some time, which may deter candidates with the desired profile from applying, especially in the post-pandemic period where in-person jobs at the workplace are perceived as riskier says CTN News.

Make the workplace safer: Since the pandemic has made workers wary about attending the workplace, employers must be proactive about communicating what they are doing to invest in health safety like changing the office layout, free vaccinations, providing sanitation and PPE facilities, and other safety measures to ensure candidates know how much the organization values their safety, health, and wellbeing.

Targeting different demographics:

Many times, it can be easier to fill positions by expanding your consideration set to demographics, recruiters usually exclude such as older people in the age group of 50-plus who may have been impacted more by the pandemic. Taking proactive steps to let this target group apply can help fill the positions.

Conclusion 

The problem of filling positions is harder for the SME sector since they often lack the money to power their recruitment. Employers finding it difficult to attract talent with lower remuneration packages can think harder about providing amenities and facilities like food service, childcare, extra vacation days, work flexibility, education, elderly care, healthcare, etc., to attract and retain employees.