Moving Past The Cons Of Onboarding Millennials With Recruiting Software

Recruiting software – pros and cons graphLike it or not – your clients are going to need to onboard Millennials. And if you remain in the recruiting or staffing industry, you will have to be the one to help. Fortunately, although Millennials often receive a bad rap, they bring a number of strengths to the workforce.

Ultimately, every generation has its strengths and weaknesses. With Millennials, too many of us have become accustomed to focusing only on the cons. To help level your thinking – while at the same time avoiding any sugar coating – I’ve provided the biggest con – coupled with two big pros below to keep in mind when considering a Millennial candidate.

Thanks in advance to Jiwire for creating the infographic to the left that helps demonstrate these pros and Brandon Russell at WebLinkBlog for sharing. See the full infographic.)

Con – Self-centeredness. Yes, many individuals in this generation have been raised with the notion that everything they do is wonderful. Feeding into the self-centeredness, to a certain extent, is technology’s ability to put any one person at the center of any group. That said, there is a positive side effect of this first big con. The Millennials’ habit of constantly using social media, smartphones, and tablet PCs makes them infinitely more trackable – especially by the right staffing software and recruiting software.

Pro – The ability to adapt to change. That constant usage of technology throughout their young lives has also positioned Millennials with another strength – the ability to adapt to change more rapidly than any previous generation. And, you know the future business world will continue to change faster than ever before, so why not get the right individuals in place now?

Pro – They work well in teams. Because of the constant electronic communication they’re used to, Millennials are well-prepared to work in teams. Just how connected to the digital world are they? As noted by the infographic above:

  • Millennials own 2.4 devices
  • 28% use location-based apps more than once per day
  • 71% use laptops and 62% use smartphones to connect on-the-go

So what conclusion should you draw from this? While Millennials may not fit what previous generations of employees view as the most desirable work skills, the truth remains they do have many valuable talents. At some point, we will all need to learn how to pick the best candidates and set them up for success at ours or our clients’ organizations. When that time comes, don’t let the con overshadow the pros.

To learn more about how staffing and recruiting software from Bond US can help your agency achieve its onboarding goals, regardless of what generation candidates you are bringing on, request a demo.

How Staffing Software and Recruiting Software Helps Find The Right Culture Fit

Routine disagreement.  A new hire just doesn’t gel, disagrees with new coworkers and openly disrespects the way things are being done.  Frequent disagreements lead to lost productivity due to the constant need for discussion to clarify issues, impacting the bottom line.

Awkward social interactions and increased tension.  When just one person is on a different page from everyone else and is not willing to make the necessary change, it puts the rest of the staff on edge.  When everyone is on edge, workflow is disrupted and when that happens, the bottom line is negatively impacted.

A culture gap that just cannot be overcome.  An otherwise stellar Generation Y candidate you recruited simply does not fit in with a more traditional employer, leaving both the employee and the company unhappy.

When you engage in the staffing process, you’re typically looking at a number of factors to determine whether the candidate fits the position well. The backbone of our company’s staffing software and recruiting software, in fact, is the built-in functionality designed to help you find candidates with the right experience, skills, education and references.

Fortunately, staffing and recruiting software can help you move beyond searching for skills, education and references – and also help you find the right culture fit for both your clients and candidates. For instance, you can:

Filter candidates with short work tenures.  How often have you come across a candidate who has held multiple jobs over a short period of time that did not reveal some underlying issue with past employers? Even if your answer is ‘no,’ would this type of candidate be worth the risk with a larger client?  Using staffing and recruiting software resume harvesting capabilities, you can parse the candidates you have on file based on custom criteria, like length of time at past jobs.

Documenting the unstated portion of candidate interviews. The answers the candidate provided were on target – but there was something about the body language and interaction style that didn’t quite feel right. Documenting this type of information in your recruiting software – and making it searchable for later – can ensure you don’t inadvertently match up a client with the wrong candidate in the future, based on answers alone.

Sorting by industry. Would your client in a traditional industry – think steel working – gel with a stellar marketing candidate who has the right qualifications but comes from a more modern online background? With the right staffing and recruiting software – you can add in or segment out these candidates based on how you answer this question.

Ultimately – the purpose of your staffing agency, and what companies like mine try to help you do, is to put people back to work. But doing so at the cost of connecting the wrong candidates with the wrong companies is simply the wrong way to accomplish this.

I don’t get it… what is it?

Are you one of those people that hear buzz words thrown around, but not quite sure what they mean? People talk about Social Media like they are discussing the weather but not everyone knows how Twitter or Facebook work. I found some great videos online that will quickly remove the mystery of five common terms or sites related to being ‘social’ online. Here you can learn about Social Media in general, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Blogs and RSS Feeds.

So, grab some popcorn, sit back and enjoy!

Social Media in Plain English

Facebook – In Simple English

Twitter in Plain English

LinkedIn in Plain English

What Makes A Blog A Blog?

How RSS Works

Zombies in Plain English (just making sure you were still paying attention! 🙂 enjoy!)

Moxie Maven Alexia Vernon On What Your Staffing Agency Needs To Know About Onboarding Millennials With Recruiting Software

Recruiting software user – Alexia Vernon If you work for a recruiting or staffing agency, you have an opinion on Millennial – or Generation Y – candidates.  For seasoned recruiters or staffing professionals, these candidates – born between the early 80s and early 90s – can bring a frustratingly unbalanced mix of confidence and sense of entitlement.  And, of course, all the resulting headaches.

But is this a completely fair assessment of Generation Y recruiting? Or can staffers and recruiters relieve their headaches by taking time to better understand how the ‘wants’ of Generation Y sync with the ‘needs’ of clients? For help, I turned to consultant and author Alexia Vernon.

Called a “Moxie Maven” by the White House, since winning the Miss Junior America competition in college, Alexia Vernon has been working with companies, campuses, and community organizations to help develop successful, sustainable, and socially impactful employees and leaders. She has shared her advice with myriad media such as CNN, NBC, CBS MoneyWatch, FOX Business News, the Wall Street Journal, CareerBuilder.com, Monster.com, and Forbes.com.

She is also the author of Awaken Your CAREERpreneur: A Holistic Road Map to Climb from Your Calling to Your Career, and most recently, 90 Days 90 Ways: Onboard Young Professionals to Peak Performance.

Below, Alexia shares what your recruiting or staffing agency needs to know when onboarding Millennial workers:

Some have referred to Generation Y as the entitlement generation. Do you feel that the fault behind this admittedly broad definition rests more with Millennials themselves, or with traditional employers being hesitant to change their views?

Alexia Vernon: While I like to think of Generation Y (Gen Y) or Millennials as “creative, collaborative, and tech- savvy” rather than “disrespectful, whiny, and entitled,!” I believe that Gen Y’s’ bad rap stems equally from the fact that EVERY generation is a little rough around the edges when entering the workplace AND that Gen Y, overall, has been a very coddled generation.

Scheduled play dates. Trophies for everything short of breathing. Oprah playing on our TV’s when we got home from school. Why Gen Y behaves as it does though, honestly, is not so important (unless you’re a demographer or run a Gen Y consulting business like me!). What matters is that employers understand how to meet us where we are when we come in the door and co-create solutions to take us where we need to be in order to capitalize on our lauded potential.

It’s been said that money is not necessarily a primary motivator for Generation Y. It has also been said that Generation Y employees will stay at their first job for only about two years. How can employers retain the most skilled Millennial employees, when traditional motivators are not what these employees are after?

AV: You are correct. Across studies, the #1 reason that Millennials consistently leave a job is because they no longer feel like they are learning and growing in their roles. And this is great news. Companies should not get in their own way of retaining top talent by moaning over the fact they don’t have the capacity to offer Millennials a raise or a promotion. Rather, employers have a real opportunity to put time and energy into ensuring that Millennials have opportunities to stretch. Whether that means participating in a formal learning and development program, sitting on a committee, spearheading a new project, or simply engaging in a mentoring relationship – it’s important that companies put their high-potential Millennials in these situations to keep them engaged and growing professionally and personally.

In your book, 90 Days, 90 Ways, you share strategies for employers to successfully onboard Generation Y workers. What advice would you offer to recruiters or staffing agencies that find themselves a few steps in front of the onboarding process, striving to effectively place the most skilled Millennial candidates with appropriate employers?

AV: Look for a strong cultural fit. While a candidate might look like a good fit for a company on paper – for the relationship to be a long-term, mutually beneficial one, it’s important that an employee fits in at a deeper level. Make sure you know how your talent communicates, creates, learns, handles conflict, plays, and so forth so that you are effectively playing matchmaker.

Based on your experience, what would you consider to be the most significant hurdle for any Millennial entering the workforce today?

AV: Unfortunately, I’ve been giving the same answer for the last four years. — the economy. When you have less educational and professional experience than Baby Boomers, Gen X’ers, and even older Millennials who were laid off, became under employed, and/or are in the throes of reinventing themselves, you really need to be clear about how you are uniquely poised to deliver the value a company desires in order to stand out in the application process.

Similar to the question above, what would you consider to be the most significant challenge that employers or staffing agencies should be aware of, prior to hiring or placing a Millennial worker, and how can this challenge be overcome?

AV: Companies that are employing Millennial talent should be aware that, as a generation, Millennials have had fewer opportunities to hone face-to-face communication skills than any previous generation in our nation’s history. While Millennials love to work collaboratively, build relationships, and so forth, they typically have a lot of room for growth in their interpersonal communication. The good news is that high-impact communication is a skill. As long as companies are aware that their young employees need formal and informal opportunities to practice their 30-second introductions, negotiation, feedback, banter, and presentation skills, they can efficiently and effectively get their young employees producing the results they seek.

You can learn more about Alexia at AlexiaVernon.com, follow her on Twitter @AlexiaVernon, or connect on Facebook and LinkedIn.

To learn more about how recruiting software and staffing software from Bond US can help your agency achieve its onboarding goals, regardless of what generation candidates you are bringing on, request a demo.

How Recruiting Software Can Help You Evolve To Generation Y Recruiting

Some may find it strange that the personality of a group can impact the attitudes and practices of an entire industry – but when discussing generation Y and recruiting, that is exactly what is happening.  By 2025, this 30-and-under crowd will make up half of the world’s population – and account for 75% of the workforce.

As a recruiter, you need to both be aware of how this group will force your practices to evolve – but also – be aware of how the tools you have at your disposal that can ease this evolution.

And if you’ll forgive a bit of helpful Friday bias, I’ve listed below a few ways that a tool like recruiting software can be this tool:

  1. Ensuring You Remain as Technologically Savvy & Connected As Your Candidate
    Gen Y’s have grown up completely immersed and connected by technology and social media.  For better or worse, the right candidate may be counting on this ability to be found by the right employer or recruiter, rather than vice versa.But as my colleague Phil McCutchen writes, when searching for candidates in social media, “you need help separating the chafe (all the junk out there on the Internet) from the wheat (all the good candidate and employee information you need for recruiting.)”With the right recruiting software, you can do everything from record candidates’ online profiles on LinkedIn (ie finding the right candidates) or automate job postings through RSS feeds or social media sites – an effective, if slightly old fashioned method for this group.
  2. Record New & Unfamiliar Idiosyncrasies
    What candidate isn’t interested in more money?  Potentially, many Gen Y candidates.  Per the latest Cisco Connected World Report, Gen Y’s will often count social media freedom, device flexibility and work mobility in much higher regard than salary. They will also oftentimes flock to employers that offer such alternatives as compressed work schedules, teleworking and generous leave packages.As a recruiter, the first steps in effectively servicing both employers and Y candidates is to find the connections between the employer that is offering and the candidate that is wanting.  The only potentially new wrinkle to this idea is the variety of non-traditional wants you may hear from candidates.  The right recruiting software is the one constant you can count on to help keep it all straight.
  1. Keep A Steady Candidate Funnel
    According to a Gen Y and Facebook study by Millennial Branding, the average Gen Y employee will spend just two years at his or her first position and will job hop multiple times in their career.This does not mean you stop recruiting Gen Y.  It simply means that you always have a backup in mind, especially for your bigger clients.  By using software to match up your current clients with your current list of candidates, you can ensure you are always ready to fill a hole left by a Gen Y candidate that is following their own natural progression.  And the best part is, the new candidate you provide will probably have an even more evolved skill set than the first employee you placed – ensuring your candidate pool continues to be the one your clients prefer to pull from.

How have your recruiting processes evolved to keep up with Gen Y?  Or what challenges have you faced when trying to evolve with this candidate?  I encourage you to share, via a comment below.