This Is Not Your Father’s World Of Recruiting

As companies jostle to find the best talent in 2014, more and more are offering creative perks in order to attract elusive top candidates.  Just as recruiting software has become more flexible to adapt to a hiring landscape that has very little resemblance to years past, recruiting companies are finding new ways to facelift traditional job offers and packages.

Today, “work-life balance” drips from the lips of many job candidates (active and passive alike). More and more, staffing and recruiting professionals are hearing that “the ability to telecommute” is more than nice to have.

This really is no longer your father’s world of recruiting.

Project manager at the Chicago Metropolitan Planning Council Yonah Freemark shares Why Telecommuting Really Matters. Whereas a mere 2% of Americans spent time working at home in 1994, The U.S. Census Bureau found that by 2012, 9.4 percent of people were telecommuting from home at least one day a week.

For recruiting dogs young and old, this means it’s time to pick up a fresh collection of pretty sophisticated tricks.

It isn’t just the use of the latest tools such as recruitment software that companies need to use to manage top talent these days.  It’s the understanding that the candidates they are approaching want more than the typical hiring package.  Staffing and recruiting firms now must help their clients develop offers that will one-up their competitors. Quite likely they will need to offer telecommuting as a perk to top talent.

Need more proof of the telecommuting movement?  Flexjob.com, a website targeted at employment seekers interested in flexible jobs with flexible work environments that include telecommuting, analyzed their database of over 25,000 pre-screened and vetted companies with flexible work options.  The resulting list of the top 100 companies that offered the best remote jobs was topped by such names as Xerox, United Health Group, Aetna and American Express.

A Greybeard Dell Is Not
The number three company on that list, the IT giant Dell, is shaking its cane and orthopedics and leading the telecommuting race.

Business Insider shares that Dell has clearly figured out that flexible options help recruit and keep valuable workers.  Job satisfaction appears to be more readily attained by Dell’s telecommuting offer. The company also saved about $14 million last year by offering work at home flexibility.

And for the environmentally concerned, “these workers also kept 6,735 metric tons of CO2 out of the atmosphere by no longer commuting.” So how do recruiting companies adjust to top candidates’ need for flexibility?

It’s time for bifocals, baby! It’s time for recruiters and staffers to really see candidates’ and clients’ near and far-off needs. A recruiter needs to dig in. For example, a hot talent may not share – unless probed – that he’s not only passively open to telecommuting but would be heavily swayed by a job that offered such an option.

This is golden data! Recruiters need to be able to attain this critical information and be supported by a recruiting software system which allows easy access to candidates who fit this profile.

The New World DNA Job Candidate
The old hunt and peck system of matching job seekers with positions has now morphed into a DNA-type search of the ideal candidate.

With high-tech recruiting software, now we’ve got the ability to identify a more perfect DNA job-candidate match. Having a more complete view of the candidate, including interests such as telecommuting makes it easier to find the best fit – and one that will contribute to job satisfaction and retention.

With the limit of qualified candidates, companies have to find ways to become more attractive. Whereas 20 years ago telecommuting wasn’t a word on any seasoned recruiter’s lips, today it’s becoming an essential job perk that can contribute to romancing the right candidate.

Don’t be an old-style recruiter sitting on a park bench continuing to conduct recruiting “business as usual.” Stay current by more effectively profiling candidates.

Oh, and you may also need to persuade your clients that telecommuting benefits are the best way to attract tier-one talent. But isn’t that what we are all in this industry to do? Subtly persuade – where needed – in order to match the best candidates with the best employers!