Hiring Needs.

• Author: Hart, Jack

The Expert: Jack Hart

Obtaining and retaining the best talent for your team has been an ongoing battle for hiring managers for many years now, but with the complexity that COVID has brought, accompanied by "the Great Resignation," this challenge has become even more difficult.

Question: How has the pandemic changed hiring, and what do you need to do to get ahead in the race to hire the best?

Answer: To start off, recruiters are short-staffed themselves, and yet they have to hire more than ever before amid a shortage of talent. But where there's great challenge comes great opportunity, which has led to specialist recruiters being more in demand than ever compared to generalist recruiters, mostly due to the networks that specialist recruiters have, their better understanding of the job brief, and their better understanding of team dynamics and the distinction between what "good" and "great" look like. In contrast, generalist recruiters, who hire for any job thrown at them, may get lucky and find the right candidate, but they simply won't have the right understanding or network to give their clients real service and market insight.

What Candidates Are Seeking

The constant struggle when it comes to staffing needs is real, whether it's retaining or enticing staff, the internal battle that comes with promotions, or making sure "bench strength" is good enough. What candidates are looking for in 2022 is roughly the same as in 2021:

* flexibility for child care support;

* benefits such as 401(k), health care, vacation, and parental leave; and

* higher salaries, which since 2020 have shot up as much as twenty percent in some cases.

We continue to see, across the board, candidates choosing jobs and companies that offer more flexibility than salary. Ask most recruiters, and they will say that "time kills deals" when hiring. The best thing a hiring manager can do is to have a plan and stick to it. Most processes should be two to four stages long across a two- to three-week process at maximum, which gives candidates the best impression of the company, suggesting that it is organized and a great business to work for, with a solid team culture.

With the market as busy as it was in 2021--a scenario that likely will continue into 2022--internal HR and all recruiters are "pre-closing" hard on candidates due to a plethora of open opportunities and the fact that most candidates interviewing will be in multiple hiring processes at once.

Team Culture in a Remote...