Tips For Effective Candidate Communication

Whether you are working with one single job listing or are managing many simultaneously, it can be difficult to stay in touch with a number of candidates.  In order to remain successful with your recruitment efforts, candidate communication is imperative. This can be done in a number of different ways and with a good plan in place, you can easily incorporate proper practice into your current processes.

Building Strong Relationships

In order to ensure you find qualified candidates and place them accordingly, a solid relationship built on a foundation of clear communication is vital.  Without this, you risk missing many key pieces of information that can help you make more educated hiring decisions. When your applicants trust your insight and direction, you will open the lines to honest conversation, full of insight and useful information.  This could be anything from competitor job offers to personal information that can help better guide and direct your future with this candidate.

Communicate Clearly

Continuous communication with your candidates helps keep everyone on a level playing field throughout the process.  From the candidate’s perspective, it can be very discouraging and frustrating to feel like you have been forgotten. This can result in many negative outcomes even long after the process is complete.  No matter what the outcome or decision, your candidate should walk away from the experience with a positive impression of you and the organization you represent. While there are often unplanned delays in the decision making process, candidates deserve an open line of communication, knowing the status of their application at all times.

Transparency in Expectations

At every stage in this process, it is important that every candidate knows exactly what you are looking for in your ideal fit and what it is that you expect of them in this potential position.  You want to make your selection process fair, structured and objective so that each candidate understands how they are being evaluated.  Pre-employment assessments are a great way to standardize this process. Through a clear, practical, and routine hiring process, candidates will not leave the hiring process confused or unsure as to why the outcome was what it was.  In addition, applicants should feel like they had a fair shot landing the role, and should know if they should reapply for future positions.

Making an Offer

Deciding to make an offer is an important step in the hiring process.  If in the midst of this, your prospect informs you that they are considering another offer, you can then have the ability to speed up the process to make your final decision.  This honesty and openness from your candidate enables you to act accordingly.  If you need to secure a great candidate, open communication styles can help get you there.

If you want to make sure that you are successful in your hiring process while representing your client or company well— clear, honest and open candidate communication is vital.

Put yourself in your candidate’s shoes; the more information you can share with this person, the more real this applicant will view your relationship which will foster honesty, trust, and integrity.  Remember, the hiring process is typically the first impression of a company for your candidate.  Your practices and values will be viewed as a company-wide culture so make sure they are ones you can be proud of.