ApplicantStack Blog: Hiring and Recruiting Best Practices

Filling open positions may inspire a panicked hire or feel like a months-long slog where it’s hard to pin down a decision. Both scenarios can end in regret. Finding the right balance between a quick turnaround and costly delays can be a challenge, but the right tools and procedures can be a big help.

What Is the Average Time to Hire?

Human resources departments rely on a key metric known as “Time to Hire” to assess hiring practices. It refers to the number of days it takes for a candidate to see the job posting, apply, and officially accept a job offer. A 2023 report by the Josh Bersin Company found that the average time to hire across all industries was 44 days. While some industries vary from that figure, it can provide a useful benchmark.

If your time to hire is significantly more than 44 days, consider where you might be experiencing bottlenecks in the process. Do you have inadequate staff to receive applications or resumes? Do you use an outdated or inefficient applicant tracking system? Are candidates stuck waiting for communication for too long, and move on to other jobs?

Risks of Rushing Hires

Giving in to hiring pressure can lead to rushed hires that may prove more costly in the long run. Risks include:

• ​Poor candidate experience. Candidates who feel rushed or undervalued during the hiring process are less likely to accept an offer. They are also more likely to share their negative experience with others, potentially deterring other top candidates from applying in the future. Find the balance between timely hiring and helping the candidates not feel like a cog in a machine.
• ​Lesser quality hires. Rushed hiring can cause you to skip steps and due diligence you would otherwise prioritize. You may gloss over a mediocre reference or make assumptions about experience that prove problematic once the candidate starts work. Poor quality hires may never become a cultural fit in your company.
• ​Team dynamic disruption. Introducing a new member of the team will always require some adjustment, but a rushed hire can prove to be extra challenging during the transition. Poor onboarding and training put the new hire at a disadvantage, and can overly burden existing employees. The disruption to the team may lead to lower productivity and decreased morale.
• ​Higher costs. Rushing hires may cost more in both hiring budget dollars and opportunity costs to the company. If you lose the new hire to resignation or termination, you’ll end up right back where you started, with potentially lower morale and even more anxiety about filling the position. The worst-case scenario is that you also lose existing employees because of the turmoil.

Risks of Long Hiring Cycles

Lengthy hiring cycles carry risks, too:

• ​Poor candidate experience. Taking too long to respond to applications, schedule interviews, and make offers can make candidates feel undervalued and anxious. Long gaps between communication imply disinterest, when the opposite may be true. It can be difficult to win back a candidate who has made up their mind about how you’ve treated them.
• ​Losing out on top talent. Most job seekers pursue many options at once. Prime talent may no longer be available by the time you get around to requesting an interview or extending an offer. If you’ve settled on an unavailable candidate as the best option, you’ll be forced to start over.
• ​Burnout and decreased productivity from existing employees. The longer positions go unfilled, the more current employees are required to pick up the slack. Long periods of doing extra work – particularly without additional compensation – can lead to dropped tasks, missed deadlines, and employee burnout. It’s important to keep current employees happy so they can help integrate new team members once they’re hired.

5 Tips for Hiring Faster and Better

Explore these 5 tips that can help you hire faster and identify great candidates.

Establish an employee referral program

Your best ambassadors show up every day, shaping the company culture, boosting productivity, and making your company’s products enticing to the end user. Tap into their commitment to the company by making referrals worth their while. A good employee referral program is well-organized, highly advertised, and offers real incentives for high-quality referrals, including rewards for new-hire retention.

Use third-party recruiters

Companies with small HR departments may find the employees stretched too thin to handle proactive recruiting. Third-party recruiters can help narrow the candidate pool for you, providing the right type of potential hire. This can save time and money in the long run.

Optimize job descriptions

The best job descriptions avoid common clichés and focus on the specific requirements, responsibilities, and benefits of the job. Rather than casting a wide net with vague information, narrow your candidate pool to truly qualified candidates with focused and precise job descriptions. When a position opens up, don’t just recycle the old job description. Confer with the team doing the work every day to write the description to fit the job as it currently stands. Some people find AI tools helpful for polishing the language for clarity and reaching the right candidates.

Post salary ranges

Pay transparency aims to reduce pay disparities existing among genders, races, and other group classifications in the U.S. Providing applicants and employees with the wage information that was once hidden from them can empower individuals to negotiate fairer compensation. Some states have laws to require this; wherever your company operates, posting salary ranges shows respect to the candidates and eliminates time spent with someone whose interest will disappear once they learn the salary.

Use an applicant tracking system

Robust applicant tracking software reduces time spent on culling applications, saves emails from getting lost in an inbox, allows you to communicate with candidates either by text or email, and produces reports that help you analyze and perfect your hiring process.

By understanding the risks of rushed or prolonged hiring and applying thoughtful preparation, you can find hires who are a good fit for your company. Streamline hiring while finding and bringing on top candidates with ApplicantStack.

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Even small businesses need a brand identity to attract top talent in the job market. The purpose of recruiting is to make that brand attractive to potential candidates. A strategy without clear purpose can send mixed messages during the recruitment process. Consider some of the following strategies to help focus your message.

Two Main Recruitment Strategies

Recruitment marketing can be narrowed down into two strategies, according to Lori Syliva of Rally Recruitment Marketing:

• ​Adding more candidates into the top of the funnel, or
• ​Getting more candidates to make it to the bottom of the funnel

Depending on the needs of your company, you may not be attracting the right kind of talent (top of the funnel). Or, you may be losing quality candidates showing interest (bottom of the funnel) because there are parts of your recruiting process are weak.

“The key,” says Sylvia, “is identifying where your biggest gaps are and focusing your strategies there. By zeroing in on the top, middle or bottom of the funnel—or all!—you can make a meaningful impact on your hiring outcomes.”

Essential Recruiting Tactics

With all the budget in the world, you could host large industry events, buy spots in nationwide advertising, and an active mail campaign. But even on a smaller budget, you can maximize your recruiting dollars by spending more effort and less money:

• ​Internal recruiting. Sometimes the best candidate for the job already works for you. Hiring from within saves time and money. Current employees know the culture, require less training, and can be a valuable asset in a new position.
• ​Employee referrals. Employees are effective ambassadors for your company. Referrals are hired at a rate of about 30 percent versus 7 percent by other methods. Developing an effective employee referral program with incentives takes some effort, but the results can lead to higher retention numbers and recruits that come in with company knowledge to start.
• ​Alternative interviews. You can become known as the company who doesn’t just ask the same 10 interview questions as everyone else. Creative interview strategies include portfolio presentations, case studies and problem solving, role playing, or group interviews.
• ​Applicant tracking software. One of the best ways you can spend your recruitment budget is on robust applicant tracking software like ApplicantStack. With integrated tracking, messaging, and sorting, you have all the candidate data at your fingertips.

Candidate Outreach

The tone you set in your recruiting communication can go a long way towards attracting top talent. Consider the following best practices for sending emails.

Be concise

Aim for 150 – 200 words, and always proofread before you hit send. Spell-check can catch spelling mistakes, but it won’t catch misused words that are spelled correctly. Some people find using an LLM like ChatGPT helpful as a proofreader or editor. Simply enter the text of your drafted email, and review the results for clarity and corrected grammatical errors. Make sure the content is accurate before you hit send.

Use a thoughtful subject line

Most of us scan email subjects quickly, so you want to be sure your email stands out and warrants a stop. Avoid cliches and phrases easily caught by spam filters.

Maintain a consistent voice

Though multiple members of the hiring team may be involved in recruiting emails, it’s valuable to generate an in-house style guide so the voice always sounds consistent. Again, AI may be a helpful tool for maintaining a consistent and professional tone.

Use a warm and engaging tone

Warm and engaging doesn’t mean either casual or overly jargon-filled. Your goal is to sound like a real person. Jenna Kalinsky from OneLitPlace suggests this exercise: “The best way to do this is to visualize the person to whom you’re writing. See their face, imagine them laughing at something you said. Then write to them from that feeling. (Even if they aren’t your favorite person, or you’ve never met them, imagine a person on the other side of your words. It helps humanize and warm your tone measurably).”

Personalize beyond the candidate’s name

Addressing someone by name is the bare minimum; how else can you foster recognition? Consider how you became introduced to them and mention that briefly – the name of a shared connection or a project you’re familiar with, for example.

Avoid pressure language

Avoid falsely urgent or overly sensational phrases like “this position won’t last,” “what are you waiting for,” “you’ve been selected for an opportunity of a lifetime,” or “you’re the winner.” Instead, use language that shows respect for the candidate’s intelligence. Spell out the opportunity in clear, concise language and include a call to action such as “after you read over the job description, I’d love to set up a call to discuss next steps.”

Automated Tools in Recruiting

HR professionals are discovering the power of automated tools to “augment and automate manual, repetitive tasks while offering personalization and data insights throughout the hiring process.” AI is the science of training machines to simulate human intelligence and develop systems that can perform tasks that typically require human intelligence.

AI is not meant to replace human recruiters, contrary to some common beliefs. Instead, AI tools automate some of the time-consuming recruiting tasks like screening and scheduling. By removing some of the tedious aspects of hiring, you can free up human labor for more strategic, big-picture goals. Helpful possibilities include:

• ​Sourcing: AI-powered matching and scoring capabilities identify the best-fit candidates automatically.
• ​Screening: Candidates are ranked based on predefined criteria to streamline shortlisting.
• ​Scheduling: AI chatbots and calendar integrations coordinate interviews efficiently.

Effective recruitment requires a multi-pronged approach. By developing your voice and taking advantage of all available technology tools, you can focus your recruitment message and bring the right candidates to your door. ApplicantStack makes it easier to manage the hiring process and find top candidates. Plus, onboarding tools streamline the process.

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For many job seekers, the prospect of working for a small business offers a lot. Small businesses have an earned reputation for culture, pace, and type of work that can feel refreshing when compared to a large corporation. Thus, attracting and hiring such applicants is a high priority for small businesses with open positions. While your small business can’t compete with the Googles of the world for certain types of work, you can optimize your hiring process by finding effective ways of speeding it up.

Causes of Slow Hiring in Small Businesses

Jen L’Estrange reports that while “31% of small business owners reported open positions they couldn’t fill, and 50% said they were hiring or trying to hire,” it’s also true that “44% of owners said they saw few or no qualified applicants for the roles they were trying to fill.” The friction on the applicant side is just as painful: qualified applicants meet challenges getting through AI filters, apply to hundreds of jobs to get one interview, and find networking less effective than before.

Given these struggles, identifiable issues contribute to the overall sense of frustration on both sides of the hiring process.

Too Much Focus on Quality of Hire

While it’s important to find qualified and capable candidates, small businesses can overreact to historical hiring failures and spend too much time seeking out the perfect fit, dismissing fine candidates in search of something better.

Overwork and Burnout in Hiring Staff

As small businesses grow and evolve, people may take on multiple roles to cover new responsibilities. You may end up with hiring tasks spread out among a disparate group of workers who also have other jobs, causing delays in coordination and communication.

Weak Job Descriptions

Recycled job descriptions, overreliance on AI, and vague language and clichés can cause confusion and even bad feelings if candidates find the job description doesn’t accurately reflect the job’s responsibilities. This sends you back to the beginning of the hiring process.

Excessive Interviews

Interview scheduling can be a challenge for companies with multiple people involved in the hiring process. Candidates are likely to be at some stage in the interview process with other companies, and they want to feel their time is valued. Overdoing the number or length of interviews can be a turnoff and prolong the process.

Cultural Fit Concerns

One of the advantages of working for a small business is the camaraderie and collaborative atmosphere that develops with a smaller team. That can also be a roadblock to hiring if you worry too much about how a candidate may fit into the culture.

Financial Uncertainty

Small businesses may find that original hiring plans don’t fit within new budget realities, leading to setbacks or delays for candidates already in the pipeline.

Unsuitable Technology

While small businesses may not have the budget or desire to adopt every new technology on the market, resistance to updating hiring technology can hold you back and lead to unnecessary delays in hiring.

Real Costs of a Slow Hiring Process

SHRM estimates the average cost of hiring at around $4,700, but some businesses report it can be three times that when you factor in additional costs. Some of these costs are a direct result of taking too long in the hiring process:

1. 1.Lost Candidates: When small businesses can’t act quickly on a candidate, they can lose that potential hire to another company. This resets the clock on finding a new candidate, costing time, money, and emotional toll.
2. 2.Additional Hiring Responsibilities: When managers and department leaders take on HR tasks, their energy is diverted from other projects that may directly affect productivity and the company’s bottom line. Delays and setbacks can compound these results.
3. 3.Vacancy Costs: Unfilled roles can cost as much as hiring a new person, and that number can skyrocket if the position is revenue-generating. Plus, unfilled positions take an emotional toll on employees who take on additional responsibilities, eroding stability and potentially leading to further vacancies.

Automated Solutions to Speed Up Hiring

Adopting software that automates hiring processes can be the most important tool in overcoming slow hiring. ApplicantStack automates writing and posting job descriptions to job boards, sorts applicants by keywords, provides a communication framework that uses the candidate’s preferred method, and keeps a running checklist of tasks with reminders so each member of the hiring team knows where each candidate stands in the process. With onboarding and payroll integration, your new hire can hit the ground running without delay. These tools take away hours of manual task management and free up your time and energy to focus on the human side of hiring: bringing the right person to join your team.

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Conventional wisdom guides many perceptions about hiring, job performance, and overall success. Though certain ideas may be useful, some don’t stand up to scrutiny. To predict job performance over time, consider tools that offer real insight.

Worst Predictors of Job Performance

“Some of the most relied-on assessments of job capability,” writes eskill’s Dalia Gulca, “…are actually some of the worst predictors of hiring success — completely useless for determining whether a hire is good or not.” These assessments include:

• ​Years of experience. This metric doesn’t distinguish between high and low performers; it merely indicates the passage of time.
• ​First impressions. Hiring based on first impressions values superficial characteristics like attractiveness, a firm handshake, or an assertive smile, which don’t indicate job performance.
• ​Tricky questions. While some hiring managers enjoy watching someone squirm when asked what they’d do during a zombie attack, the answer is merely an interesting conversation rather than an indicator of success.
• ​Education and college grades. While the ability to do well in school may have a small correlation with work ethic, it doesn’t indicate all the skills and aptitudes that may be needed for job success.
• ​Interests and hobbies. Hobbies may indicate aptitude for certain jobs – e.g. art for design work – and may help indicate a culture fit, but they are rarely helpful for predicting future success.

Six Tools to Predict Job Performance

1. Reverse engineer successful hires

This approach studies successful employees to analyze indicators along the way that may predict a similarly successful future hire. You can review interview questions and answers, and early training and onboarding experiences. Equally important is analyzing “mis-hires” to understand what creates false positives in the interview process, helping eliminate factors that may appear promising but don’t actually predict success.

2. Check your biases

Unconscious bias and discrimination – by ruling out “Black-sounding” names, for example – can be a risk of hiring by first impression or biased intuition. This type of fast thinking—by time-crunched hiring managers quickly sorting candidates into yes and no piles—can lead to lawsuits, to say nothing of neglected job candidates and foregone workforce diversity.

3. Employ traditional data-gathering sources

Analytics of all kinds can be an excellent predictor of success. For example, a sporting goods retailer found that “people who love the outdoors” performed better than those with more basic sales skills. The results of work samples, tests of general cognitive ability, the results of structured interviews, and tests of such non-cognitive abilities as conscientiousness are all (to varying degrees) predictive of future job performance.

4. Use a pre-assessment tool

Applicant tracking systems like ApplicantStack give you the capability to create and administer a pre-screening questionnaire. Filtering out unsuitable candidates from the start saves your staff from hiring fatigue. A pool of quality potential hires saves you from hiring someone too quickly based on insufficient information.

5. Use assessments in place of interviews

Rather than asking candidates to recount past work or success, employ a non-traditional interview approach where candidates demonstrate their soft skills. By having them walk in the shoes of the job, you can see how they would approach a real-life problem. This approach assesses whether they actually possess the skills listed on their resume and how quickly they can apply the skills you consider most vital for the role. For candidates who appear nervous or unskilled in an interview, a role-specific test may reveal their competence and prove them to be a worthy hire.

6. Use current research into “behavioral insights”

Three facets of behavioral analysis insights can be pivotal to predicting successful job performance:

• ​Bounded rationality: humans will make satisfactory rather than optimal choices to stay within the constraints of our own cognitive capability
• ​Bounded willpower: humans take actions that conflict with our own future self-interest
• ​Bounded self-interest: humans’ ability to care about others more than themselves is limited by the circumstances

Studying this research can help HR professionals reject conventional thinking about how humans behave now and in the future, and hold each candidate up to scrutiny within this model.

Hiring can be an overwhelming prospect, filled with more questions than answers at the beginning. While it may be tempting to take the easy road and stick with the more traditional and overly simplistic approaches, those may not produce the quality hires you’re looking for. By employing these six tools, you can better understand your potential hires and choose someone who can go the distance with your company.

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Candidate drop-off is a problem that often gets overlooked in small business recruiting. Understanding this important metric can give you insight into a candidate’s application experience. It can also help you identify and make changes to keep them engaged and excited about working for your company.

Problems and Solutions in Small Business Recruiting

Prospective candidates form opinions about your company immediately when submitting an application. If you haven’t scrutinized your process recently, consider some of the following common friction points. These often cause candidates to abandon the process.