It’s never the easiest thing to keep up with the pace of change, and in the ultra-fast world of Tech, it gets harder even still. You need the right men and women to do the job, but how do you go about finding them? Do you put an ad in the newspaper in this day and age? Of course not. 21st-century recruitment needs 21st-century solutions. A “Help Wanted” sign isn’t going to bring you the employees you need.
Good employees are like gold dust. I don’t mean those who are simply qualified to do the job; you know how to find them. Simply wait outside the colleges for them to finish. No, by good staff I mean those who are qualified and who have the right attitude, the right stuff. Those people who’ll go above and beyond the call of duty for your business. Henry Thoreau wrote: “Do not hire a man who does your work for money, but him who does it for the love of it.” Now, I’m not suggesting you hire someone who’ll work for free, but finding someone who can do the job and enjoy it at the same time is the Holy Grail of recruitment, as such staff is worth a fortune in the long run.
But who are these people you want to hire? There’s a rapidly growing demand for IT professionals all across the region, and the skill-sets are becoming increasingly specialised. It can be difficult to tell your E-Commerce Analyst from your Keyword researcher. Finding out what skills you need to hire is as important as the who, and savvy recruiters are increasingly using technology to find the right people for the right job.
In the online environment, everyone has a digital footprint, and that footprint can be revealing about the sort of person they are. Social media has been a game-changing catalyst for recruitment, suddenly everyone has a public face and is easily accessible, we can get a feel of what our candidates are like. The internet knows our likes and dislikes, what football team we follow or what we last ate. But it also knows our skills and abilities.
Moving forward, these skills will be even more searchable than they are now. Talent search engines scour the web for the best and brightest available. The old days, of putting a job ad up and simply having to deal with who came to you are gone. Now, you can go to them, using the internet to track down the right people for the right job as the search engines sort them by their relevant skills and experience. You can proactively look for the right person.
This isn’t the only way, professional networks, the businesslike siblings of Facebook and Twitter, feature a whole host of talent crammed in one place. Sites such as LinkedIn or Meetup are full of highly qualified, professional and motivated individuals.
The old ways of recruiting don’t cut it these days. If you want to find the brightest and the best to work for you, then it’s a matter of going and looking for them. Before somebody else does.
