3 Fundamental Reasons Companies Fail to Attract Top Talent

Fail may seem like a harsh term, but it’s time to face the cold hard facts.

According to the CBRE report in “Scoring Tech Talent in North America 2018,” places like the San Francisco Bay Area and Seattle, WA, (two of our biggest client markets, by the way) are scored as the top-ranked tech talent markets. Yet, both these hubs experience something referred to as “brain gain,” which means they are creating more jobs than there is tech talent available. *(Read more about the tech talent market reports and research from CBRE here).

So how do recruiters from these ‘brain gain” locations get away from this classic supply & demand conundrum? Here are our 3 fundamental reasons companies fail to attract top talent AND how they can fix it.

1. Funnel of Failure

Recruitment, in many ways, serves as a sales function in the workplace. Most companies have a sales team to attract customers or a client base, but as a recruiter, you understand the importance of selling your company to its employees, too. You aren’t just selling the position, you’re selling your brand. Someone looking for the role of Software Engineer can find an abundance of positions at many different companies – the key is what makes “Software Engineer” different at your company. What experience is this talent going to have while working for your company that is different or unique compared to working for your competitor? This should be the first question you ask yourself before entering what we call the “Funnel of Failure.”  For more on building your company’s pitch, read Laurence Bradford’s Forbes article here.

Starting at the top – recruiters that fail to sell their companies find themselves at the bottom of the funnel with just average (or below average) talent. Going through this funnel is both time-consuming and inefficient when it comes to hiring top talent, resulting in unmet company goals and hiring deadlines – all starting with something as simple as why working at your company is so great!

Garbage In → Garbage Out

Continuing with the theme of our Funnel of Failure, Garbage in – Garbage out implies exactly what you imagine. Everything you put into your recruiting funnel is exactly what you will get out of it. To be more specific, not taking the time to create a thorough recruiting process in which the company values, mission, and benefits are clearly described and understood (garbage in) will only lead to recruiting someone who doesn’t value your mission or company goals – which will be fairly obvious in the new hire’s work output (garbage out).

2.  Little-to-No Investment in Technical Recruiters

Anyone looking for a job will tell you, they always say “It’s all about who you know.” The same is true for recruiters, especially in the technical field. At SkillGigs, we believe that recruiting is all about relationships.  People naturally are drawn to those they trust, so developing these relationships with skilled talent is crucial to recruiting top candidates. This is why using technical recruiters can be so beneficial when filling positions that require the best of the best.

SkillGigs already has established relationships with top tech talent, shortening the searching process and filtering through only quality matches that best fill the positions. We cater specifically to every recruiter’s favorite type of talent – passive job seekers. This group of people is casual with their job search, browsing for opportunities that may be better than their current position. We give passive job seekers the tools to make their search as simple as possible while developing relationships in order to “reactivate” their job search – leading them to companies just like yours! Read more about passive job seekers in this Forbes article by Liz Ryan here, or schedule a demo to find out why SkillGigs is the technical recruiter you want in your corner.

3. Turning Top Talent Away Without Realizing It

Even the best recruiters can run into this problem without even realizing it and here’s why: looking at recruiting talent as a transaction can potentially turn off talent. The user experience is important for recruiting for any position – even more so for technical positions with experience specifically in UX/UI. If applying to a job with your company feels like they’re just a number for your quota, it’s really not going to appeal to top talent – especially hidden passive seekers. Referring back to the second point and developing relationships, engagement is crucial in finding quality talent. Read more about moving from transactional recruiting to engaged recruiting here from Kevin Wheeler.

What Can Companies Do To Attract Talent?

So what does this all mean? What’s the way out of the funnel of failure? Here are some steps you can take today to enhance your recruiting process and attract top talent.

  1. Formulate your pitch around your brand. Make sure your product/services, company goals, mission, and vision are perfectly clear throughout the hiring process. Candidates should have a clear understanding of who they are as a business and what is expected of them as they are hired.
  2. A-players want to work with other A-players: Take a good look at the people around you, or the people you have hired recently. Make sure you are heading in the direction you want to grow as a company by starting now. As mentioned in this Forbes article, “great talent attracts great talent.”
  3. Give your recruiters the attention they need – and deserve. HR should be on the same playing field as your sales department. Sales attract the clients, but your recruiters attract the talent that fulfills your client’s needs. They are instrumental to the success of your team and control the momentum of what your company can accomplish.

Taking the time to invest in your recruiting strategy will pull you out of these fundamental recruiting setbacks and into a stronger process of attracting the best of the best.

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