Michael DeSafey | Executive Recruiter and HR Professional
Teamwork in Recruiting — Build a Hiring Dream Team
Recruiting is expensive and time-consuming. Whether you’re looking for entry-level laborers or top talent, employers can expect to spend thousands of dollars — and several weeks — searching for that one special recruit. One study published by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), suggests it costs nearly $4,200 to hire one employee, and takes an average of 42 days of advertising and interviewing time to settle on one recruit.
It’s only natural that those numbers get bigger for mass hiring’s. While bulk advertising rates might lower the resources spent reaching out, every potential recruit will need to be interviewed and vetted. Depending on your organization’s pre-hire requirements (like drug testing), mass hiring can get costly.
In the construction and environmental industries in particular, organizations looking to hire entire crews at once will invest even more resources into recruiting and vetting.
That’s why the most efficient organizations put considerable thought into building an effective hiring team. Whether your business is large or small, your hiring team will be responsible for selecting the best candidates, and ensuring your recruiting dollars are well spent. This hiring dream team needs to know about the job at hand, have a solid understanding of HR topics, and be a terrific judge of character.
But it’s practically impossible to find a single person with all those qualities, so start your hiring dream team with the right hiring manager.
The Right Hiring Manager is the Foundation of Your Hiring Team
Whether you need one or ten, hiring managers need to work well with your HR department. It will be their job to:
- Identify open positions or create new posts within your organization.
- Craft accurate job descriptions that attract the best candidates.
- Define roles and responsibilities for the rest of your hiring team.
- Serve as the point person and primary interviewer throughout the interview process.
- Give the final hiring approval (in some cases pending executive approval).
- And sometimes negotiate the terms of employment, like wages, overtime and vacation
With all these tasks in mind, many firms prefer to select a hiring manager who has a background in human resources. If you’re hiring from within, look to your HR department first for the perfect candidate. Dependability is a must!
However, a background in sales and contract management could also be fruitful for the organization. Outstanding salespeople will have a knack for persuasion. This could be tremendously helpful in competitive hiring markets — if you can spare them from the sales department.
Once you’ve selected a solid hiring manager, flesh out the rest of the recruiting team.
The Rest of Your Hiring Dream Team
Depending on the company’s goals, your hiring team might need anywhere from one to ten support personnel. It helps to have at least one person who is extremely internet savvy in the modern employment marketplace. This person would be tasked with monitoring job boards, posting positions and earmarking the best potential recruits as resumes come in.
An administrative assistant could be a great addition too. This person should be able to schedule appointments, maintain a calendar for the hiring manager, and track down licensing and compliance issues as they arise. This way, your hiring manager can focus on legitimate candidates first.
Ultimately, your hiring team will be as unique as your organization. But it will undoubtedly need a chief, an internet performer and an administrator to get started.
Michael DeSafey is a leading executive recruiter for professionals in the construction, engineering and environmental industries. He is currently the President of Webuild Staffing www.webuildstaffing.com . To learn more about Michael or to follow his blog please visit www.michaeldesafey.com