It’s getting harder to attract and retain top talent. Most companies start with the process of sourcing new employees but don’t put time and effort into developing the company culture into one where people want to stay (and so, the cycle is ongoing). Based on this, we recommend a bottom up approach to hiring speciality employees starting with understanding their employment needs.
So what is a ‘bottom up’ approach?

• Focus on deliverables
Tony Delmarcardo, writing for Entrepeneur.com suggests focusing on deliverables above all else. What does this mean exactly? Well: employees are increasingly wanting autonomy and flexibility in their roles. Smart companies are breaking down roles into the key deliverables and offering flexibility in how these activities might be delivered. This innovative approach is less about the ‘9 to 5’ and incorporates ‘working from home’ and ‘hot desking’ so employees can come and go as they want, so long as they can deliver on agreed outcomes.

• Help them understand how to succeed at your company
Clarifying how success is measured and communicating this to prospective and new employees is a clever strategy to both help them envision success in a new role and increase the likelihood of finding success at your organisation. It’s a strategy that IBM do incredibly well, through their program Succeeding@IBM, which is offered to new recruits and is a useful tool to help them navigate their first two years at IBM. Helping your employees succeed is akin to helping them stay.

So once we’ve tuned into employee needs, how do we recruit them?

• Communicate with both active and passive candidates
LinkedIn is like the ‘golden egg’ of recruitment. Using its search functionality, you can search for particular skills and experience amongst your immediate contacts but also their contacts. Advertising for a role is one thing, but if you are wanting specialist skills, it’s smart to find out which candidates are currently employed but still open to offers. One of Seek’s products, Premium Talent Search, has a similar functionality, but searching the Seek database. You are also able to learn which candidates are potentially open to being approached and can contact those candidates directly.

• Differentiate and communicate
Some of the best ways of attracting top talent is by being an innovative company that seeks out how to do things differently and better than your competitors. On top of this, you need to find ways to communicate this effectively to your market. Top candidates want to work for innovative companies. Make yours one of them.

If you would like support helping to recruit speciality employees, speak to the Recruitment team at Flexi Personnel.