Publishing and checking recruiting trend reports awaken ever greater interest. It is difficult to open a business magazine without an article about some new fancy recruiting trend. A recruiting trend may truly reflect what is happening right now or be an indication of something that will happen in the future. But pay attention. A recruiting trend is not a truth carved in stone, no matter how exciting/trendy it may sound or how much publicity it may get. Also, sometimes it reflects the marketing department of companies promoting their recruiting-related software or services, and who between the lines implies to us: “It is in your best interest to buy our product”.
How interested you are in the subject and how you look at it depends on if you are a company or a private person. How a particular recruiting trend might impact a company depends on the situation, its needs, goals, and actions. How an employee or job seeker feels about a recruiting trend is likewise always in the eyes of the beholder.
I see a recruiting trend as a signal predicting a potential recruiting-related activity, action or behaviour, given the conditions that are the basis for the trend, will prevail. Sometimes the signal is so strong that one can almost take for granted that the predicted activity, action, or behaviour will happen. Sometimes even a strong signal vanishes like in thin air, never to return. What it predicted did not occur.
It is worth noting that recruiting trends (not any for that matter) are not necessarily commensurable, no matter how global, trendy/popular, or similar they may look. Differences may exist between different countries, cultures, economies, geographical areas, industries, markets, individual companies, and persons. Various parties publishing what they see as potential future recruiting trends often have different perspectives and interests in the subject and approach this subject with different points of view. A “local approach”, if you will.
Conditions and recruiting trends change over time, also how we look at them. Extraordinary times and unexpected happenings like war, pandemics, and recession often strongly impact how we think about recruiting “trends”. Some examples of this are below.
Remote work was predicted as a recruiting trend already ten years ago. Yet it was only Covid-19 that made this trend an actual reality worldwide, by necessity. Nowadays, remote work is a common practice, almost a virtue in some professions. However, no matter how popular it may be nowadays, remote work does not suit all professions and industries and never will. Even if possible to implement, it would simply put, for many, cost more than it would benefit. So, very useful for some, not at all for others. But here to stay for sure.
Employer Branding and Candidate Experience are like really hot recruiting trends right now. Yet, when I was in the Executive Search industry (for over 30 years), there was not a single assignment where these “subjects” were not somehow discussed and paid attention to. These two “subjects” have been on the table for a long time, even well before my time. Nowadays, they just happen to be extraordinary “hot trends” due to the present conditions and challenges prevailing in the recruiting market. But it is good to remember that this is not a new thing. There exist many companies for whom Employer Branding and Candidate Experience have been the cornerstone of their recruiting strategy all through their existence, to this very day. But maybe for many others, it has until now been just empty words, and who only now have realised how important this is.
I feel a recruiting trend has many dimensions. I, therefore, analyse recruiting trends via three categories:
1) values, attitudes, ethics, and morale
2) technology
3) recruiting best practices
Three different ways of looking at this. This gives me a clearer understanding of the recruiting trends and helps me analyse how they may impact me and my behaviour.
1) Values, attitude, ethics, and morale
Any action or behaviour in a recruiting process also reflects values, attitudes, ethics, and morale. The world has changed a lot in only the last ten years. How we think about these issues determines what we do in any recruiting-related situation. We evermore face situations where we have to ask ourselves, do we cross some line here when using technology and AI to process candidates in a recruiting process. Do our recruiting process consider the best interest of both parties, or do we perhaps prioritise promoting our efficiency over treating the candidates well? When is too much too much, or perhaps even wrong? How do we avoid starting to do something “wrong”, which may negatively impact things like employer brand, employee satisfaction, candidate experience, and our long-term success and profitability over time? Mind you, it does not have to be a conscious action. It can happen by mistake.
2) Technology
The keywords here are technology vs recruiting need. We today develop “software/hardware tools” for every recruiting-related purpose imaginable. We now live in a world where only the imagination seems to limit the technology and tools being created. If someone thinks there is a need, a “product” trying to satisfy that need will be developed. But technology is just something having the potential to help you to do something. There is no silver bullet in solving your recruiting challenges by itself. Also, wrong technology can backfire. Only you can define what you want to do and why. Only you can choose the right technology, tool or practice for your needs. So, the main question to be answered here is: Does this solve my problem? Mind you, what is good for someone else is not always necessarily the right solution for you and vice versa.
3) Recruiting best practices
A Best Practice, simply put, is a method or technique by which you try to achieve your goals that is superior to any alternatives because it produces results that are superior to those achieved by other means. In the last 10-15 years, there has been a big change in how recruiting processes are conducted, how candidates are approached and attracted, and how job-seeking candidates go by when trying to land a new job. A best practice approach helps analyse these changes. Without a best practice, how can we know if a recruiting trend, perhaps promoting a new action, process, behaviour, or technology, is in our best interest? Even the best technology in the world cannot help us if we use it the wrong way. Also, it seldom, if ever, is a must or wise to adapt to every recruiting trend out there. If our recruiting best practices are in order, and we follow them, we can successfully conduct high-standard recruiting processes in all situations.
A list of recruiting trends
Below are some examples of present days recruiting trends. The list is in alphabetical order. It is for the reader to define the importance of any individual trend from their situation/needs point of view. What is important for some may be totally irrelevant for someone else. As can be seen, some trends have been with us for a long time, now “reinvented” and looked at from present day recruiting challenges.
Try using the three categories when checking them. Gave you any new ideas?
- Artificial Intelligence & automation
- Augmented and virtual reality
- Boomerang Hires
- Candidate Experience
- Candidate Relationship Management
- Collaborative hiring
- Company career websites
- Compliance with GDPR top priority.
- Conclusion
- Data-Driven recruiting
- Diversity and inclusion
- Do away with Paper Resumes
- Employee Benefits rethinking
- Employee health and wellbeing
- Employee referral programs
- Employer Branding
- Ethical leadership
- Gamification
- Higher level of transparency in recruiting
- HR Analytics
- HR outsourcing
- HR Technology
- Inbound Recruiting
- Increased Emphasis on Using Social Networks
- Internal Candidate Databases
- Internal Recruitment
- Internet job boards
- Mobile sourcing and recruiting
- Networking
- Optimisation of the recruiting process
- Organised Interviews
- Recruitment Marketing
- Referrals
- Reinvention of the interview: new tools, different focus
- Remote hiring and onboarding
- Remote Work & Mobile Work Environment
- Skills testing and behavioural assessment
- Social media recruiting
- Soft Skills: Looking beyond the traditional set of skills
- Strategic alignment – linking recruiting with the company’s overall strategic goals.
- Structured interviews
- Talent acquisition – Talent Pools – Talent Relationship Management
- Transferable skills
- Upskilling a strategic benefit
- Work Flexibility
- Work/life balance facilitation