The average hiring cycle has risen sharply in the past few years (from 13 days to over 23 days). Some positions take even longer—2 months or more to make a hire. All of this lost time slows down team momentum and actually leads to a sloppier hiring process, not a more careful one. Not only that, many of the top job candidates are off the market in 10 days or less. Companies that take a long time to hire are depriving themselves of the best talent in the industry.

This year, aim to slash the hiring time by 50%. Here are the best ways to cut down lag time on a new hire:

Diagnose the problem areas

Start by taking a quick look at the numbers. How long did it take to hire the last 3 employees? Break down the hiring process into role creation, role approval, applicant tracking/sourcing, screening, interviewing, and extending the offer. Which takes the most time? Where can the process be sped up? Most companies lose steam in screening and interviewing candidates.

Plan out the hiring cycle

Set a deadline for onboarding the new hire. While most hiring cycles do not go exactly according to plan, having a deadline creates an incentive for good time management and fast responses. It is a common pitfall to subconsciously underestimate the time it takes to make the hire.

Start by coordinating the schedules of everyone involved in making the hire. Most companies try to get too many people involved in the hiring process, which can create confusion and delays. Best practice is to include the person who will be directly managing the employee, someone who can drill them on the technical skills, and preferably one team member who would be working alongside them.

If one of the hiring managers will be traveling, overloaded, or working on a complex project, consider reassessing the hiring timeline or cutting them out of the hiring process altogether. Good candidates may stick it out for a long hiring process, but most won’t.

Urgency bonus

Sometimes, a long hiring cycle happens when a manager is afraid of hiring the wrong person. This is a valid concern, because bad hires are expensive—but so is a long hiring cycle. A delayed hire can mean expensive overtime, overworked team members, missed deadlines, or even falling behind in market competitiveness.

For companies that work with recruiters (internal or external), an urgency bonus is a great incentive to keep things moving. The bonus should be enough to overcome the temptation to procrastinate, but not so big that the hiring manager is tempted to rush the hire.

Resist “Mini Me” and “Queen Bee” Syndrome

Most hiring managers want to hire someone with a similar industry background and skill mix, essentially, someone whose resume looks just like their own…minus 5 years of experience and 25% in salary, give or take. The reality is that it’s more comfortable to hire “mini me” people with a similar background, but the strongest and highest-performing teams are diverse—in strengths as well as in personality.

Avoid “mini me” syndrome in a hiring cycle. The best teams have diverse work histories.

The other pitfall to avoid is “queen bee” syndrome. It can be tempting to always go after the perfect candidate with the strongest career path, best leadership qualities, impeccable background, and every skill under the sun. Not only are these “queen bee” candidates rare and expensive, but they also often are not what is needed. Most teams are made up of worker bees. Resist the urge to insist on every skill, and assess what is truly needed in the role.

Training Skills and “Bend” Points

In today’s market, there is a resistance to on-the-job training at nearly every seniority level. Many hiring managers overestimate the amount of experience they need in a candidate, but they underestimate what someone can learn on the job. Keep in mind that a newly hired person is more likely to put in extra hours and extra work to close their skills gap. In many cases, hiring managers wait around for an extra 3 months for the perfect candidate, when they could have hired someone slightly less senior and trained them on the job in less time than it took to find them.

Backfills vs. New Roles

In the staffing industry, recruiters know that backfills nearly always get filled faster than newly created positions. In fact, many new roles change several times during the hiring process. Many never get filled at all. This is because backfill roles are under pressure to fill. Keep this in mind when creating a new role. It is a huge time drain to get everyone involved in a hiring project that may change three times and still take six months to fill.

Most hiring managers prefer to focus on their projects, not on drawn-out hiring cycles. Cutting down the hiring cycle time benefits everyone. It takes dedication, so set multiple milestones if necessary. By slashing wasted time in the hiring process, companies will boost morale, get on top of projects faster, and hit their goals at a better rate than the competition.

Recently I was asked, “When you are working on a search for one of your best clients, and the resumes come to you, how quickly can you determine if it is someone your client will be interested in?”

I was honest and admitted it only took about five seconds. He gasped on the other end of the phone and asked what I do with the people who don’t cut the mustard. I told him our process was telling candidates that they are not a fit for our current role, but that I will keep their information for other opportunities and imply that we will likely have something for them in the future.

He calmed down, but pointed out that what really frustrates him is that quite a few hiring managers only look at resumes for a few seconds after many of them prolong the application process, which can take candidates multiple hours to submit. It is no longer just sending in a resume. He said it disgusts him that they are only spending five seconds looking at an application that likely took two hours to apply to.

He made a great point; it’s not a fair tradeoff. This got me thinking; are we really being fair to people who want to work for us? Candidates have spent two hours of time filling out an application for the chance to join your company, yet we are only giving them five seconds of review before we make a decision.

Today, everyone is talking about customer experience management; creating a consistent, desirable and differentiated experience across all touch-points with your organization. According to a Walker study, by the year 2020, customer experience will overtake price and products as the key brand differentiator.

The reality is that every time you or someone in your company engages a customer, it creates an experience that they remember. A positive emotional experience anchors them to you, whereas a negative experience will encourage them to head straight to your competitor. Where are the hidden opportunities to add enough value for our customers that it begins to offset the effort they’ve expended for us, thus forging a more equitable exchange?

Big box industries say that the key is Voice of the Customer (VOC) tools like reviews and surveys. Hotel chains and software companies ask their biggest customers, “What can we do differently?” and “How did we do?”

But how do you encourage your customers to take the time to volunteer this type of feedback? You try to dangle a carrot. Entice them with a discount, money, gift card or future services. Valuable comments are only going to be offered if something is in it for them, right? Never is a customer going to say they will drop everything to give a company advice on their service. Everyone is money-driven, and everyone is time-driven.

In recruiting; we are trying to best service our clients and candidates. But rarely do recruiting firms solicit clients  to ask how they can service them better. From a recruiting perspective, a question that is always asked from our clients is, “How do you differentiate yourself?” We go into recruiter autopilot, explaining very quickly what sets us apart: “We offer a full year guarantee, access to great candidates, we are fast, and we have a winning success rate. We are available 24-7 and offer a human touch, etc.….”

Yes, these are all positive ways to set your firm apart. But are they really differentiating? Probably not.

When it comes to customer experience management how do we as recruiters better ourselves and put the client first? The answer can be applied to every business interaction, and that is:

Ask better questions.

Questions such as:

• “What can we be doing differently?”
• “What are you looking for from a recruiter?”
• “Can you fill the role on your own?”
• “What type of talent are you searching for?”
• “Does a full-year guarantee mean anything to you?”
• “Do you want your industry’s #1 sales player in this industry? Or do you need someone in the chair who’s capable of doing the job?”

I have learned over the years that if we ask the right questions and understand the client’s needs, we create better relationships and earn long term results.

The truth is that dangling a carrot in exchange for reviews doesn’t work. Once you have formed a relationship with them, they will offer genuine feedback and ways to help. The best way to manage your customer experience comes back to better questioning. Dig deeper. Ask questions like:

• “What is important to you in your career?”
• “Where do you want to be in ten years?”
• “How will you get there and why?”

Over 90% of professionals won’t know the answers to these questions. But that is okay, because we as recruiters are here as sounding boards to help them better understand companies, industry trends, and even their own needs.

At the end of the day, the most valuable reviews come from asking the right questions. No one truly tells you how to do things differently until they are upset or realize that things went wrong.

When you think of customer experience management, are you really listening to your customer? Here at Blue Signal, we pride ourselves on asking the right questions and are always open to hearing how we can improve.

Feel free to hear our full line of questions on the client side by reaching out at [email protected] .