Remote hiring has become the norm over the past years. The digital revolution has made recruitment easier, faster, and more convenient – not just for candidates searching for employment opportunities, but also for employers.
So, here’s the big question – how do you efficiently hire candidates remotely?
You’ll need a solid recruitment process to ensure you get the best candidates for the job. If you’re in need to upgrade your remote hiring skills, this article is for you.
Why Should You Start Hiring Remotely?
In a nutshell, remote recruitment involves sourcing, interviewing, and hiring employees with the use of online tools such as an applicant tracking system. Recruiters utilize technology to communicate and connect with candidates, no matter where they may be.
Embracing remote recruitment trends has become vital today as many global companies transition to a hybrid work setup. As more individuals opt for remote or hybrid working arrangements, remote recruitment has become the new standard.
An 8-Step Guide on Hiring Remote Employees
1. Prepare Your Brand
As you start to lay the groundwork for hiring new employees, you should think about your brand’s reputation in the market. Your brand defines the kind of culture potential employees are looking for and positions yourself as the employer of their choice. If you’re conducting internet checks on your potential candidates – they could also be doing the same to your company.
One way to build your employer brand is by optimizing your online profiles such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and Glassdoor to reflect your company’s values and culture.
2. Post Accurate and Engaging Job Ads
Writing accurate and engaging job advertisements is always a good rule of thumb during the recruitment process, but it’s especially important when you’re hiring remote candidates. To do this effectively, you need to create a brief outline of the job’s responsibilities, expectations, and work arrangements.
You can also improve your job postings by adding videos to them. This is one of the best virtual recruitment techniques you can employ because it lets you establish a more personal connection with candidates. In fact, a study from CareerBuilder states that job postings with videos receive 34% greater application rates compared to image-based and text-based job ads.
To make it more relevant, you can ask members of your team to send you video clips sharing important details about the role, expectations, and company culture.
3. Utilize Your Assets
Apart from using job boards for your openings, you can also add a dedicated Careers page to your website. Strategizing for an effective career page may require some technical expertise but, it’s a cost-efficient way for your company to post job ads because you forego the expenses of posting on online listings.
Additionally, you can also ask your team for referrals.
As employees already have insider knowledge of how the company works and its culture, it’s easier for them to refer candidates who are fit for the vacant position. Use incentives to encourage colleagues to refer candidates.
For instance, you can allocate a referral fee for every position available, let employees know about this, and have them share a link to your Careers page on their social profiles. Using your hiring software to keep track of employee referrals is one way to ensure that they receive their reward.
4. Leverage Remote Recruitment Tools
A problem that most companies face when recruiting remote employees is the large volume of applicants. The overwhelming number of applications can be detrimental to your hiring process, especially if you don’t have a stable workflow in place.
One way to combat this is to use a recruitment management system that can help you filter applications and shortlist candidates. With a recruitment management software, you can monitor each candidate’s progress in the virtual recruitment cycle.
Other online recruitment tools you can use include social recruiting software that drives qualified job seekers from platforms such as Facebook and LinkedIn directly to your postings.
5. Use a Virtual Interviewing Process
Thanks to the rise of video messaging apps such as Zoom, remote recruiting is now easier than ever before. Even the world’s leading companies like Amazon, Google, Facebook, and Microsoft are integrating virtual job interviews into their hiring process.
In your remote recruitment process, utilize both one-way and two-way video interviewing in various stages. One-way interviewing can replace a phone screening, whereas two-way virtual interviews are solid alternatives to in-person meetings.
6. Stay Aligned with the Team
It’s crucial that you and your remote recruiting team are on the same page throughout the hiring process—especially when everyone is operating from different locations. Stay aligned by ensuring each member knows what steps they need to complete and the deadlines for each task.
Assign who will determine the top talents, interview the potential candidates, and who gets the final word. Then, keep everyone in the loop by constantly updating them. For instance, in your team’s management software, make use of comments, notifications, and mentions for effective collaboration.
7. Keep Candidates Engaged
The crux that most remote employee recruitment guides have is candidate engagement. One way to do this is to keep job seekers informed of the status of their applications.
Many companies tend to leave candidates in the dark about their applications. Don’t make the same mistake because candidate experience is important as this will reflect on review sites such as Glassdoor and LinkedIn. Keeping candidates posted about their application’s status and sharing your organization’s decision can give a good impression and help retain the relationship.
Listed are some template ideas to help you get started:
- Application is rejected because a candidate didn’t meet the qualifications.
- A candidate’s application is still in review.
- The candidate is being considered for other positions.
- The application was a success.
Once you’ve created your template, you can simply schedule out these messages for your candidates.
8. Onboard Them Virtually
Virtual onboarding is the final step in the remote recruitment process. With effective virtual onboarding, you keep new hires engaged as they continue to work from a distance.
As your onboarding will be completely done online, you can start the process even before a new hire’s official start date – as long as you get their approval to do so. This will help generate excitement and make remote employees feel welcome in the organization.
It’s best to not overwhelm or bombard them with training and orientations in the first week. Spread the onboarding sessions over a period of two to three weeks. After all, the timing and quality of your onboarding process play a crucial part in an employee’s opinion of your organization.
To successfully onboard new employees virtually, you can use a combination of media. Here are several actions you can take:
- Create a PDF guide or presentation deck about your company, your core values, key personnel, software or applications used, challenges, etc.
- Set the new employee up with the hardware, tools, and applications needed for their role
- Conduct weekly catch-ups or check-ins and invite them to all team meetings
Additionally, letting your new hires learn more about their colleagues and supervisors can help build a stronger working relationship to motivate them to work hard together as a team.
Set Your Company Up for Remote Hiring Success
Now that you’ve learned how to hire remote employees, you can now put your new knowledge into action. Implementing this process in your organization will surely elevate your remote hiring process and improve employee engagement.
With the help of our guide and the latest tools in online recruitment, you’re sure to be hiring high-quality employees in no time.
