Bad news. It seems to be everywhere these days. At home and abroad, there are no shortage of scary, horrifying, discouraging stories.
With all this negativity swirling around, it’s easy to get distracted and have trouble focusing on everyday things – like your job. Even if you’re the most passionate recruiter around, hiring the right person might seem sort of inconsequential compared with the big, bad problems facing the world.
However, that couldn’t be further from the truth. As the saying goes, if you want things to change, you have to start in your own backyard.
So here are 3 ways to focus on recruiting in a world gone mad, and maybe even make a difference in the process.
1) Apply the Golden Rule.
You know the one – treat others as you’d want to be treated. It’s a simple concept that seems profoundly lacking in the world today. Just about any situation can be improved by taking the Golden Rule into account – so why not try it with candidates? (Actually, live by it with everyone you come across, but for our purposes let’s stick to candidates.)
Think about how a job seeker will feel going through your application and interview process. Is it unnecessarily complex and time-consuming? Does it fail to communicate with candidates about their status? Many of the standard practices are not designed to make candidates feel valued, or even respected. Of course, time is a factor. But consider what you could do to improve the process – whether it’s setting up an auto-reply email for every applicant, eliminating a few non-essential fields from your online application or taking time to provide feedback to the candidate who didn’t make the cut. It might take a little extra time and effort on your part, but for the anxious, hopeful candidates waiting to hear whether this is the opportunity to finally pan out, it will mean more than you know.
2) Make diversity a priority.
I’m not just talking ethnicity here either. Prioritizing diversity in all its forms – gender, age, education level, socioeconomic status, professional background, etc. – will do more than check a box in your compliance review; it will make your company stronger and more innovative. Pretty much every one of the major conflicts going on in the world involves a lack of acceptance and understanding between people who perceive their differences too great to overcome. It’s a tall order to combat that attitude on a global scale, so start with your workplace.
Let’s assume you’ve already mastered the very difficult task of hiring without bias toward age, gender, race and so on. Can you also resist the urge to focus so much on cultural fit that you miss out on a candidate with an unconventional career path or quirky interview style? It requires a certain level of confidence, but your company will likely be better for it.
3) Give yourself some credit.
We tend to get so comfortable in our day-to-day that we don’t really think about the good things we’re contributing to the world. Take a step back and acknowledge your own positive contributions, small as they may seem.
Making a great new hire benefits your company, reduces the stress of coworkers who have been carrying that extra workload and probably makes a huge positive impact on the hire themselves. Sure, it’s your job. But it also changes people’s lives for the better in your little corner of the world. So appreciate the good you’re doing, and keep doing it.
These suggestions might seem silly or trivial in the face the problems we see on the news and in our social media feeds every day, but don’t discount the power of small changes. From regaining a sense of purpose at work to improving the experience of your candidates and coworkers, doing what you can is far better than doing nothing at all.
Nexxt is a recruitment media company that uses today’s most effective marketing tactics to reach the full spectrum of talent – from active to passive, and everything in between. Learn more about hiring with Nexxt.