4 Ways Technology Has Transformed Hiring in Past 10 Years

Hiring technology continuously evolves, empowering hiring managers to create a better candidate experience and drive hiring efficiencies. And having a successful hiring strategy in place is more important than ever before, given the historically-low unemployment rate and tight labor market. 

As a new decade kicks off, it’s a better time than ever to reflect on hiring technology and trends that have emerged in the past 10 years – and how your team can leverage the latest technology to turn your people into a source of competitive advantage. 

Below, we’ve outlined several of the top ways technology has transformed hiring in the past decade – and how you can set yourself up for success by making the most of hiring technology. 

1. Search algorithms have changed how job descriptions are written 

Over the past decade, as most job applications have switched from paper to digital, job seekers have also increasingly searched for their next career moves online. In fact, more than 70 percent of job searches begin on Google, so if your job descriptions aren’t reaching job seekers in search results, you’ll miss out on a significant portion of the talent pool.

It’s important to write job descriptions with Google search results in mind. Start by keeping your job titles short and sweet – avoid including anything about sign-on bonuses or other added details in the job title. In Google results, standard job titles that are most likely to match what job seekers are searching rank higher in search results.

Also keep your job descriptions short – ideally between 300 and 800 words. In your job description, share what makes your team stand out – including a strong company overview, list of responsibilities and requirements, an overview of your benefits and opportunities for career growth. Also state the exact address of your open role(s) – including the zip code – as jobs with specific locations outlined are more likely to rank higher in Google results. And make sure to refresh your posted jobs after a reasonable amount of time, as older jobs do not rank well on Google.

2. Mobile is key to an effective, engaging candidate experience

Not only have job searches and applications moved online, but job seekers are also increasingly tapping into their mobile devices throughout the job search. In fact, more than 90 percent of job seekers use their mobile devices at one point while searching and applying to jobs. Given this trend, your organization needs to have a strategy in place to engage with job seekers on mobile devices. 

One way to reach job seekers on their mobile devices is by making your career site content and job applications mobile-friendly. Hireology data found that adding additional questions to a job application decreases apply rates by 20 percent. To address this challenge, we recently rolled out a mobile-friendly, basic application.

With this update, the job description and job application pages have been streamlined into one page, boosting applicant traffic by 33 percent. The updated application also only includes four required fields – first name, last name, email address and phone number – with an option to attach a resume.

Another way to keep candidates engaged via mobile devices is by leveraging text messaging for communication throughout the hiring process. Hireology data found that text messaging can decrease total time to hire by an average of eight days – and any steps you can take to decrease your time to hire are critical in today’s competitive hiring market. 

Text messaging can be used to schedule interviews, share directions to your workplace, follow up with feedback post-interview and remind candidates of actions they need to take – such as
completing prescreen surveys. Tapping into text messaging will ultimately save your team time and help you support continuous communication with candidates.

Not only can mobile technology help you keep candidates engaged but it can also make your job easier as a hiring manager. Text messaging can save time you would have otherwise spent playing phone tag with candidates or sending multiple emails that end up getting lost in a crowded inbox. And it can be further streamlined with mass text messaging to multiple candidates. 

In addition to text messaging, you can tap into mobile technology to simplify other aspects of your day-to-day role. With some of Hireology’s latest product updates, you can now create new jobs via mobile devices and even view Insights, our Q&A analytics solution, on your mobile device, enabling you to gauge the health of your hiring process even when you’re on the go. We’re excited to roll out additional mobile enhancements throughout 2020.

3. Technology streamlines hiring steps

The latest hiring process can help you automate many steps during the hiring process that previously had to be completed manually. And the time you save as a result will enable you to dedicate your time to more strategic tasks to help your business grow. Streamlined hiring stops will also enable you to hire top talent sooner, boosting productivity and profitability at your organization. 

One step that can be easily streamlined is initial candidate review. Automated prescreen surveys can be sent to applicants, to cut back on initial applicant review time and weed out those who are not a fit. Applicants who score well on prescreen surveys are then sent to the candidate stage of your hiring process for your hiring managers to review, saving time that would have been spent manually reviewing unqualified applicants.

Later in the hiring process, a final step your team should always take before extending a job offer is verifying candidates using reference and background checks – another step that can easily be automated. For reference checks, candidates can simply fill in their references’ contact information and surveys are automatically sent out – saving you from tracking down references for a phone call. And for background checks, candidates can submit the required personal information and the rest of the process is taken care of automatically. 

4. Post-hire technology drives increased productivity 

In the past, onboarding new hires was a tedious, manual process. But with the latest hiring technology, you can seamlessly transfer candidate data to your post-hire systems, such as onboarding, payroll and scheduling. 

At a lot of organizations, employees spend the majority of their first day filling out administrative paperwork. But as more time is spent on paperwork, employees might lose the initial excitement they had when they accepted the job offer – and time spent on paperwork also leads to lost productivity. 

In recent years, digital onboarding has emerged, enabling employers to cut back on administrative tasks during a new hire’s first day or week. With digital onboarding, new employees can fill out paperwork once their offer letters are signed and kick off their day-to-day work sooner rather than later. And it saves your HR team from spending time repeating the same onboarding tasks each time a new employee is hired.

Onboarding tasks that can be completed before the first day include: filling out direct deposit information for automated payroll, completing tax forms, filling out benefits paperwork and signing the employee handbook.

These are just a few of the many ways technology has positively impacted the hiring process and employee experience in the past decade. With the right hiring partner in place, you can support a top notch candidate experience, while saving your team time and money that can be reallocated elsewhere in the business.

Hireology is here to help you make the most of the latest technology to attract top talent, hire qualified employees and connect them with your HR systems. Interested in learning more? See a demo today.

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