How to attract the right staff in a tight labour market

Article

When people talk about ‘brand’ they often think solely from a customer perspective. However, a strong ’employer brand’ is also critical when attracting the right talent to your business. With a shift in skill-set requirements across most industries, it’s more important than ever to attract the right potential employees, especially in such a tight labour market.

So how do you go about attracting great talent to your business?

Give prospects the full picture.
When you have a role to fill, make sure you…

Describe the working environment in your job description and publish this on your website and on social media
Add a careers page, with details on the company culture as well as the job
Provide some insight into company life, why people would want to work for you and why you might be better than the competition.
Attracting the right candidates
Build personas of the types of talent you’d like to hire. From there, you can build a profile of your ideal candidate.

The profile can include:

Education
Work experience
Personal activities
Aspirations and goals
Values
Personal life and family situation

Once you have a profile, you can engineer questions to ascertain whether a candidate will be a good fit. Additionally, you can tailor the advert and medium to speak to that profile.

Writing the job advert

The job market is running hot and it’s tough to attract good staff. You need to write a job listing that will help your role stand out from the crowd. Here are three tips for writing an appealing job ad:

1. Sell the role upfront

Instead of beginning with a job description or a list of requirements, sell the role first. Think about what makes the job most appealing; it might be the industry, location, salary or perks. Spell out the advantages as clearly as you can – with the numbers if possible – early on in the listing. Include anything that will grab people’s attention and encourage them to read more.

2. Keep it short and simple

Longer job ads, packed with jargon, might seem like they’re making your business sound impressive. But, if candidates have hundreds of jobs to choose from, they might simply look at a dense wall of text and move to the next advertisement. Aim for straightforward, readable language without unnecessary words or repetition. Keep your job listing to a maximum of 700 words – any longer and you risk losing the reader.

3. Avoid meaningless clichés

Almost all companies think they have an ‘amazing team’ and a ‘fast-paced environment’. All jobs call for a ‘self-starter’ or a ‘superstar’ with ‘excellent communication skills’. Everyone says they’re offering a ‘competitive salary’. Instead of using these meaningless phrases, be more specific – provide the actual salary, for instance. Describe the job, the team and the environment clearly and accurately. This helps the candidate get a genuine understanding of what the role is all about.

Hiring can be challenging, but the right team can really support the growth of your business. For other ideas on business growth, we’re here to help! We always love to hear from our clients, so get in touch.

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