Why structured personnel selection is crucial for attracting and hiring top talent

It's no secret that the modern workforce is becoming increasingly dissatisfied. We recently surveyed 1,500 workers worldwide and found that 84% of respondents are looking for or open to a new job in the next six months.

Whether you call this trend "Great Resignation", "Great Rehiring" or "Great Reshuffle", it has serious implications for how you run your business. And whether you're backfilling employees who have left or creating new positions to meet growth demands, recruitment is sure to be one of your top priorities.

If you want to excel in the current job market, your recruitment strategy is crucial. Today's candidates demand efficiency and respect. Their patience with slow or repetitive processes is at an all-time low.

So how can you get - and keep - the attention of experienced job seekers? With structured hiring processes, you can stand out from the crowd and show candidates how much you value their time and experience.

What is structured hiring? A brief overview

Structured hiring or structured recruitment involves a systematic and scalable approach to every step of the recruitment process. It all starts with a solid partnership between the recruiter and hiring manager, who work together to determine what makes a candidate successful for a job, how to evaluate candidates based on those characteristics, and put together a hiring plan and team that will consistently and fairly evaluate candidates.

With structured recruitment, you no longer rely on gut feeling or instinct, but ask each candidate the same questions and use a standardized rubric to evaluate their answers. Gone are the days of interviewers improvising during the interview or repeating questions that have already been covered in a previous interview. Every contact with candidates is designed to be clear and meaningful and respectful of everyone's time.

The key stages of a structured recruitment process include:

1. kick-off for the role and creation of a scorecard

Define the short and long-term prospects of success for the role and the desired candidate characteristics.

2. scheduling interviews and creating an interview kit

Defining the objective of each interview and the attributes to be assessed.

3. sourcing and interviewing

Conducting an efficient and informative interview based on the scorecard and interview schedule.

4. compilation

Gathering facts and data to support the hiring manager's decision in a structured roundup. Systematic review of data and feedback on final candidates to make an informed decision.

What makes this approach so effective? Here are some of the key benefits.

Why switch to structured recruitment?

It's much faster than traditional recruiting

60% of job seekers say they are unimpressed by time-consuming recruitment processes, and 58% expect to hear back from a company within a week of an interview. However, if your hiring team doesn't know what you're looking for, it's almost impossible to act quickly and decisively. If you've ever interviewed multiple candidates and been unable to make a decision, you know how frustrating that can be for everyone. Structured hiring means you're aligned from the start, which leads to greater efficiency throughout the process. Greenhouse President and Co-Founder Jon Stross puts it this way: " Alignment means speed. That small investment in the kickoff meeting at the beginning of the process is the best way to build speed."

You get more accessible, reliable data

Standardizing how you interact with applicants and move them through your pipeline not only promotes efficiency. It also makes data collection much easier, which increases accountability and informs the recruiting team and others in the organization about what's working - and what's not. You no longer have to guess how close you are to recruiting or hitting your targets. "You want to highlight the good work that's being done," says Matthias Schmeisser, Director of Talent at Beamery. "When you look at the data on talent sourcing, you can really see how competitive the market is, what's working and what's not, and how many touchpoints you should have to attract good candidates."

Applicants appreciate the structured approach

The traditional, unstructured approach to recruitment meant that applicants often had to answer the same questions over and over again. Or worse, they spent the entire time chatting to their interviewer about their hobbies and didn't even talk about the advertised position. No wonder many applicants felt frustrated and disrespected at the end of the interview.

Structured recruitment processes show applicants that every interview has a purpose, and can therefore show different facets of their personality. And those efforts can translate into real results. "What you invest upfront in Structured Hiring has a direct impact on job acceptance and candidate experience," says Alison dela Cruz, Recruitment Lead at trivago. It makes sense: candidates see the interview as a preview of the company culture and working style, and if it feels chaotic or confusing, they are unlikely to accept the offer.

They reduce bias and create a more inclusive process

When interviewers don't have guidelines on what to talk about during the interview, they often ask candidates about their educational background, previous companies, or even their hobbies. While these topics may seem innocuous at first glance, interviewers are still susceptible to cognitive biases, such as "Similar to me" or confirmation bias. This is not intentional, it's just how our brains work. We prefer people who are similar to us and look for information that confirms our existing beliefs.

In a job interview, however, this can be problematic because it can put applicants with a different background at a disadvantage. "Asking interview questions and always asking the same questions in the same order can make a difference," says Riham Satti, CEO and co-founder of MeVitae. A structured and consistent approach to interviewing can limit the impact of this bias and create a more inclusive recruitment process. "Structured recruitment is the foundation for all diversity efforts," says Matthias. Rather than judging applicants based on their similarity to existing employees, structured recruitment guides interviewers to assess an applicant's skills and fit for the open position.

If you want to attract talent in today's market, yesterday's tactics will no longer work. A structured recruitment process will ensure you treat candidates with the respect they deserve - and increasingly demand.

Learn more about Greenhouse.