Tech Recruitment Mistakes - HR Do ALL the Recruitment

A lot of people associate recruitment with HR, think they are the same. Wrong.

Thinking Mistake;

As HR is often involved with recruitment, business leaders then think they can unload all of the work involved with recruitment onto their HR department. Recruitment is probably a small percentage of what they actually do and if it’s not a direct impact on them or their department they will often not feel the pain as much as you, as a tech leader will or what your team will feel.

Action Mistake;

This then leads business leaders to dump all the core functions of recruitment onto HR and asking them to take control of the whole process.

Why it's a mistake;

HR is a great part of the process but they should not completely control it. If you are hiring for a tech position, that person will not end up working in HR so the candidate will have very little interest in speaking with HR at the beginning. If you are tech person you want to be talking to the lead of that department to understand what exactly the position looks like, who they will be working with and what the challenges are - something that HR will not be able to answer in detail or give further credibility to the position which in the end can lead to the candidate losing interest quickly. Business owners think that HR should control most of the process as they are usually responsible for all employees so they don’t get involved in the recruitment process until the end. As result candidates lose interest in the position as HR won’t always understand the pain of the department or be able to articulate what the main challenges are in the position and therefore they will miss out on good people.

Solution;

Our advice is that if the position is in your department and under your direct responsibility get involved with the recruitment process from the beginning, people want to work for you, not HR, otherwise they would apply for an HR position in their team, right? Make sure you are screening all the resumes that come in as it will stop you from losing a few gems that HR could miss by only looking at buzzwords. Alternatively working with an experienced recruiter/talent acquisition specialist that understands exactly what you are looking for can reduce this 'screening time' by only proposing suitable people. Ask HR to support you if needed but not to control the process but keep them in cc on everything you do so they know what’s happening. Personally, my favorite tool for collaborative recruitment is Workable which is great at keeping everyone informed (even recruiters).