Recruitment is an essential aspect of running a successful company because it helps identify and onboard the right employees to help the company achieve its goals.
To undertake successful recruitment, there are steps you must follow. If you follow these processes, you will be sure of getting the best heads into vacant positions in the company.
Table of Contents
Here are the stages of recruitment
- First, you need to identify the vacancy
- Undertake a job analysis
- Create a job description
- Craft a person specification
- Put out adverts for the vacancy
- Call for the submission of curriculum vitae’s (CVs) or send out application forms
- Develop an effective means of collecting the application forms/CVS
- Make a shortlist of successful candidates
- Conduct interviews and tests
- Reach out to successful candidates and inform them of their recruitment
Because recruitment and selection are knitted into each other, the first six stages constitute the recruitment process, while the last four make up the selection process.
Just to we are on the same page and not confuse recruitment with selection, selection refers to the methods adopted to choose the most suitable candidate for a job.
On the other hand, recruitment refers to finding people who will work for a company. Hopefully, our distinction clears the argument about recruitment and selection.
Now, let’s discuss the stages of recruitment
Stage 1. Identify the vacancy
A vacancy becomes available when someone leaves an organization leaving their role or position vacant. In these instances, it’s easy to spot these vacancies because there is an existing role.
However, identifying vacancies in a new or expanding firm can be tricky because identifying what vacancies are available can be tricky.
Stage 2. Undertake job analysis
You can think of job analysis as identifying the skills and tasks needed to fill the position. Undertaking job analysis helps organizations decide if they need to fill the vacancy with a new person or distribute the roles to other staff.
Job analysis also provides the recruiter with all the information he/she needs to write the job description and person specification.
Stage 3. Create a job description
In the job description stage, you need to develop a document that spells out the duties, pay, work hours, location, and work conditions.
Stage 4. Craft a person specification
Similar to the job description, creating a person description involves creating a document that highlights the skills and qualifications required for the job. The person description can also serve as a yardstick by which the organization can screen candidates.
Stage 5. Put out adverts for the vacancy
Depending on the organization’s decision and what they intend to achieve with the recruitment, adverts for recruitment can either be internal or external. Internal recruitment is intended to promote people who are already working in the organization. Such adverts are mostly posted on the company’s intranet or notice board.
External recruitment, as the name implies, involves bringing people from outside the organization. You will find advertisements for external recruitment in national dailies, local press or been announced by a recruitment agency. Another method of external advertising recruitment is via online advertisement.
Stage 6. Call for the submission of curriculum vitae’s (CVs) or send out application forms
Having posted advertisements or announced the vacancy, you can consider making application forms available to candidates interested in applying for the position.
Another way to go is to call for the submission of curriculum vitae (CVS). Application forms are prepared by the organization and designed to collect information they need to decide who fits into the role.
The candidates prepare the Curriculum vitae, and it presents a summary of their education, qualifications, and prior employment experience or history.
Conclusion
As we mentioned earlier, the last four stages of the recruitment process are the selection stages.
The selection stages involve collecting the CVs or application forms, making a shortlist of qualified candidates, conducting tests and interviews, and contacting the successful candidates.
Generally, you can think of the recruitment process in five (5) steps:
- Recruitment planning (drafting job specification and person description)
- strategy development (determining recruitment method),
- searching (source of target candidates — either internal or external),
- screening,
- evaluation and control.
Evaluation and control are essential because recruitment often incurs cost. Some of these costs include preparing job analysis and advertisements, administrative expenses, cost of outsourcing, and salary of recruiters, among others. If you are worried about finding the best candidate to fill any vacancy, it is best to contact a recruitment specialist to manage your recruitment process. That way, you can go to sleep with both eyes closed, knowing you have competent hands managing your recruitment.