Minimizing Turnover Is the Key to Avoiding A Lengthy Hiring Process In IT in 2015
Companies everywhere are looking for ways to shorten their hiring processes so they can get the top-tier technical talent they need in the doors as soon as possible. With the increasingly shallow talent pool and rapidly growing demand, employers everywhere are feeling the crunch as suitable talent grows more difficult to find with each passing day.
On a year-over-year basis IT employment has grown by 5% since April of 2014. With the IT workforce growing by 234,400 workers, many employers are trying to make their organizations the most enticing and attractive to competent technical professionals. As Mark Roberts, the CEO of TechServe Alliance, points out, “IT employment continues to outperform the growth rate of the overall workforce.” Therefore, approaching your hiring process in IT the same way you’re approaching your hiring process for other employees won’t be effective.
One way to avoid the lengthy hiring process is to offer the best of the best when it comes to salary, benefits, and growth opportunities. To attract top-tier talent to your organization you’ll need to pull out all the stops and offer a competitive salary along with stellar benefits like unlimited paid time off, flextime, telecommuting, and annual bonuses. As for growth opportunities, having benefits like tuition reimbursement or initiatives for internal promotions will show IT talent that you’re willing to invest in their skillset over the long term.
Once you attract the excellent technical talent you need, your best bet for avoiding a lengthy hiring process is to lower your turnover rate. According to Laszlo Block, SVP of Google’s People Operations, surrounding great employees with equally great people, and giving them meaningful work, are the two keys to ensuring that someone sticks around for years as opposed to a few months. Even at a successful IT organization like Google, people will come for the money and great benefits but stay because they believe in the mission and respect the people they interact with on a day-to-day basis.
As the IT job market becomes increasingly competitive your organization’s best bet at having the talented technical team they need is to focus on offering the best salary, benefits, and growth opportunities you can while fostering an environment with a low turnover rate. Otherwise you’ll keep drawing from the same shallow well of IT employment and continue the cycle of lengthy hiring processes.