Top Challenges for Recruiters in 2022 and How To Overcome Them

The findings were not surprising, considering the challenges the profession had to confront last year. In late 2020, XpertHR was surveyed to identify the top concerns for the human resource management profession in the coming year. 66% of the 563 employers who attended the survey singled out hiring as the biggest challenge. From hastily having to re-assess their relationships with workers due to the pandemic to prioritizing values of diversity and inclusion spurred by widespread social justice protests, recruiters have had a challenging year. 

As organizations try to redefine best practices across the board to ease through this transitional period, recruiters are gearing up for another challenging year. Let's take a closer look at the most critical HR challenges in 2021 and possible solutions to overcoming them in more detail.

Digital recruitment

The rapid switch to digital recruitment during the pandemic has been an arduous task for many enterprises. Many hiring managers are still grappling with the shifting trends of hiring in this transitional phase, and there is a lot of ground to cover. There have also been cases of companies switching back to face-face interviews, only to rebound back to virtual recruitment following another wave of the pandemic. 

It has therefore become essential to quickly address challenges posed by virtual recruitment to make progress. According to this LinkedIn report, 81% of talent professionals say that virtual recruitment will continue in the future, while 70% add that it will become the new norm. There are, after all, multiple advantages to digital recruitment, including scheduling flexibility, cost savings, and an expanded candidate pool. Therefore, shifting the focus to rapidly upskilling hiring managers to navigate virtual recruitment with ease would help organizations hire better and faster in these testing times.

Changes in the talent pool

The changing nature of the workplace in the post-pandemic world has not impacted all organizations in a homogeneous manner. For example, organizations making the shift to remote work a fixture for the foreseeable future has seen their geographical pool of talent expand. At the same time, the opposite has been the case with organizations returning to traditional setups due to safety, mobility, etc. For them, the shrinking of their talent pool has been compounded by the closure of international borders and ongoing governmental restrictions. 

Interestingly, the LinkedIn report also mentions that recruiters have an excellent opportunity to become indispensable to their organizations because of these changes. An anywhere-in-the-world approach to remote work could be crucial to improving talent acquisition as we move forward in an increasingly digital world. Remote work is also predicted to improve the geographical diversity of applicants by at least 20%. Therefore, the onus is on recruiters to lead the way, applying efficient workforce planning, insights, and resources that only they are uniquely positioned to provide.

Virtual Onboarding 

As virtual recruitment and remote work take center stage, an inevitable consequence is new hires having to onboard virtually. Starting a new job can be intimidating, and an unfamiliar virtual setting can aggravate such anxieties. Moreover, if starters are not given the right amount of guidance, a sense of community, and purpose in their initial days, the workflow will suffer. 

Nonetheless, recruiters have the choice to get creative with the virtual onboarding process. Organizing virtual meets with new teammates and delivering a clear idea of the work culture and schedules are important points to add to your checklist. Using clear communication and adding a personal touch to your interactions from day one would go a long way in equipping starters with the motivation and a sense of purpose that will help them perform well. 

Tighter budgets and heightened caution

As they recover from the slowdown, several businesses are adopting a cautious approach to hiring. Many are yet to revoke hiring freezes. And due to the increased strain on budgets, getting the right hire has become more crucial than ever. Therefore, enterprises are forced to take a more rigorous approach to due diligence, requiring multiple levels of approvals, which inevitably results in procedural delays.

Integrating a robust system of talent analytics could be the best way out of such deadlocks. With guidance from experts who can put together the correct data and analytics to identify the best candidates from your talent pool, the hiring process can be made a lot smoother.

At Cogent Staffing, we help you do just that. We have revolutionized our hiring methodology to provide you the best of talent analytics, domain expertise, and skilled recruiting talent. For more insights and resources on improving your recruitment, hiring, and retention processes, connect with us today.