How to Hire Employees
There comes a point when great ideas become too rare, turning away business becomes too common, wearing multiple hats has gotten old and you need to hire someone new.
You can no longer ignore the opportunity costs of doing business as usual. Your company needs the extra help, the fresh perspectives and the capacity to take on more business – or you need to replace people who once brought those things or never quite lived up to them.
Everyone would like to make strong hires. But really, what does it take to land talented employees without wasting time and money chasing dead ends?
Consider this your quick-start guide on how to hire new employees. We’ll cover what to look for, where to look and what you need to do to attract relevant candidates to your job posting.
How to Hire Employees
Step 1. Register as an employer.
Step 2. Define the position.
Step 3. Choose a job board.
Step 4. Source candidates.
Step 5. Interview candidates.
Step 6. Complete due diligence and make a decision.
Register as an Employer
If this is your company’s first time hiring, you’ll need to complete the following registrations beforehand:
- Get your employer identification number (EIN) from the IRS
- Register your company as an employer with your state’s labor department
Define the Position
Figure out what you’re looking for before you start searching for it. It’s a simple concept, but it can help you identify relevant candidates when you see them. And with an understanding of what the job entails, you can craft more informative job postings and help job seekers self-select.
Consider all of the responsibilities you’d like this role to own, as well those things that might fall under “and other duties as assigned.”
After you determine what you need your new hires to do, pen it down into a job description that makes your expectations clear and a job title that sums it all up.
You could miss out on the ideal candidate if they aren’t clear on what the job entails or what their title will be.
Choosing a Job Board to Launch Your Campaign
Posting a job ad can be as simple as posting a job title, compensation, job description and company background. Though, it should take a bit more effort than that if you want to hire efficiently.
You don’t necessarily need a recruiter to conduct a successful recruitment campaign on a job board. Popular job sites package their recruiting tools into accessible workflows that can be as simple as you want or as granular as you need.
These are some of the top features to consider when choosing a job site to host your recruitment campaign:
- Resume database: If you want to get proactive and reach out to candidates first, check for a job board that has a database of active job seeker resumes.
- Screening Solutions: Iome job boards include screening tools such as tests and questionnaires. Others offer outsourcing through third-party screening services that can function as a recruiter.
- Artificial Intelligence: A little AI assistance can minimize the time you spend sourcing candidates and help you launch your recruitment campaign with much less effort.
- Applicant tracking system: These systems track your interactions with job seekers throughout your recruitment campaign. Some sites include native tools while others support for third-party platforms.
- Sponsored Postings: Some job boards are crowded with duplicate, inactive and even spam listings. Those with sponsorship opportunities let you pay to have your job listing promoted for better visibility.
- Pricing models: Some sites charge by the performance of your post — the more clicks you get, the more you’ll have to pay. Other sites operate on a subscription model, with free trials that let you try before you buy.
- Syndicated Job Postings: Though rare, this feature lets you scale the syndication of your job posting over multiple job boards. This job board can share your job to over 100 boards.
- Mobile-Friendly: Mobile devices have outpaced desktop web browsing, so it’s important to post to a site that caters to job seekers on smartphones and tablets.
- Customer Support: All job boards offer customer support to some degree. Yet, it’s still important to compare the level of support provided by the job sites you compare, especially if you don’t have enterprise-level resources.
Sourcing Candidates
Once your campaign is underway, it’s time to start screening candidates and working toward building a shortlist.
Job sites like Indeed and ZipRecruiter give hiring managers tools for presenting job candidates with questionnaires for screening. You could still use a phone screen to further qualify candidates, but a brief list of questions can lower the effort you have to put into sourcing talent for interviews.
Want to save even more time on sourcing candidates? A few sites like ZipRecruiter have integrated artificial intelligence into the mix.
ZipRecruiter’s AI can match candidates to your job posting, and it works both ways. The AI can recommend strong candidates to you and it can also prompt relevant candidates to apply.
ZipRecruiter makes the hiring process even more accessible with assistance from artificial intelligence. The job site’s AI can match the right candidates to your job postings and promote your listing to job seekers with relevant experience, so you can spend more time interviewing and less time searching for qualified candidates.
Interview Questions to Ask Candidates
A big part of learning how to hire employees is learning how to interview them. Some of the questions you’ll ask will be unique to your company, but the prompts below are some of the most effective in helping hiring managers glean key data to inform your decision in hiring employees.
What attracted you to this position?
This question gets into the hopes and expectations a candidate has for joining your company. It can help you gauge if your open position would be a pit stop or pivotal moment in their career.
What do you know about the industry this company is in?
Industry and institutional knowledge can be learned on the job. But this question can help you determine which candidates will likely hit the ground running, and which ones you may have to train a little more than others.
What was one of the biggest challenges you overcame at work?
This question offers a look into a candidate’s resiliency and ability to stick with the job when things get tough.
What drives you forward?
Motives explain our actions, and they can help you understand how invested a candidate will be in the role you’re hiring for.
Why did you leave your last job and what did you learn from that experience?
This question can uncover potential behavioral issues with a candidate during the interview process, but it can also clue you into what a candidate wants out of a job.
Due Diligence and Making a Decision
You’ve found the right person. It’s cause for a little celebration, yet there’s still more you need to do to actually hire your new employee.
First, you need to get them to verbally agree to join your company. Set up some time to talk to your prospective employee, review what the position entails and then make a verbal offer.
If they accept your offer and they’re just as excited about the opportunity as you are, let them know when they can expect an offer in writing.
You’re not legally obligated to have your new hire sign an offer letter, but it affirms a commitment to employing them on both sides — you intend to employ them, and they’re intent on doing the job.
Once the job offer letter has been signed, you want to begin the onboarding stage of the hiring process: sharing the employee handbook, explaining employee benefits, conducting a background check and having your new hire fill out a W-4 for tax withholdings.
While you’re celebrating your new hire, it’s important not to forget about the candidates that won’t be. So be prompt in notifying the finalists you won’t move forward with — those who weren’t finalists should know so before you make a final decision.
Take the First Steps to Hire a New Employee Today
Even if this isn’t your first time recruiting and you’ve already started to develop your own hiring process, it’s important to exercise patience and to be deliberate in your planning. Rushing into a hiring decision can send you tumbling back down to square one.
While it’s tempting to test the waters with the cheapest option, the best way to start interviewing qualified candidates is to meet them where they’re at. Visibility is just as important as patience during the hiring process.
The right job board will put your job posting in front of the right eyes. With ZipRecruiter, you can reach candidates on over 100 job boards with a single posting.
And with the site’s integrated artificial intelligence, you can comb through a seemingly endless sea of candidates effortlessly — it’s like having a recruiter on your team without having them on your payroll.
Launch your recruitment campaign today. Explore a resume database with millions of active, up-to-date resumes. And get the tools you need to manage your campaign every step of the way.
