These Are Some of the Smartest Ways You Can Use Video in Hiring
Anyone involved in recruiting and hiring probably already knows that video can be a powerful tool when interviewing candidates who can’t reach the office for an in-person interview. Maybe the candidate is potentially filling a major role, and will thus be willing to relocate if he or she receives an offer, but currently lives too far away to justify traveling for an interview. In other instances, you might simply be hiring employees who will work on a remote basis. Either way, when a candidate isn’t able to meet with you for a face-to-face interview, a video chat will often suffice.
That’s not to say facilitating remote interviews is the only way you can benefit from using video in your recruiting and hiring processes. The following are examples of additional ways you might capitalize on video.
Give Office Tours
Remote work is on the rise. Every year, research confirms that more workers are being permitted to work from home (or anywhere else they choose).
While there are major benefits associated with this trend, including access to a larger talent pool, it also has some potential downsides for which companies should prepare. For instance, it’s very important that new hires be thoroughly introduced to the company culture. New employees who aren’t familiar with the culture may be less engaged than workers who feel they are part of a team with a common goal.
Introducing new hires to the company culture typically involves several processes and steps, including an office tour. This acquaints them with not only the workspace, but also the day-to-day operations of their coworkers.
Such tours can prove valuable for those prepared to relocate for a key role and remote workers alike; even if an employee won’t actually be working in the office, seeing its “vibe” could facilitate that individual’s sense of belonging. So, while an in-person tour is ideal, a video tour is a perfectly sufficient alternative to consider when the former isn’t practical.
Don’t merely use this to introduce new employees to the company culture. You may also benefit from offering video office tours to candidates who haven’t been hired yet. If they realize the culture isn’t a good fit, they might save both of you a lot of time by deciding not to continue pursuing a job with your organization.
Improve Job Descriptions
Drafting accurate and effective job descriptions should be among your key goals. History shows that strong job descriptions typically lead to better hiring decisions. Additionally, an accurate listing will reduce the odds of receiving applications from unqualified candidates. This is yet another way in which you can save time and money.
Video can also help in this capacity. If you want to ensure that potential candidates thoroughly understand what their duties will be in a given role, a video can often demonstrate the nature of the job far more effectively than text alone. This is particularly true when the job involves specialized processes or manual labor.
Develop Your Brand
Whether you’re actively hiring or not, you should take steps to ensure that the prospect of working at your company is appealing. For instance, if you were to coordinate with an executive search firm to fill an opening, you might spend less time on recruitment and more time on improving your overall brand.
This is another instance in which you could use video to your advantage. By integrating videos on your careers page and in your social media, for example, you could illustrate the benefits of working at your organization. You can share videos from behind the scenes that showcase your office, of events, of interviews with happy employees who have thrived at the company, and even of explanations of the company’s mission. After all, surveys indicate that today’s job seekers are eager to work for companies whose missions and values correspond with their own. A video showing that your organization is committed to making a positive difference could help you attract the types of candidates who are most likely to be passionate and engaged on the job.
Again, while using video to conduct interviews with remote candidates is a good idea, you’re limiting yourself if that’s the only way you use — or plan on using — it. These few examples prove that it can deliver much more value than you might have initially considered.
