5 Tips to Hire the Ideal Employee in 2020

From Silicon Valley startups to Fortune 500 companies, hiring has evolved. No longer does the 9-5 workday accommodate everyone nor is the Ivy-league candidate always the right choice. More companies are shifting their hiring practices to attract employees representing the technologically connected and multi-faceted world that we live in.

Whether it’s a remote employee or someone from a completely different field with transferable skills, candidates now bring in a wealth of knowledge and skill-sets from all backgrounds. For recruiters, this diversified talent pool means bringing in a multitude of viewpoints and ideas—which not only has a positive impact on the company but also on the bottom line.

Here are the top five hiring best practices from successful companies to help attract and find the ideal employee in 2020.

Companies like Accenture, Cisco, Intel, Proctor & Gamble, and Verizon and others across the Fortune 500 have learned something important through their diversity and inclusion work. It isn’t enough to just bring in diverse candidates. They also need diverse interviewers. 

Just look at Intel, who increased their underrepresented employee representation to 15.8% in 2019. For the past five years, Intel has made it mandatory that a panel for any new hire includes at least two women and/or members of underrepresented minorities. Because of this, they began to see a significant increase in new hires being women and people of color. 

This is why building diverse candidate panels is important. When candidates see diversity celebrated at their potential employers, they see that they can bring their full selves to work.

To build this team atmosphere, when candidates come in, have them interview with employees from all different backgrounds: race, gender, sexual preference, religion, and ability. By showing that your company is invested in diversity, you are expanding your talent pool and reaching your full potential. 

Diversity and inclusion are key pillars within the workplace in 2020. Voices from women and people of color are rising in the boardroom. Teams should include employees with a myriad of ideas that are shaped from varied experiences to develop campaigns and products that speak to all consumers — not just one specific race and gender. 

From ping-pong tables to engaging off-sites, the most valuable asset a company has are the people that work there. Companies can leverage culture as a positive value-add when hiring. On social media channels, especially professional ones such as Linkedin, companies can post photos and videos from events where the culture and community shine. This helps the hiring funnel. Candidates searching for jobs can see and hear first-hand from employees that are in fun and healthy environments — as they’ll be there eight hours a day.

Tech companies like Facebook and Google are known for their company culture and benefits. To find the best talent, they leverage LinkedIn to visually demonstrate employee camaraderie and impact. Facebook, on their LinkedIn page, illustrates how employees find purpose and an opportunity to give back through their #HashtagLunchbag program to feed those in need — showing that being part of a company is not just doing your assigned work but can have higher intention. When companies showcase these positive examples, it is more likely they’ll garner a higher application rate and quality level of candidates.

Most companies use background checks when hiring employees, but what they don’t realize is that they can be one of their greatest hiring strengths. You can look at current candidates, check their records, and identify certain changes that aren’t relevant to your company or that specific role. 

For example, marijuana-specific charges may be omitted, especially since it’s becoming legal in more and more states. Or you can look at other records, like parking and speeding, and determine if they are relevant for the role you’re hiring for.

It’s a smart and strategic decision to check records, as it allows for a larger talent pool and helps those who need it most. 

You can take dismissing certain records a step further and open yourself up to becoming a fair chance employer. 

Fair chance hiring is where “everyone, regardless of their background, has the right to be fairly assessed for a role they are qualified.” In most instances, this means that employers are bringing in candidates with criminal records. 

Many companies have been practicing fair chance hiring. For the past twenty years, Johns Hopkins Health System and Hospital employs hundreds of people with criminal records. In fact, 5% of its yearly hires are part of fair chance hiring. When they dove deep into the data, they found that over a four-year period, fair chance workers had a retention rate of 43%, significantly higher than the rate for those without a record. This is just one example of many that illustrate how fair chance hiring helps the culture and bottom-line immensely, and in doing so, creates a workplace that embraces those that have overcome challenges.

With the influx of productivity work tools like chat-based, Slack and video-conferencing, Zoom, there’s been a rise in remote work. In fact, according to LinkedIn’s Global Talent Trends Report for 2019, 72% of talent professionals agree that work flexibility will be very important for the future of HR and recruiting. Additionally, companies that embrace work flexibility have a substantial competitive edge. There has been a 78% increase in job posts, mentioning “workplace flexibility” since 2016.

By focusing on remote workers, companies can look beyond in-house and expand their geographies for hiring talent. Now, anyone with a WiFi connection and computer can provide value as a team member no matter the location. Remote work is a great way to include diverse viewpoints on the company culture and bottom line. Now, a team has an opportunity to be comprised of all different communities, including working parents that have the flexibility to stay home with their children or a millennial digital nomad working from a cafe in Bali or an older worker who prefers the quiet of home. With more coworkers from different places and situations, it allows for a more diverse team; and luckily, they’re all connected easily through technology. 

These five steps will help you look at hiring as an ongoing practice that is malleable as technology advances and society become more accepting. Embracing this mindset while hiring, especially as we go into the next decade, will have incredible results in building a team that is diverse, inclusive, and ultimately high-performing.