Tips for Picking up Hiring Operations After COVID-19

A lot has changed for hiring teams during COVID-19. Here’s how you can rebuild processes to come out even stronger.

The world as we knew it has had a great fall. It’s taken down the economy faster than anyone could have ever predicted and along with it, entire companies and record-level job losses. While it may feel like things have cracked, there is always a way to put ourselves back together. 

If you missed our Roundtable on June 10th to discuss what happened to HR teams, candidates, and technology during COVID and how we can put it all back together again, you can watch the recording here. Hint: It can be even better than before!

The biggest impact to HR teams all across the US has been that this generation of employers and employees has never faced over 30% unemployment. The modern hiring process was never meant to carry this heavy of a burden. Some employers had to hire 4x during COVID, while others immediately froze all roles and even worse, had to layoff employees. 

As we start to reopen local economies, hiring teams will face new challenges of trying to hire remotely or moving more processes to digital forums to reduce exposure and protect the safety of both candidates and employees. This may mean using different tools such as texts, an applicant tracking system, and onboarding platforms in new ways.

For existing employees, the definition of “best place to work” may change as workers demand more flexibility in their pre-COVID arrangements. Another element that one customer, TalentBurst, brought up is the need to ensure the mental and physical security of their employees to ensure retained talent. This means surveying employees about their comfort level on the job and how protected they feel from exposure to the novel coronavirus. 

HR teams are experiencing new challenges. There is no playbook, reference guide, or silver bullet for what to do next. HR leaders need to learn from others, quickly adapt to modern needs, and ensure they have the right partners in place to set themselves up for success.

Similar to HR teams, candidates and employees have never been in a market with 30%+ unemployment. Overnight, we went from a war of talent due to lack of supply to an unprecedented level of people filing for unemployment. This is a unique situation though— candidates are now looking at their safety and potential exposure to COVID when evaluating opportunities. Some industries will continue to face challenges in attracting talent if it’s a high-hazard role. 

Employers are about to be faced with a war for talent 2.0. This time, it will be felt the greatest in areas that require a high volume of candidates and cities. How can you run Space Mountain if you don’t have talent? Similarly, how can you open your restaurant a mile away if you don’t have employees? For a variety of reasons, not all of the employees that were employed pre-COVID will return. We recommend setting a plan for how you’re going to win back talent and retain existing staff. That may include new benefits, increased compensation, and more flexibility in the day to day job, if applicable. Don’t assume that the old ways will do the trick and don’t wait for your competitors to hire everyone first. 

There’s never been a more critical time to keep the human in human resources. That doesn’t mean automation is dead and technology should be overlooked. Quite the opposite— it means that redundant, inefficient tasks should be handed over to technology to allow humans to focus on the things that matter most. HR professionals are being asked to do more, with less resources and budget. Candidates don’t get hired without a human involved and employees don’t stay unless they feel connected. HR teams are the core of the company. 

To be an HR hero though, leaders learn where they can delegate. Should they manually process 100 applications or let an ATS do that and focus on getting the right talent onboard? Should they review 100 background checks or let a system flag only the cases that they care about and focus on getting the right talent onboard? COVID has highlighted the need for digital transformation and where HR teams can keep the core connection while increasing efficiencies. 

Checkr and our partners are here to help. Whether it’s a discussion on what to do next or you’re ready to get started, we’ll work to share insights across teams so that we can all come out better and stronger. 

Interested in joining our next Roundtable? The upcoming schedule can be found here.