How To Attract New Employees By Following The Top New Recruiting Trends

Finding new employees is not only challenging because the entire job market is in a bit of a pickle (putting it lightly), but the entire recruitment process is drastically different than it was a few years ago. 

This is why many organizations are finding it difficult to recruit top-notch candidates, especially if they require rare and specialized skills such as cybersecurity. 

To overcome these challenges, businesses need to be aware of the top new recruiting trends and find original ways to implement them as soon as possible. That way, you’ll have an easier time sourcing, attracting, and hiring new candidates.

Here’s the rundown:

1. Proactive recruitment at all levels

As the name suggests, proactive recruitment is a practice in which companies source, engage, and try to attract candidates before they even hire them. This helps you build a short list of prospects you can draw from in the future to fill an open position fast.

A large majority of candidates are passive. In other words, they aren’t actively looking for jobs but they are open to good opportunities. Through proactive recruitment, you can tap into this huge talent pool of unclaimed candidates, ahead of the demand.

In the past, this was common for sourcing candidates for high-ranking titles, but due to the employee shortage, it’s useful for sourcing candidates at all levels.

2. Employer branding

Employers no longer hold all the power, especially in competitive industries where talent is scarce. To attract top candidates, you need to be aware of one of the fastest-growing recruiting trends of 2023 - employer branding.

Your employer brand is how your potential candidates perceive you, as well as your company’s popularity and reputation.

With the demand for skilled workers growing, job seekers are looking beyond just a salary and are becoming more selective. They’ll look at your reputation and if they don’t like what they see, they’re going to look elsewhere - as simple as that.

3. Work flexibility

There is a growing acceptance for businesses that operate outside the traditional work structure. Following the events of 2020, it’s not uncommon to see a team of full-time workers, interns, freelancers, and part-time contractors.

By offering benefits such as flexible work schedules, you can create an attractive workplace that many potential candidates will appreciate. Because why not? 

Independent workers will enjoy working outside the shackles of the traditional office and classic nine-to-five schedule. 

In fact, this opens up many opportunities for you too, as you can now connect people from all over the world into a single team.

4. Diversity

Some consider it a buzzword, but diversity is still one of the most important recruiting trends. By placing a larger focus on it, inclusion, and equality, you can have a strong impact on the candidates that come into contact with your employer brand. 

It’s not enough to just preach diversity, you also need to practice it. Demonstrate your wide variety of sourcing channels and openly leverage unbiased evaluation and screening practices.

5. Providing more internal mobility

Not all recruiting trends are related to external recruitment methods as a solution to filling skills gaps. Some are about placing a bigger emphasis on internal mobility.

It’s quite straightforward - this practice refers to looking for your existing workforce capital first before even starting an external recruitment process.

This isn’t only more time- and cost-effective, but it also raises your employer brand as you’re offering valuable development opportunities to your existing workforce. More importantly, it’s a win-win strategy for both you and your employees. It helps fill in skills gaps and increases employee loyalty and satisfaction, thus boosting your employee retention rates.

6. Project-based hiring

While contract work is nothing new, it’s one of the top recruiting trends due to its growing adoption. 

As we mentioned, flexibility and independence are what most talented workers are looking for, which is why many of them are open to working under a contract. 

Many employers are diving headfirst into hiring freelancers and contractors, with a large number of companies implementing a hybrid model with full-time and freelance workers bridging the skills gap. 

If you want to survive this talent scarcity, you should be open to contingent talent. 

7. Collaborative hiring

To keep up with recruiting trends, you should include your team in the recruitment process. Their wealth of knowledge and experience allows you to build a completely new talent pool of candidates loyal to your business. 

Collaborative hiring is currently on the rise and there is a significant increase in companies implementing referral programs. 

8. Online recruitment

The following recruiting trend is a no-brainer, as it involves a higher reliance on technology and the internet to find, assess, and hire perfect candidates. 

Online recruitment may include leveraging social media and the use of new software solutions such as Applicant Tracking to simplify the recruitment process.

9. Attracting Gen Z candidates

Millennials are no longer the hip new kids. At the moment, Gen Z is already filling entry-level positions and completing internships, meaning they are the key to circumventing the talent shortage. 

This recruiting trend is all about looking into the future and investing in a new generation of workers. How important is it? Just consider that in the coming years, the market will be flooded with 60 million of these modern job seekers. 

To try and snag them as soon as possible and keep them in your ranks for the long haul, you should already start finding new ways of attracting Gen Z candidates.

10. Recruitment marketing

Last, but not least on our list of top recruiting trends is recruitment marketing. This involves using the standard marketing techniques as the crux of your hiring process. By leveraging marketing, you can find and nurture the best candidates. 

In other words, you’re marketing a job opening and trying to inspire your ideal workers-to-be to take action once they see your job listing. 

The time is nigh 

All of these recruiting trends offer a dash of hope amidst the time of uncertainty. If implemented with thought and care, they can help you minimize the damage from the current talent crisis. 

Furthermore, they can provide you with a significant edge over your competitors, as you’ll be able to offer more of what your candidates truly value. This is because no matter what trend you decide to follow, the ultimate goal is the same - enhancing candidate experience.

Will you be implementing any of these techniques the next time you want to fill a position?