The recruitment plan is a selection tool that helps businesses find the most suitable candidate for the position in a predictable timeline.
Steps in developing a recruitment plan
1. Deciding on the starting date for the job
As a business, the date to keep in mind when starting the recruitment process is actually the date by which the person needs to be hired. Working in reverse, one can create a timeline which should offer other important dates such as the advertisement and interview times as well. Time for checking references and background checks should be included, if necessary.
2. Developing the job description
If it is a new position, a job analysis is highly desirable in order to pinpoint essential skills and requirements, but also input from team leaders and other staff might be important.
3. Conducting a skills gap analysis
By conducting a skills gap analysis, the organization identifies the current skills level of the staff and decides how to fill those gaps in the future.
The necessary steps are:
Identifying necessary skills in the organization;
Check whether they are filled by staff in current positions;
Plan to fill in the gap with the desired skills.
4. Setting a hiring budget
A necessary step in creating a successful recruitment plan is establishing a hiring budget by foreseeing costs entailed by the recruitment process. It is important to compare costs between external and internal recruitment and decide which type of recruitment method will be used. Once established, it is important to set within the set budget and keep the unforeseen costs reasonable.
5. Creating an advertisement plan
In accordance with the recruitment method chosen, the employer will need to decide on the hiring timeline by setting up an advertisement and work on its distribution. Furthermore, if a recruitment agency is used, then the timeline will probably need to be longer to include their own recruitment process.
6. Interview and final decision
One important stage is the interview phase and deciding on the final candidate to fill the position.
As part of the hiring process:
Supervising managers and/or team members should be included in the interview panel;
A list of job-related questions should be created that should be cross-checked with relevant people from the department the position needs to be filled;
Setting up the interview process, that may include second or third interviews as well, as well as reference-checking;
Maintaining documentation covering the interview stage that should be archived in order to assess whether all legal requirements had been met, if necessary.
