Academic hiring is a challenge with nationwide teacher shortages and huge competition for the very best teaching staff. So, when it comes to the advertising and recruitment process, standing out from the crowd and delivering a candidate experience that shows real consideration for applicants can make all the difference.
Here are 3 tips to make an immediate impact on your recruitment experience.
Job adverts - a picture paints a thousand words
We live in an age of visual media (think YouTube, Instagram and Facebook) and to truly engage candidates and sell your school to potential talent, use images and videos to enhance your job adverts.
Using rich media in your adverts gives you an opportunity to inform, communicate, inspire and emotionally connect people to your school, its values, mission / goals and principles.
Job descriptions are vital in academic recruitment but to attract the best talent, it’s important to ‘sell’ the role opportunity and also your school with an advert too. A good applicant tracking system can help you by supporting including images and video into your job adverts and providing a downloadable job description.
Did you know that video job adverts are also shared 20x more than text-based advertisements?
Remove Barriers For Candidates Applying
Hiring teachers requires us to gather a great deal of information for thorough assessment and compliance but with most candidates starting their job search on mobile phones, challenge yourself and consider a 2-stage application process to reduce initial time to apply.
Good applicant tracking systems deliver a mobile first candidate experience and allow you to adopt a 2-stage application process. You can then collect just enough information at the first stage for you to make an initial assessment as to candidate fit (basic screening questions, contact details and a CV) and keep the apply time to under 2 minutes. You’ll provide a standout candidate experience, experience less candidate drop-off through the application process, and can contact relevant candidates to complete full work history, qualifications etc at a second stage.
Enhance Your Candidate Experience, Brand and Empower Applicants
Managing and communicating with high volumes of applicants for roles is a challenge and can create a huge admin burden for schools. However, this is where a recruitment system can do the heavy lifting for you and deliver a personalised candidate experience which shows consideration and the human touch.
Automate communication with candidates (application acknowledgement, interview invites and regret emails) but personalise it with their names, the role they’ve applied for and signed off by a member of the team. Set clear expectations as to when they will hear back from you and what the process and timelines look like. An applicant tracking system can do all of this for you automatically whilst still providing a personalised experience for candidates and showing consideration.
When it comes to interviews, a good recruitment system will enable candidates to conveniently select their preferred interview slot online (saving you lots of time) and even send a calendar invite to the interviewer automatically. Interview confirmations can then be sent out to candidates automatically via the ATS with a full guide for what to expect on the day and even produce an interview pack for the interviewer too!
A good candidate experience can do so much to enhance your brand, school reputation and critically show real consideration to people applying for your roles. You’ll stand out from your competition and teachers will thank you for it!
Is There Room For Improvement To Help You Stand Out From the Crowd?
I've included some useful links throughout this article. If you have any questions on how you could improve your candidate experience, please contact us and we'll be happy to help.