Recruiters play a crucial role in your organization’s success. Identifying and attracting top talent is a heavy lift and that is just one task in your multitudinous role as a recruiter. The demands on your time can often be overwhelming. With a barrage of meetings, interviews, and so many administrative tasks, it can be challenging to allocate sufficient time to focus on that core responsibility: recruiting. In this blog post, I will explore some practical strategies you can employ to make time for actual recruitment amidst your hectic schedule.
Recruiters often find themselves swamped with administrative duties, such as reviewing applications daily, coordinating with candidates, scheduling panel interviews with leaders who show no availability for 3 months, calculating comp, working on special projects, and the list goes on and on. By leveraging technology and an automation tool or two, you can streamline some of these tasks.
Streamline Scheduling
At eHospitalHire, we use Acuity, a self-scheduling calendar tool to streamline scheduling phone screens with visually screened candidates, both for active applicants and for those we source. It is very similar to Calendly and Microsoft Bookings. Each recruiter has their own scheduling link that is synced with their calendars. We created templates in our clients’ ATS’s and our CRM that incorporate this link both in the body of the outreach and the signature. We save an incredible amount of time by inviting qualified candidates to phone screen with this tool. In addition, you can create a form to ask preliminary questions so you can be really prepared for the call. Before you know it, the calendar is filled with potential candidates. Acuity is also an amazing tool for scheduling interview days/hiring events. There are free versions for several of these tools, by the way.
Meetings, meetings, and more meetings. How can you find the time to actually work?
While meetings are essential for collaboration and alignment, try to prioritize your attendance wisely. If you are listed as an optional attendee, take a minute to evaluate the relevance and necessity of each meeting. Do you really need to attend? If you need to focus and your meeting does not have an urgent or important agenda, ask your leader if the meeting can be recorded for later viewing.
Phone Screening
Crafting effective interview questions and evaluating candidate responses can be time-consuming, yet I hear from many recruiters that their healthcare system does not require them to phone screen any candidate in advance. If they look good on paper, set them up for an interview. If retention is a buzzword in your organization, I highly suggest implementing phone screening in your candidate journey. Have you ever arrived at the offer stage to learn that your candidate’s compensation expectations far exceed what your organization can offer or they cannot relocate for six months or they feel the benefits are too expensive? I think we have all been there. Implementing structured interview techniques helps recruiters streamline the process while ensuring consistent evaluation. Preparing a standardized set of questions tailored to the position’s requirements enables recruiters to assess candidates more efficiently. If you don’t have a standardized template, click HERE to download eHospitalHire’s basic phone screen template that you can modify and make your own. Nothing saves more time than documenting notes about your interaction and uploading the phone screen template to the candidate profile for future reference. Have you ever interviewed a candidate twice? I bet you have…or at least come close to doing so. When you rely on your system to store your candidate information and interaction, you will save your time and potentially your colleagues in the future.
Let’s Talk About Your Brand
By building a strong employer brand and leveraging recruitment marketing strategies, you can attract high-quality candidates proactively. Establishing a compelling online presence through social media and career websites helps to create a talent pool of candidates interested in your organization. Take a minute to evaluate your presence on LinkedIn. What does your banner and profile picture say to the audience you want to attract? Are they relevant? Do you actively post in your feed? Have you joined relevant groups and engaged with other members? When you do post are you just reposting jobs or are you telling your audience why they want to connect with you and talk about your open roles? Everyone, and I mean, everyone wants to know what is in it for them. Do the same evaluation for Facebook, X, TikTok, and any other social site you use to recruit.
Knowledge is Power
You must understand what you are recruiting for or you run the risk of wasting your time, the candidate’s time, and your hiring leader’s time. Working closely with hiring leaders will significantly impact your effectiveness. You will want insight into the position requirements, ideal candidate profiles, and the hiring process. Clear and regular, open communication with hiring managers means avoiding unnecessary delays, aligns expectations, and helps recruiters make informed decisions. Having the knowledge you need on the front end will save so much time in the long run. Click HERE to access our intake form which will help you document these factors clearly.
Staying updated with the latest recruitment trends, techniques, and tools is essential for you to optimize your time. Join groups on LinkedIn and Facebook to help you stay updated. I am in a Facebook group called Secret Sourcers. This group asks a LOT of questions about which technology is best for certain situations. We now use ContactOut and SignalHire as our go-to Chrome extensions because of what I learned in this group. There is another group on LinkedIn that you can join to share your recruitment challenges and engage with other recruiters to discuss solutions. Engaging in networking activities enables you to build connections, exchange ideas, and learn from healthcare recruitment peers, fostering professional growth and discovering new strategies for efficient recruitment. Explore the integrations that your ATS already has in play and evaluate how much time incorporating one will save you. Does your background company, your video interview platform, or your reference-checking tool integrate? Most CRMS and some ATS’s have Chrome extensions available at no charge to you that will automatically import LinkedIn profiles into your system.
As a recruiter, you face the challenge of balancing numerous responsibilities while ensuring an effective, personal candidate experience. By implementing these strategies, you can make better use of your time, enabling you to focus on recruiting top talent. Streamlining administrative tasks, prioritizing meetings, adopting structured interviewing techniques, leveraging your brand, collaborating with hiring leaders, and continuously networking are key steps that you can take to optimize your time and achieve successful recruitment outcomes. With these practices in place, you can efficiently navigate your busy schedules while bringing the best talent to your organization.
About eHospitalHire
As one of the leading hospital recruitment firms in the country, eHospitalHire is dedicated to providing hospital talent acquisition teams with quality, strategic, and cost-effective recruitment solutions personalized to their needs. By extending their teams with our experienced hospital recruiters and sourcers, eHospitalHire brings results that move the bottom line.
