Recruiters and businesses looking for a competitive edge in attracting high-quality talent should be thinking about changing up their recruitment offering and start adapting to what the industry is doing, and what candidates are looking for in jobs. While this is true, the reality is, the pandemic has made the recruitment process more difficult to assess candidates. The things that previously helped you make successful hires – like being able to build rapport easily face to face, shake hands, make eye contact and speak without the added challenges of internet issues have disappeared. Having been through a series of lockdowns, recruitment agencies in Vietnam like us have had to pivot and adjust our recruitment process for the better. Here are our tips.

Reevaluate the recruitment process

Our first suggestion is to audit your existing recruitment process. Make it easy for your candidates to apply to your job ads. Weed out the unnecessary steps like redundant application forms, and shorten the application process online. To an applicant, it doesn’t make sense to spend more than five minutes filling out a digital form especially if they have their CV ready on LinkedIn or in a PDF – you’ll definitely lose their interest. Many applicants are applying for jobs on their phones, so this process needs to be simple.

You should also review how you’re ensuring candidates are right for their jobs. Are you just looking at their CV and matching them with the client’s job description, or are you also looking at their achievements listed on their CV, their extra-curricular interests, volunteer work, LI profile, or published articles?

When phone-screening candidates, spend extra time to build rapport, assess values, career goals and culture fit. Candidates don’t want to move in this current climate unless they feel that it will be a safe and rewarding move for them. Trust is key.

Look at the recruitment process as a whole and try to see which parts you can do without for now, which parts need more focus, and which parts need more development and even investment. Soon you’ll have a more streamlined recruitment process that both you, your hiring managers and your candidates will enjoy.

Use technology intelligently

Make technology work for you. One great example for this is automating where you can. No need to email or SMS your candidates individually about how their applications are progressing. Some Applicant Tracking Systems automatically do this for you when you reach certain milestones in the process, which reduces the administrative tasks and gives you more time to focus on interviews and finding high-quality talent.

You can also employ online testing or psychometrics in the interview process like how some talent staffing agencies and highly experienced recruiters do. These tools can provide additional insights which can then be used to develop more systematic questions with criteria that will allow you to conduct interviews in a structured manner, and evaluate your candidates later based on their answers.

Better recruitment marketing

What job boards are you on? Are you maximising your social media platforms through organic posts and paid campaigns to reach your desired audiences? Recruitment agencies in Vietnam like us need to make sure our talent acquisition tools integrate well with all of our different platforms so we can run our campaigns seamlessly.

Clarify client EVP to candidates

Package the career opportunity to your candidates with the Employer Value Proposition – the benefits, development, culture, and other advantages of being part of this organisation. Candidates, especially C-suite professionals, look beyond compensation when considering a job opportunity. A perfectly articulated EVP will help you create a more attractive picture of what kind of organisation your client is – one that candidates will want to be a part of.

Recruitment agency in Vietnam

ASW Consulting is a trusted permanent recruitment services agency in Vietnam committed to bringing talented people together. While the world is changing throughout the pandemic, our job as a recruitment agency is to constantly adapt to the changing recruitment landscape in Vietnam to better serve both our clients and candidates.

For more information on how you can improve as a recruiter, visit our Resources page to learn more about recruitment, interviewing, and onboarding.