How to Hunt Down Candidates for Tough-to-Fill Roles

The recruiting industry is filled with those stories about hunting the six toed, purple people eater and other hard to find roles. But given the future workforce shortage, the need to hunt those specials roles is going to get more frequent, and apply to the more common roles. My advice? Make sure to keep your hunting skills sharp, by practicing these techniques.  Save for Winter--the Shortage is REAL Right now you are probably getting flooded by applicants, so it’s easy to get complacent. We are the US and doing great - right? Let me start with the sobering statistic that the US is has hit a 40 year high - and for the first time has a 75% graduation rate. For most of us, it means that 1 out of 4 US workers - we can’t utilize - as most jobs require a high school degree. Furthermore, 67% of companies surveyed said they had a hard time finding skilled labor today, and over the next 3 to 5 years - that demand is going to increase by 20%. Do a quick search for job shortages- and you will find articles discussing the urgent issue of shortages for skilled labor, STEM roles, pilots, LPN’s, Urologists (not joking) and clowns (seriously, not joking). So grab your binoculars - it’s time to go hunting. Look Past the Camouflage Sad but true, if you’re an HR professional you know that the resume is often a lie. Or at best, a piece of marketing speak designed by the applicant. A recent survey of college students revealed that more than 70% said that they would lie on their resume and about 92% had already done so. The lesson? Don’t trust the resume; it may just be camouflaging the truth. Be the King of the Watering Hole Join the conversations everywhere you can. Think about who you are searching for and where they spend time virtually. For instance, hardware engineers are often filing patents so try going to the US patent database and search the abstract section for keywords that you are looking for. Or you can go to IEEE journals and see who is writing articles on the keywords you are searching for. For software engineers, go to the code forums, and see who is contributing code, participating in code reviews, etc. Almost every industry has a watering hole - you just need to find it. Trust the Pack The last approach to find what you’re looking for is to follow the herd! But here is the great thing, you likely already have part of the herd in your group. If your IT group is looking for database administrators - ask your IT group who they have worked with previously that was great! Make it easy for them, make a write-up about the job, have the application link, and have them forward the email to their social network and previous co-workers. If you can get the pack to provide the referrals, these hires are the best, highest quality hires you can find. RELATED POST: How to Encourage Employees to Recruit a Friend Respect the Hunted Getting bombarded by recruiters can be a frustrating scenario. Realize that the folks you’re trying to bring in have lives and respect their time and privacy. RELATED POST: How to Recruit Software Engineers; 1 in 4 Expect to Look for a New Job in Next 3 Months, Glassdoor Survey From me to you, Happy Hunting!!