You’re Hiring a Recruiter: Now What? Getting Your Talent Team Up to Speed

“Ramping up,” is a term used frequently when discussing the time it takes to get a sales person up to speed and functioning, but this term is also applicable to your new recruiting hire.

When your company is in the expansion stage and needs to hire a talent team to source, screen, and hire for your roles, chances are there is already of bottle neck of requisitions that need immediate attention. There is little time to waste in getting your internal recruiters up to speed. How can you ensure this process goes smoothly? Set out expectations from the final interview.

Prior to handing out an offer you should define exactly how recruiters can achieve success at your company and how they will be able to tell whether they are doing a good job. If you do not know how your talent team can measure success, then you need to figure that out before you extend any offers. Your initial conversation with each recruiter should include how he or she can expect to be measured.

For internal recruiters, you can’t measure success on the number of hires they make alone. You need a way for measuring quality. For example, at the end of each quarter poll the hiring managers in your company and see how the searches that were conducted went and what could have gone better. Take that constructive feedback and figure out a way to implement it.

You also need to set a precedent for what a successful day, week, month and quarter looks like. Set attainable and realistic goals for your recruiters that will allow them to feel like they are accomplishing something. Recruiting can be a very frustrating profession because there are so many variables — candidates reject offers, people miss interviews, job openings are put on hold, etc. Because there are so many pieces that need to fall into place in order to make a hire it is crucial you allow your recruiters smaller successes to track their progress.

By defining expectations for your talent team from the get-go you will have an easier time getting them up to speed. Many internal recruiting teams fail because they do not have clear goals against which to execute. So, before implementing your talent team, make sure you have a plan for how they can achieve their success.