The most important investment you will make for your small business is your team. Employees are vital assets for any new business and play an integral role in its success.
It can be challenging for small businesses to grow at the same pace as the economy as they fail to fill important positions with the right people. Not having the best employees on your team makes everything more difficult, including sudden market demands and spikes in workload.
Hiring the right kind of employees for your business is challenging, particularly as you are battling with hundreds of other start-ups for the expertise of elite employees. To give your company the best chance to develop a strong, lasting team, you must be able to attract the best candidates in your sector. Here are our tips to make this easier.
Sell your business
Many small businesses forget that they are on trial as well. Candidates will look at potential employers in a similar way to how they are evaluated themselves. It is very much a two-way process involving both candidate and employer.
Therefore, when you post a job ad for your business, you should consider what will attract the kind of candidate you want. In a similar way to candidates sprucing up their CV online, you should ensure your company’s online presence is as attractive as possible.
Information should be easily visible, and details should be encouraging and positive. Your company’s online presence should make your business a place where people want to work. Offer an email address for candidates to get in touch and find out more about the business and position before they apply if they wish to do so.
Look for specialist skills
Research shows that the most effective employers hone in on specialist skills, rather than recruiting people who can do a bit of everything. By choosing candidates who have taken time to hone a specific set of skills, you will be employing the best in their field.
While you may have to recruit more people to cover all of the needs of your business, you will benefit from a higher quality team. Therefore, when recruiting employees, avoid very broad job descriptions. To attract the right kind of candidates, you should target your job ads as much as possible.
Make sure that the advert is clear about exactly what you’re looking for. It should be easy to understand and quickly readable. Even the highest quality candidates only spend a few minutes scanning ads before deciding to read in full, so you should concentrate on key phrases and concise writing.
Use your networks
You may not have to look that far for the best quality candidates. Often, people already within your network could be right for key roles in your company. Consider the people you already know before reaching out for new candidates.
Ask current employees for recommendations as people often have strong networks of skilled individuals. You can also use LinkedIn and other social media platforms to search for people and ask for recommendations.
Develop candidates
An often-neglected step is keeping in contact with past potential candidates. Recruitment isn’t a one-time thing, and as your business grows you will need to hire more people for important roles. There’s little point struggling to find a host of new candidates every time you advertise, when you can develop and nurture a group of skilled candidates over time.
When you screen candidates for one role, think about whether they could potentially fit in at your company in the future. While they may not be quite right for the current role, they may have skills you’ll need at another time. Keeping their details and contacting them allows you to manage future recruitment too.
At Turner Little, we can help with all kinds of advice for small and new businesses. Whether you need more tips on recruitment or advice on business structuring, trademarks, Intellectual Property or finance, contact the team at Turner Little here.
About Turner Little
Founded in 1998 in Yorkshire, UK, Turner Little is a specialist UK and offshore company formation, banking and corporate services provider. Our services include company formation, UK and offshore banking, asset protection, credit correction/repair, trademarking and trusts. Other services include Internet services, mail forwarding, wills and probate. Turner Little’s vision is to offer the best possible service, together with market leading products.
