A Candidate Pipeline Helps a Business Run Smoothly

A Candidate Pipeline Helps a Business Run Smoothly

Human resources and recruitment professionals play a vital part in filling roles for your business; with a well-maintained candidate pipeline, you can find the right people before you even need them.

If you’ve got a job opening, you want it filled fast. It may be a new position or an existing role now vacant; whatever its nature, your performance will suffer until it’s filled. This is where talent pipelines, also known as candidate pipelines, come into play.

As the name implies, talent pipelines exist to funnel the most suitable personnel when and where they’re needed. Sometimes the right fit may be brought in from outside or from within your organization. Building a pipeline takes time and care, but it makes all the difference in becoming a proactive employer.

Define the gap your candidate pipeline must fill

A talent pipeline can save a company by filling up role-gaps before they even appear. The more important or specialized the position, the more effective and protective a talent pipeline is. Lower-level positions are important, too, but they don’t have the same kind of impact potential if they take some time to fill.

Therefore, it’s important to identify key positions in your company and profile them accurately before they become vacant. What qualifications and personal skills make this role so vital? This is the first step in successful pipelining, as this profile will help define the next person to fill the gap.

How to begin a talent pipeline

If you foresee an upcoming vacancy (and even if you don’t), it’s time to start drawing in a talent pool to keep on reserve. A solid research double here is job sites and social media. Indeed is currently the number one job site in America, and others like LinkedIn and CareerBuilder are good sources.

Social media is being used by 94% of recruiters to screen and shortlist potential employees, and 78% of them have made a hire this way. It works both ways; over 300 million Google searches a month are by candidates looking for work. When your business keeps its own social media vibrant and current, those millions of people have a better chance of finding you.

Leverage job boards and social media to invite applications for key positions. Be honest if they’re currently available, may become available, or if you’re simply scouting. Getting the applications coming down the pipeline is your first preparatory step.

How to construct a candidate pipeline

The central part of the process involves vetting potential candidates via the online resources you’ve used. From there, how pressing the need to hire is will dictate the next steps. If there’s no rush, you could stop at the information gathering stage. If there’s a chance a vacancy will arise, you can reach out informally by phone call or email and test the candidate for suitability and their own interest.

If needs are driving, bringing in suitable candidates for an interview is the surest way to gauge their suitability. Again, be clear about the availability of the position and don’t make any promises you can’t keep. Candidates will value transparency, whether you hire them or not.

How to maintain a recruiting pipeline

You must treat a talent pipeline like its namesake. Keep it clean and unclogged of material you don’t need. Your candidate pipeline must be cultivated and cleansed to stay fresh and current. It won’t be effective if it’s blocked up with old, outdated resumes and defunct details.

Remember: resumes are only reflections of the people behind them, and people don’t stay still. They gain new skills, they form new goals, they change their minds. In short, they’re never the person on the resume for very long.

If you’re not 100 percent up to date on a candidate’s skills and ambitions, you’re way behind in the talent race. Relationship building is critical for a pipeline to stay strong. When you build active relationships with potential personnel, you get insight into a candidate’s background and not just an employment history.

Keep in touch with potential role-fillers, or at least follow them on social media. Know where they are, what they’re learning and where they want to go. This does more than keep your database energized; it connects with the real person behind the resume, reminding them that you’re genuinely interested.

Sourcing for your pipeline – where a recruiter excels

Don’t forget that you already have recruiters in your ranks! Keeping an eye on in-house talent can show you who to groom, while staff may also know friends, family or old colleagues who could be perfect for an upcoming vacancy.

If you want decades of experience in funneling the right talent to the proper positions, then get in touch with a qualified recruiting professional. At Consultis Information Technology we have over 30 years of employer-candidate relationship building under our belt, and we take finding the right IT staff for your business needs.