Great people — the most talented people — drive growth faster, creating midsized companies that are stronger than their competition. Midsized companies that commit to a systematic recruiting process make talent a competitive advantage.

The Powerful Midsized Advantage

When it comes to recruiting, midsized companies have a lot going for them.  They have more resources at their disposal than startups or other small businesses, and they can use those resources to create disciplined recruiting processes. They can offer candidates more stability and better compensation than firms smaller than they are. And compared to larger companies, midsized companies feel more intimate. Because they tend to run leaner, there’s typically less bureaucracy than there is at larger companies, and more opportunities to rise through the ranks. They also tend to have a stronger connection to the communities in which they’re located, a big plus for many younger people.

Adopt a “Funnel” Approach to Recruiting

When you’re selling a product or service, what you’re really selling is the various ways in which your product or service is better than the competition’s at meeting a potential customer’s wants or needs. When you’re promoting a new position, it’s the same thing. You’re selling the reason why your company is better than other organizations at meeting the candidates’ wants and needs. To do that, you must think about why people would want to be associated with your company.

Just as sales and marketing identify prospects who are a great fit for a company’s products and services, good recruiting finds candidates who are a great fit for your business.  

The Short Game

Midsized companies achieve the best recruiting results when they take the long view and make strategic moves that take time and money. But there’s also much to be gained from using short-term tactics, especially when you have high priority positions to fill.

To build a short game, put someone in charge of and dedicated to recruiting, writing effective job ads, and adopting and implementing best practices for the interviewing process. Those include treating job candidates with as much TLC as prospective customers.

Write Snazzy Job Ads; Never Post a Job Description

Don’t underestimate the power of a well-written job ad. An ad that explains succinctly why a job is an amazing opportunity, what it entails, and why the company is a great place to work can be the key to attracting candidates that are a great fit. A badly written ad—or worse, a job description posing as an ad—can attract the wrong candidate or fail to attract any qualified candidates at all.

Interview with Precision and Discipline

Your hires represent the future of your company. That’s true whether you’re hiring for the call center, upper management, R&D lab, or retail floor. Once you’ve weeded out the no-go prospects, you need a process to evaluate the remaining candidates to identify a few finalists. You’ll want to minimize the time you invest per candidate until you zero in on the best one. Similarly, you may choose to take a more simplified, streamlined approach to interviewing for lower-level positions than for higher level jobs, matching the investment you make to the risk of a substandard hire. Four rounds of interviews would be overkill for all but the very top positions.

The Long Game

Short-term hiring tactics work, but they only get a company so far. Sure, you can write job ads that sparkle and spend $5,000 on a recruiting effort. But it takes a strategic, long-term approach to make the business a talent magnet.

With that, you’ll always have a list of candidates who will jump at the chance to work with you. You also might not need to spend that $5,000 every time you need to make a hire.

Attract the Best with your Employer Brand

Midsized companies know that when sales prospects have a positive perception of the company it makes selling faster and easier. The same thinking applies to prospective employees and a company’s employer brand. Employer brand is your company’s image and reputation with prospective candidates, current employees, and the general public. Seventy-nine percent of midsized company executives believe that having a good employer brand is essential to their ability to attract top talent.

A Written Recruiting Budget Says You Mean Business

Many midsized firms claim to have a recruiting budget. But for too many, that just describes an intention to budget, a willingness, “when the time is right,” not a commitment to investing. Not surprisingly, those kind of budget intentions tend to fall by the wayside when different business priorities crop up.

Measure Both Activity and Results

Sales and marketing measure their funnel and conversion rates. That tells them how well they’re doing. They also have tools to track prospects. Recruiting should do the same. Many human resources information systems or HR management suites have recruiting applications, including systems for tracking job applications. Scores of stand-alone applicant-tracking systems (ATS) are also available for businesses of all sizes, including midsized companies.

Don’t Waste the Relationship With Good Talent

There are people out there who don’t work for you now who could be amazing employees in the future. You know who they are because you met them in the process of hiring someone else. Too many midsized companies abandon these connections when they’ve filled the position. What a waste!

Remember the strong candidates who made it to the final round but for whatever reason didn’t get the job. Don’t forget the people who would have been a great fit but weren’t quite ready to make a change. Don’t discard their applications or let the relationship you’ve established wither away. Things change. The time may not be right now, but someday…

Don’t Tinker With Your Long-Term Strategy

Once you’ve laid the foundation for a long-term recruiting strategy, resist the urge to tinker with it too much. Brand building requires continuity and commitment. You can’t make sharp turns or flip initiatives on or off. Don’t get excited about a brand-building tactic if you’re not willing to stick with it. Either commit to executing your long-term strategies with discipline over the long term, or don’t waste your time.

Never Stop Recruiting

No growth-oriented company ever turns off sales and marketing. The same should hold true for recruiting. Even if you’re not actively looking for candidates for open positions, keep recruiting because great people are available at different times, not necessarily when you post a job ad.

You want great candidates to know your company and that you’re interested in them. When you do that, you’ll be the first one they call when they’re ready.  

Recruiting Assessment

We’ve created a quick free assessment on recruiting. These are many of the same questions we’d ask as consultants to understand where a client company stands on its use of these leading practices.