What Are the Key Recruitment Challenges for HR in 2023?

Table of contents:#1 - Knowing How to Attract True Talent in 2023#2 - Knowing How to Be Attractive to Talent#3 - Placing People at the Heart of the Recruitment Process#4 - Improving HR ROI: A Not-So-New Recruitment Challenge#5 - Considering Customer Experience During RecruitmentThe HR trends of 2023 require the function to face new recruitment challenges that are in reality an extension of those from the previous year. Questions around salaries, the importance of soft skills, digitalization, and especially the place of talent in the recruitment process are raising numerous concerns. Human Resources teams will need to find clear answers to these to enable companies to meet all the commercial, organizational, structural, competitive, and collaborative challenges ahead. We invite you to explore 5 major recruitment challenges in 2023.

1 - Knowing How to Attract True Talent in 2023

This challenge is not truly specific to 2023, but it takes on a new dimension when considering the growing shortage of talented candidates and the difficulty of recognizing talents who can help the company grow. This is when we recognize the value of psychometric tests in recruitment. These are new tools used by recruitment agencies to identify certain character traits in future employees. These tests constitute powerful tools for addressing this recruitment challenge. Originally, psychometric tests were designed to identify children with superior intelligence. In recent years, they have been adapted to optimize the recruitment process. The main objective of such tests is therefore to identify the character traits, abilities, aptitudes, values, competencies, and even aspirations of a candidate. They provide recruiters with relevant indicators that a resume cannot evaluate. By using, for example, a logic test for recruitment, it becomes easier to assess the candidate's reasoning ability, critical and moral judgment, as well as their problem identification and resolution skills. These are essential indicators that today enable the identification of true talent in the job market and thus address this recruitment challenge that is crucial in application management.

2 - Knowing How to Be Attractive to Talent

This is a challenge that takes on its full meaning in 2023 because in the era of social media, candidates also evaluate the company where they wish to obtain a job. Key recruitment stakeholders must then ensure the company makes itself attractive in the eyes of participants. In 2023, job offers must be comparable to commercial offers. Companies must sell themselves and sell the position to candidates as they would have done with their products for potential clients. Being able to face this recruitment challenge will allow recruiters to attract the rarest talents. They will also be able to stand out from the competition and hope to obtain quality profiles to satisfy companies. But how can such a feat be achieved? Some use inbound recruiting, by analogy with inbound marketing, to attract target candidates. Others have turned to recruitment gamification to offer an innovative experience and differentiate themselves from the competition.

3 - Placing People at the Heart of the Recruitment Process

Today, the main recruitment stakeholders in 2023—namely HR departments, recruitment agencies, and staffing firms—must take this recruitment challenge very seriously. Indeed, placing human values at the heart of recruitment not only contributes to finding the ideal candidate but also allows the company to strengthen team cohesion, hire employees who are motivated by more than financial gain, and adopt innovative management. But how can this be achieved?

Personality Tests

In the recruitment process used by staffing agencies, for example, personality tests are used to evaluate certain character traits of candidates. Recruiters have made it a recruitment challenge to no longer rely solely on technical skills and instinct. Thanks to these tests, they can now obtain reliable and quantifiable data to evaluate not only performance but especially the candidate's values. Furthermore, these tests are a way to personalize the candidate experience and truly consider the profile they have before them. Quizzes and personality tests: how they work in a recruitment context is quite simple. Generally, the recruiter asks the candidate to answer a pre-established questionnaire. Depending on the type of test, questions can be closed or open-ended and cover various subjects. The PAPI (Personality and Preference Inventory) is the favorite personality test of recruiters in France. It comes in two forms. The first involves a selection between two statements. The candidate must determine which statement best describes them. For example: "At work, I get along with everyone" and "I work faster than others." The second form is a rating grid (in the form of statements) that the candidate must provide for questions asked. For example: "Do you agree, strongly agree, or disagree with the following statement?" Although several models exist, recruiters are recommended to create a personality test that closely matches their expectations. It should allow them to obtain the answers they seek to best understand the candidate's profile. Obviously, by creating their own personality test, the HR department, for example, can show the candidate that the company is genuinely interested in them.

The Company's Human Values

Beyond personality tests, another way to face the human-centered recruitment challenge is to showcase the brand's human values differently. To do this, the company can, for example, have current employees share testimonials on social media or on the company website. They can tell potential candidates about the benefits of working for the company, as well as all the values it demonstrates toward employees. Additionally, the company can encourage recruiters to be present on social media to better interact with candidates. It can also be interesting to put transparency at the heart of the process to succeed in this recruitment challenge. Recruiters must be honest in job postings by disclosing all constraints related to the position, salary ranges, etc. This way, the candidate feels confident and understands that the company truly cares about establishing a healthy relationship with its employees.

4 - Improving HR ROI: A Not-So-New Recruitment Challenge

Improving recruitment performance is not a new recruitment challenge per se. However, it is important to view HR ROI differently and take into account 2023's innovations. For example, this year, recruiters can rely on predictive recruitment to boost their performance. This type of recruitment involves using an algorithm to better target candidates for a given position. It allows, among other things:

• Reducing steps in the recruitment process;
• Saving time and money;
• Reducing turnover (as this recruitment focuses on the long term);
• Increasing new employee performance by approximately 15%;
• Increasing candidate opportunities (as the system favors everyone).

Furthermore, predictive recruitment reconciles soft skills and HR ROI. Thanks to the operating principle of this type of process, stakeholders can address an important recruitment challenge. They can select profiles capable of improving customer experience without jeopardizing ROI.

5 - Considering Customer Experience During Recruitment

Recruitment itself is a strategic challenge for companies. Indeed, it can be used as a way to improve certain growth parameters such as customer experience. If we consider that a good customer experience is based on certain important qualities of employees, it is possible to optimize this parameter by searching from the start for profiles possessing said qualities. This is where soft skills come into play. Why bet on soft skills for your recruitment? Simply because they are an excellent indicator of interpersonal skills. They allow you to know from the start whether the candidate will integrate well into your company and thrive there. Moreover, they help determine whether the candidate possesses the basic qualities to deliver a quality customer experience (listening, empathy, responsiveness, etc.). If you want to face this recruitment challenge more effectively, you can conduct some tests. In summary, in 2023, you will need to meet several recruitment challenges. This article summarizes the main challenges you will face, but many others exist. Fortunately, there are tests today that can help you with this task. Read this article to learn more: "Recruitment tests: how to evaluate your candidates' potential?" It should be useful in facing most of the recruitment challenges that 2023 has in store for the HR function.