Contactless Hiring – Pandemic version of Recruitment

 

   Time and again it has been proved that mankind is the most agile breed on the planet, pandemic has also proved how human beings can evolve through any adversity. The year 2020 was special in the business calendar as many businesses had to reinvent themselves to survive the new post-pandemic era. It was in a true sense a VUCA time, people were losing lives due to corona and on the other hand, were losing their livelihoods due to lockdown.

Pandemic times were the testing times for HR function as they had to ensure that the recruitment activity continues despite the constraints on the physical movement of resources. In the whole process of reinvention, the HR function had to rely on technology to ensure the recruitment momentum continues. Thus came to existence a new jargon in the HR fraternity “Contactless Hiring”. Contactless Hiring is not exactly a novel way of recruitment because in the past technology had already intruded the personal selection process and many activities were done virtually. Pandemic forced the HR fraternity to drive recruitment in a 100% contactless manner, whether it was screening or conducting interviews or to the extreme of the onboarding process.

On one hand, pandemics brought different challenges but at the same time technology came to the rescue for both the job seeker and job giver. Different perspectives played a major role in driving the recruitment process. 

Impact on Jobseeker:         

      Many employees had to lose current jobs and in many cases, offers were revoked, in such times hunting for a job was a tough task, searching and posting on sites like LinkedIn, Naukri.com etc., whereas getting such package which will fulfil the necessities of a common man wasn’t easy.

Problems being faced by a Job Seeker:

·        The actual presentation of an individual is not much possible in a virtual mode as much as in physical mode, because many of us face an issue of camera shyness because of which we cannot express ourselves confidently as compared to personal interaction.

·      Eye to eye contact builds good rapport in a conversation, whereas even a listener creates an interest in an opponent’s topic, which isn’t possible in virtual means.

·        Technological adaptability isn’t that advanced compared to developed countries, because of which we lack in terms of connectivity and proper communication, network connection in the rural part of the country, availability of gadgets is also a major problem faced.

·        Losing a current job, or looking for placement after education, in such times has also changed as the process of hiring are also evolving, the criteria of fulfilling the job position, the experience is not available with fresher candidates.

 Benefits of Virtual Hiring to Jobseekers

       Virtual hiring can be easy and cost-effective way, one can save time on hiring and onboarding, save money on overhead, and free up more of your own time to work on the things which are needed to be focused.

·        Virtual hiring gives employees the flexibility to take assessments and interviews from their comfort zones.

·        Can be confident for speaking virtually as many candidates have fear of communicating to unknowns for the first time, and cannot perform well, in virtual mean one can easily represent himself/herself. 

    Content preparation and representation skills can be made best with the help of technologies and familiarity with their gadgets.

 Impact on Job Givers:

  Keeping employees safe and healthy during the pandemic has been a top concern for any organization. The rise in video conferencing and virtual meetings has led to both small and big players in tech like Google meet, zoom even WhatsApp to enhance their production capabilities to help boost better virtual collaboration and enhance how online meetings are conducted.

 Problems Being faced by Job Givers:

 The talent gap has been a recurring global challenge for years now. Employers have been dealing with this issue the best way they can, by hiring and training candidates who do not have knowledge or skills for the position, and becomes difficult to train them virtually

       

Another major recruitment problem that businesses faces are struggling with is the onboarding of new joiners. Recruiters weren’t prepared for the current crisis and hence have limited resources for onboarding new employees remotely.

·        Low applications because of fear in the minds of the employees for the job shift, before they know anything for certain. Lack of face to face interview. 

     Benefits to Job Givers:Digital interviews are an absolute win in this pandemic situation.

      Time and cost-saving are done for employers as well as a recruiter can conduct interviews by being at home also.

       With the advancement in hiring tools, it has become easier for HR as well to interview a candidate to onboard him.

        Virtual hiring allows employers to have multiple, private conversations at once. Since everything takes place online recruiter can chat with multiples at once. This makes it easy to make more connections.

   Contactless Hiring seems to be a new normal in recruitment function but may have good prospects considering the benefits to both the recruiter as well as the prospective candidate. Few government interventions on providing efficient technological infrastructure can be a boon for corporates to promote much more innovative approaches in the interest of all stakeholders.

 

Blog by

Karan Rathod

MBA II Year 

Indira Global Business School, Pune