Candidate Attraction – A Guide For Employers

As recruiters we weigh heavily on candidates in a lot of what we post. Advice on applying, CV writing, interview tips and more.

Rarely do you see a guide for employers, hiring managers or internal HR, so we decided to put something together to give you, the employer, the best chance of securing your next employee. Below are a few tips.

Prepare your job description:

Before you even consider listing that you’re hiring, ensure that you’ve prepared a full and detailed role description for the individual that you’re looking to hire. Be sure to include:

• Role title
• Main duties
• Key stakeholders/reporting line
• Required skills, qualifications and experience
• Salary, benefits and working pattern
• Company culture

How you present this depends on the intended viewer:

Internal/Non-Advertised – A detailed spec outlining the role in depth. Ensuring the applicant fully understands the position.

External/Job Site/Website – An engaging advert, fairly short and succinct with eye-catching bullet points, leaning more towards the company culture and the exciting potential for an applicant.

How much time you put into this part of the process will go a long way to securing you the most accurate fit. We strongly advise against cutting corners during this process. It’ll also not look great when an applicant asks for a spec and there is little or nothing to present.

Be clear about career development potential:

Over the last 5 years we’ve seen ‘job-hopping’ become a lot more acceptable. Candidates are a lot more brazen in their approach to a better job title, a pay rise or better employment terms and rather that earn this through length of service with a single employer, they choose to move on.

There are two schools of thought on this as employers:

1. Why should we invest in them if we know they’ll leave?

2. What can we do to keep them?

If you answered 2, then this is where you need to be very outwards about your investment in your staff explaining how they can progress, their potential career paths and the rewards and achievements they will receive as a result. This should always be touched upon early in the hiring process.

Where to advertise:

Choosing where to advertise your roles can also wildly affect your chance of attracting the right candidates. We’re long past the days of posting an advert onto a couple of major national/international sites and expecting success.

In 2023, there are a huge number of specialist job sites for design, trades, executives and more. Do your research into where you are going to advertise your role and remember the age old motto of ‘Buy Cheap, Buy Twice’. Yes, the sites focused on exactly what you do as a business may cost 2-3 times as much, but consider the time saved through the process when you receive 5 relevant applicants, compared to trawling through 50-100 totally irrelevant ones.

As a rough guide:

Linkedin: Executive level positions & management roles.

CV Library/Indeed: Skilled trades, administration, office focussed roles.

Dezeen/Hauss – Design related positions.

Facebook/Instagram: Marketing, administration, sales roles.

Yotspot – Roles for crew coming ashore, brokerage and yacht management.

There are, of course, hundreds more job sites you can use, but this is a small sample.

How is your company represented online/on social media?

As we all know, social media rules the world, and this is the same when it comes to employment. How a company portrays itself digitally can say a lot.

What sort of business are you? Do you have a laid-back nature and a family-style ethos. If so, does your social media reflect this with a less formal style?

Or are you much more corporate with a solid structure and therefore wish to have a much more regimented social media style representing your ethos as an organisation.

We always advise our clients that their social media channels are as critical to attracting staff as their job descriptions and adverts. As newer generations join the jobseekers market, they will do more online research on a potential employer, forcing the need to cover your business perception at every corner.

Using the above will give you the building blocks you need as an employer to start attracting talent through your own channels. Whilst it’s by no means a golden ticket, using our guide above will definitely increase your chances of attracting the RIGHT talent.

Of course, the support of an experienced recruiter will always be the most effective way to hire, so if you’d like to chat to us about using our services alongside your own efforts, drop us a line to hello@superyachtrecruiter.com