With so many open jobs, job seekers can pick and choose between numerous different job opportunities. To make sure you hire the best candidate for your open engineering or manufacturing position, you will want to do all you can to snag quality talent. As you make your open position known, you’ll see a lot of applicants, and it may be hard to sort through all of these candidates to find that one special person you want to hire.
Preclosing in a technique that allows you to show the candidate that you are interested in them while also gauging their interest in the position. Using this technique, you can also learn more about the candidate’s priorities and any obstacles that might be in their way.
As soon as you believe that a candidate is viable, you can start implementing the preclosing technique. Here are a few tips using the preclosing technique from Austin Nichols Technical Search, a technical recruiting firm in Kansas City.
Phone Screening
Before scheduling a phone interview, a phone screening call can help you learn more about the candidate. While recruiting companies often help companies with this step of the hiring process, if you do all of your hiring in-house, this is something that you may want to implement into your process. Use this call to identify any potential barriers that could keep a candidate from choosing your position without worrying about compensation.
The following questions can help you learn the candidate’s concerns and priorities:
- What factors, besides compensation, affect your decision for selecting a job?
- Does anyone else affect your decision to accept a position?
- What are your top concerns or questions that you want to be answered before making a decision?
- How does this opportunity rank among the others you are currently considering? Why?
For these four questions, you can learn a lot about what the candidate thinks about your job and their level of interest. You might find out that there are ways you can make the candidate happy. For example, maybe the candidate is worried that the commute will be too long. You can talk about the work-from-home options your company has in place. Maybe the candidate’s concern is something you don’t currently have a solution to but finding out the concern now will allow you to find a solution before you speak again.
You will want to let the candidate know that there will be an additional phone interview shortly. The phone interview should be scheduled without a huge gap between the phone screening call so that the candidate doesn’t find a reason to move on to another position at another company.
Phone Interview
The phone interview is the next step in the preclosing process. Generally, the manager of the team the position will fall under conducts the phone interview. During the phone interview, the manager can give more insight into what the position will actually entail.
While many of the questions may seem similar to those that have already been asked, this interview will push these questions forward and learn more about what the candidate is expecting and what their concerns are. Compensation expectations are generally discussed during this interview, but it is important to make it clear that this isn’t an official offer. The information you gather during this interview can help you make a competitive offer.
If the interviewee volunteers their previous salary, you can always use this information to gauge what they will be expecting from the new job. It is a good assumption that the candidate will be looking to make more money than they did at their previous job, and many people expect at least a 10 percent increase in pay as they move from job to job.
Readdress any concerns that were previously discussed during the screening call. You might still be able to quell or solve these concerns. Whether the candidate is worried about travel requirements, growth opportunities, or the job title, you can do your best to fix the problem and keep the candidate interested in the position.
During the phone interview, you can ask about other opportunities that the candidate is considering. Check in to see how they feel about the other opportunities they are being presented. This information will give you a better understanding of what the candidate needs from a job.
Post-Interview Follow Up
The on-site interview should give you a good idea of whether or not you are going to choose this candidate or not. If you are going to continue with the candidate, you can intensify the preclosing. Your focus during this stage is to see how interested the candidate is while also showing your interest.
To judge how interested the candidate is, you can ask for references and see when they can start. While you want to find the answer to these questions, you need to see how the candidate answer the question. Do you hear excitement in their voice? Do they seem like they are dragging their feet?
Since it can be stressful for people to find jobs, the candidate is also trying to determine if you are interested in them. They may be trying to decide if they should hold out for an offer from you or look somewhere else.
You can show them you are interested in small ways, such as having a senior leader send out an email or taking them to lunch. Regardless, you will want to stay in contact, which can be as simple as an email every few days to keep the candidate up-to-date about the status of the hiring process.
Other Things to Consider
At many companies, the hiring manager has a lot going on. It can be difficult for them to take all of the above steps, which is why some companies tend to look toward recruiting companies for help—especially those looking for people in hard-to-hire industries such as engineering and manufacturing. Recruiting firms will be able to ask the necessary questions and report back all findings to the hiring manager or whoever is responsible for making the final hiring decisions.
For companies looking to hire the engineers, contact Austin Nichols at 816-471-5575. Located in Kansas City, Austin Nichols is known for helping companies find the engineer that they need in less time than in-house hiring methods, which frees up employees to focus on their day-to-day work instead of hiring new people.
