Team recruitment vs. candidate recruitment – Same process or not?
The process of recruiting new employees is already challenging in itself - how to implement it when you are hiring an entire team and not just one candidate?
Taking a first look, the process is similar – but only on the surface. Hiring people for five positions is one story, hiring people for 20+ positions, well... Completely different. Even if it is a matter of hiring a completely new team within the company, the task becomes even more complicated.
In the past two years, we have witnessed changes in customer behavior - more and more things are happening online, there is an increase in online shopping, so it is logical that digital stores (e-shops) will also develop together with consumers.
Therefore, Tehnomania is launching the eCommerce (r)evolution in 2022. Which for them means the formation of a new eCommerce team - the opening of 20+ positions that need to be filled in addition to the 40+ already existing positions that are distributed across three webshops: Tehnomanija, WinWin, and Emma.
As we have already said, when hiring a whole new team, you will face challenges that you did not even have to think about when hiring a smaller number of candidates.
What are the challenges, and how to solve them? Read below.
Maintaining a good company image
In order to form a completely new team within one company, transparency in recruitment must be at a high level. Why?
The last thing you want for your company is for candidates to get the impression that a large number of open positions are due to mass layoffs - which, without additional information, may be the first thought of a candidate who sees so many open positions at one company.
Usually posting ads and listing junior, mid-level, and senior positions is not enough. A different approach is needed - which one?
1.Keeping up-to-date employer branding profile - it is now more important than ever for candidates to know more about the team they would be joining
2.Communicate that you are opening a new team within the company - pay attention that a large number of open positions is not the result of mass layoffs
3.Share ads for new positions on relevant employment platforms - in Tehnomania's case, the Joberty platform is the most relevant because the open positions are related to the eComm and Tech community
Team structure and careful selection of the positions you need
Before you even start forming a new team - you and the person who will be in charge of that team should map out the entire recruitment process together.
Clearly defined roles in a team are half the success of that team.
Of course, the roles will change as the team develops – but to start with, you need to determine which are the most important positions that need to be filled and how they will work together.
Since Tehnomania plans to create an eCommerce (r)evolution, their HR team decided to create a special recruitment process for these needs.
How did they achieve this?
By forming a team and positions that will follow the segmentation of the eCommerce process - by forming positions according to which expertise is needed in different parts of the development of an eCommerce shop.
As they already have developed eComm shops - the next thing needed for the rapid expansion of eCommerce is various positions in the marketing team. And since the expansion of eCommerce is accompanied by the development of the marketplace platform from the very beginning - this implies the selection of candidates with a similar set of skills as for eComm, only with a little more expertise and innovation.
This includes that you, as a member of the HR team, must know what expertise is required by which part of the job and how much one employee can cover, so that the quality of his work is at the highest level.
Although, for example, most Frontend developers know the basics of UX/UI design, in order to give their best, they need to work together with a person who will be completely focused on the UX/UI of the website - the designer. Again, for a UX/UI designer to know exactly how to design a page, they work together with a UX/UI researcher. Based on his research, he gives instructions to the designer on how to make the website as functional as possible, and not just pleasing to the eye.
With this granulation of positions, you achieve that each employee has enough space to be an expert in his field and to give his maximum.
Therefore, it is not enough to just write that you are looking for an SEO expert - but an expert in a specific field such as "Keyword researcher" or "Backlink specialist".
It is not enough to write that you are looking for a PPC marketing specialist - but a Performance marketing specialist, a Google Ads specialist, and a Facebook Ads specialist.
The more accurately you describe the roles you need in the team, the recruitment process itself will go, which also reduces the cost of hiring new people.
Designing an effective recruiting process
In order to make it easier to sift through quality applications (because there will certainly be a lot of them), it is necessary to have an efficient recruitment process itself. How to achieve this?
1. Entrance knowledge quizzes
Instead of a simple ad, listing the qualifications that the candidate should possess, as well as the responsibilities - a more effective approach is to create an entrance knowledge quiz with specific questions that only a candidate who is truly qualified for the position could know.
In Tehnomania's case, it is a test of knowledge of terms from the eCommerce business. How did they map it?
In the test, they counted the terms that some are more familiar with, some less so - depending on the candidate's seniority.
For example, someone who is Senior in eCommerce will also know how to explain the term and its application. Medior will know most terms, Junior will only know certain terms.
This does not mean that the HR team will exclude candidates who do not have experience in that field - there are always great candidates who want to move into a new field and develop there.
With this technique, they make the process of selection and classification of candidates faster and simpler - which is crucial when hiring a large number of candidates.
Therefore, the test is only a tool for faster processing of applied candidates, but not an automatic rejection for candidates who have less experience in the eComm field.
2. Careful selection of recruitment channels
You should search for candidates on the platforms where the candidates you need move. For example, if you need writers for a blog - you will look for them on platforms that hire writers, and designers on platforms that hire designers. If you are looking for Frontend developers, you will post an ad on Joberty's section dedicated only to Frontend jobs. Quality candidates know where the best jobs are.
As Tehnomanija employs the entire eCommerce team, it was logical for them to search for candidates on a platform where IT experts gather, such as Joberty.
What are the next steps?
Getting to know the candidates, assessing their qualifications and – if all goes well, enjoying the teamwork that follows.
And for Tehnomania? Track positions on Joberty. :)
Once the marketing activities necessary for the expansion of eCommerce in Serbia are covered, the improvement of the current e-shops follows - which means the opening of new positions such as backend and frontend developers, scrum masters and project managers.
If you want to be part of the eCommerce (r)evolution and work in a team that has an innovative approach to work, look at open positions and prove your expertise in the eCommerce industry today!
