Even in a time of high unemployment, Central Florida employers often find it difficult to fill their job opportunities with qualified, skilled candidates. It is necessary to have a reliable strategy to attract and retain qualified workers.

Employers must become resourceful and rely on multiple recruitment strategies to fill their openings with the appropriate person. CareerSource Central Florida (CSCF) offers these recruitment solutions:

Know your metrics. Have you ever stopped to analyze your average cost per hire? You might be shocked at the results. The traditional measure of recruiting costs is calculated by taking the total of all expenses related to the hiring process and dividing it by the number of hires. This metric includes advertising costs, recruiter and agency fees, travel, relocation bonuses, employee referral bonuses, screening costs and costs associated with the salary and benefits of the internal recruiting staff divided by the number of hires. In some key jobs, particularly in industries where time to market is a key factor in driving corporate success, the cost of a single vacancy has been calculated to be between $7,000 and $12,000 per day.

Analyze your HR practices. Employers should devise interviewing processes that reduce the risk of selecting a bad hire by conducting reference and background checks as part of their screening process. New technologies have made this process easier to conduct. Lets face it; the interview alone doesn’t ensure that you have a good match for your vacancy. Many companies are resorting to a battery of assessments including behavior-based testing to competency testing to further solidify the hiring process.

Consider promoting from within. Sometimes your best talent can be right in front of you, consider your existing employees for promotional opportunities by taking full advantage of the skills you have already developed in-house and recruit for the lesser skills. This process may even yield that you can afford to reduce headcount overall or use skills to your best advantage to lessen the impact of positions that cannot be filled. CSCF’s Employed Worker Training program can assist you with filling these skill gaps.

Analyze your recruitment options. Employers are faced with an extensive array of recruitment options and sometimes determining which one to use can be overwhelming. The key is to use recruiting sources effectively. Which method will provide you with the most exhaustive candidate pool? From existing applicants, internal job postings, Internet postings, local newspapers, area schools from high schools to technical centers, community colleges and universities, community based organizations, job fairs, employment agencies or temporary agencies, to podcasts there is no right or wrong approach.

Network, network, network. For effective results, tap into your personal and professional networks to recruit candidates. Take advantage of industry contacts, association memberships, trade groups and social media as well.

Employee Referrals. One of the best sources of candidates is often referrals from current employees. Consider offering financial incentives to employees for each referral hired and reward them again once the new employee has been retained for 90 days or six months.

Be Competitive. Offer a competitive salary and benefit package with components such as life insurance, disability insurance and financial incentives. Research your competitors’ compensation packages and what they are doing to attract new recruits. Are you paying enough to attract the right applicants? Consider strategies such as unique benefits, offering benefits to part-time workers, job sharing, flextime, and telecommuting. Remember that different benefits will be important to different people; your package should appeal to the masses.

List your Pay Range. Employers should identify pay ranges in their advertisements. Ads that don’t include wage information gather little if any attention from serious job seekers. Listing what you can offer may make the difference in whether or not a candidate takes your listing seriously.

Re-advertise if necessary. If you cannot locate your ideal candidate then don’t settle for second best. In the end this will cost you more time and resources than it’s worth.

Credit  http://careersourcecentralflorida.com/employer/employer-research-and-resource-center/hr-tips-strategies/recruitment/recruitment-strategies#sthash.4HAwhhak.dpuf