Global Recruiting Trends In 2019

LinkedIn’s annual global recruiting report for 2018 looked at staffing trends across a wide range of recruiters. The survey solicited responses from almost 9000 recruiters and hiring managers across 39 countries worldwide and looked at issues such as diversity, interview processes, and artificial intelligence (AI).

Here is a summary of the Global Recruiting Trends report findings.

Diversity

Diversity and inclusion were found to be one of the top trends. 82 percent of respondents stated that diversity was a driving force behind their hiring strategy. Key drivers in this area were that companies see workforce diversity as an arbiter of culture and optimized performance. However, 40 percent of companies were still finding it a challenge to locate appropriate candidates and 27 percent found it difficult to retain such candidates once they had hired them.

Interviewing Trends: New Ways to Assess Candidates

Interviewing trends are shifting to accommodate new processes and modern workplace needs. these methods include a focus on soft skills assessment, understanding a candidate’s shortcomings, and mitigating interviewer bias.

Going forward, new tools that will help to streamline the process might include assessments conducted in virtual reality (VR), on-the-job auditions, and meeting outside of the office in more casual locations. The thinking behind these strategies is that it will be more difficult for candidates to overstate their skillsets and that it will be easier for the hiring manager to assess whether they are a good fit for the position.

Data-driven Decision Making

Data is already a key driver throughout the recruiting industry, but going forward, it will become even more important. The study found that almost 40 percent of respondents see data as one of the most important components of the recruiting process.

Currently, only about 65 percent are leveraging data towards reducing attrition, skills assessment, and crafting more attractive offers, but in 2018 and beyond, almost 80 percent say that they will be implementing a data strategy in the hiring process, indicating a significant movement in that direction.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) Will Become Commonplace

AI is penetrating many sectors of industry. From customer service to retail, it is seen as a potential threat to the job market, but in the recruiting sector, it may just be a game-changer. Some hiring managers receive upwards of a hundred resume’s every single day. AI can help them more accurately shortlist for required skill sets and experience, giving recruiters an accurate screening tool that will greatly reduce the time-to-hire and any recruiter bias that may exist.

That said, only 14 percent of hiring managers seem to think that AI threatens their own livelihood. Some of the things that AI simply cannot do include seeing a candidate’s potential and establishing a cultural fit within the organization.

Conclusion

While the LinkedIn report highlights that the recruiting process has become largely transactional, there are trends emerging that elevate the job to a more strategic level, emphasizing the human connection and critical thinking about how to land the right candidates. Going forward, the recruiters who will find the greatest success will be the ones who can leverage new trends and technology through these market changes.