By removing unnecessary obstacles like four-year degrees and previous work experience, skills-based hiring simplifies hiring processes. Regardless of what their resumes say, the focus is on finding talented people to fill the position. Here, we’ll show how it can improve employer productivity and how you can get started.
An overview of skill-based hiring
Rather than considering an individual’s education, degrees, or previous work experience, skills-based hiring emphasizes their skills, abilities, and talents. Your company can then find the skills needed to fill any gaps in existing skills by finding candidates that are uniquely qualified to perform the role.
Choosing a candidate based on their skills offers many benefits to a business owner and job seeker, including:
- Reduction in recruitment time
- Increased retention
- Cost savings
- Diversification of the workforce
How to improve your recruitment by using skills-based hiring practices?
Your business can identify skilled individuals who can help increase its productivity through a variety of skills-based hiring practices.
- Analyze the skills gap in your organization
An analysis of your current employees’ skills can provide insight into areas where they may be able to fill gaps. By doing so, you will be able to identify hidden gems familiar with the values and culture of your company. LinkedIn reports that 94% of employees stay at a company longer when given a chance to upskill and receive additional training.
- Create job descriptions based on skills
HRDive reported that 72% of hiring managers said they provided clear job directions, while only 36% of job applicants agreed. As a first step, remove any unnecessary obstacles, such as a degree, if they aren’t essential. Think about the skills you need to succeed in the role.
As much as possible, you should condense relevant information for the job posting. Keeping it short and snappy will make it more appealing. Applicants who read shorter job descriptions of less than 300 words applied for the position 8.4% more often, according to LinkedIn.
- Perform a skills-based assessment of applicants
There are many ways to assess applicants’ technical and soft skills through skills-based pre-employment assessments. Multiple-choice questions can be used, as well as short-answer questions, audio, and video clips, and job simulations. Skills-based assessments are most effective when they integrate different kinds of questions, such as questionnaires, immersive-style questions, and video-supported responses.
- Make use of skills assessment tools
If you use the right platform, implementing skills-based hiring for roles with many applicants won’t be a challenge. The grading and ranking of candidates can be scaled using several AI tools. Their algorithms adapt to your preferences by comparing candidate answers with thousands of others. Many in-demand roles are already covered by pre-built skills assessments. If you need a custom one, you can create it from scratch to meet the needs of your organization with companies such as KillerCoder.
Final words
The skills-based hiring approach provides an opportunity for candidates with no formal educational background to shine. It’s a win-win for both businesses and job seekers. In addition to reducing unconscious bias and promoting better diversity in the recruitment process, it can also help reduce the ongoing talent shortage.
