With businesses all over the Upstate searching for new employees it’s perhaps the perfect time to ask what those employers need to do to not just recruit, but retain the best possible employees?
It’s a pertinent question because, according to a study from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average person has 12 jobs over a span of about 30 years. Obviously, sometimes a job just isn’t the right fit, but what can employers do to make sure that they’ve created the best possible environment to recruit and retain good workers?
We spoke with two successful Upstate recruiting firms, Find Great People and Recruiting Solutions, to find the answer.
The first key to retention is perhaps the most obvious: Good compensation.
“Because of the volume of hiring, the demand for talent has exceeded the supply,” says Steve Hall, vice president of business development at Find Great People. “So compensation right now is critical because of the inflation that’s being created by the demand. And I’m finding many companies are still asleep at the wheel, thinking that they can keep offering what is typical compensation in their company structure.”
And that’s a potentially costly mistake, especially post-pandemic.
“What it will cost me to get you to join my team in today’s market versus what it would have cost me before the pandemic hit are two different numbers,” Hall adds.
Speaking of the pandemic, both Hall and Tuesday Baker with Recruiting Solutions say the post-pandemic job candidate is going to be looking for a new level of flexibility from an employer.
“During the pandemic, candidates have requested more remote opportunities and schedules that worked around their families,” Baker says. “As candidates have adapted to changes in their lives, it has required them to be open to different shifts and hours than we typically would see.”
“A question that I’m getting asked a lot is, ‘Is working remotely 100% here to stay?’” Hall says. “And you have to think about why are they asking that question. They’re asking because when the pandemic hit and everything locked down, most started working from home. So I think employers need to figure out which roles can they actually allow to be 100% remote and which roles do they need to have as a hybrid because departments may need to be working in tandem with other departments.”
Of course, Baker says, a good recruiter will discuss compensation, schedule flexibility and many other job details before sending a candidate to interview with an employer.
“We pre-screen our candidates,” Baker says. “So we’re screening candidates initially by going through resumes, then we have our initial phone conversation, and then that’s followed by another in-person or Zoom interview as well. We do that to make sure that we’re getting the right candidate out there and that they feel confident when they do accept the position; they know exactly what to expect.”
Perhaps most importantly, Hall says that it’s vital for companies to realize the playing field is bigger than it has ever been.
“Think visually about all the 8.1 million reported jobs that are open across the country, as of a couple of weeks ago,” Hall says. “And I get that here in Greenville County or Spartanburg County, you might just say, ‘I’m not competing with those folks across the country.’ Well, that’s really a bad way of looking at this. That makes no sense. You are competing, because of technology. You’re competing on a national scale; that’s more important than it has been in years past.”
- careers.sc.gov lists the following jobs as the most in-demand in the Upstate right now: Accounting, audit and finance, Automotive, Case workers, Corrections/law enforcement, Human services, Information technology and computer, Medical/dental, Mental health, Nursing & Trades.
- Greenville’s unemployment rate is currently at 5.4%, significantly lower than the national unemployment rate of 8.4%.
- There are currently more than 220 jobs listed on Find Great People’s site, fgp.com, and more than 100 listed at recruitingsolutionsonline.com.
