The lack of a strategic thinking in the company’s recruitment processes is invoked both by candidates and by some HR specialists. As a rule, multinationals import the directing lines form the strongest branches, without adapting them to the national specific, and the native companies hire by the rule “hic et nunc” (here and now), forgetting to plan at least the predicted necessary employees.

To plan and to act in a systematic manner should represent the base actions of every department or organization, indifferent of the market conditions. Therefore, whatever the number of available candidates, unemployment rate or the industry specific nature, an efficient recruitment department should set out and follow up the strategic lines.

What does a recruitment strategy contain?

The essential points of the recruitment and selection strategy are:

• Organizational environment
• The allocated budget
• The targeted “audience” meaning “whom I hire”, potential employees on which the recruitment messages and searches are focused
• The human resources necessary(“how much I hire”)
• The recruitment and selection strategy (“how I hire”, meaning the recruitment environment, recruitment methods, selection methods and type of approach).

Organizational environment:
the debut of every recruitment project must coincide with a profound perception over the company’s organizational culture, of it’s strong points (examples: pleasant environment, good location, far-reaching projects/clients etc) or weak points( example: smaller wage in comparison with the market). Furthermore every recruitment department must know exactly the direct and indirect competitors in the process of attracting new employees.

Allocated budget:
the recruitment process is an expensive one. The job advertisements, participation at different events, recruitment agencies, all of these ask for financial efforts. Furthermore, every hire requires a series of direct and indirect costs. It is very important that the recruitment and selection process have an allocated budget, preferably in a realistic manner.

Targeted audience:
The targeted audience represents that mass of potential candidates which have a value system close or compatible with the one of the hiring company. To decide on a targeted audience helps efficiently formulate the recruitment messages and to select in an adequate manner the potential candidates.

The human resources necessary:
if the targeted audience can be pointed form the company’s values, than the human resources necessary will be reflected by the annual business-plan. Based on the development or parting of some business lines predictions the candidates data base should be updated and adapted.

Recruitment and selection methodology:
in this chapter I would include:

a. The message which needs to be transmitted to the potential candidates and the communication channels. If we talk about a company with a great level of formality, the message would be rigorous, formal. If we talk about a company with a relaxed environment, the message would reflect this approach.
b. The recruitment methods. You can establish the weight of internal recruitment versus external recruitment, online recruitment (specialized sites, niche sites etc) versus classic one (specialty papers) or even unconventional manners of attracting potential candidates.
c. The selection methods. The methods and the weight of each one must be specified in the final result – selection interview, professional tests, and assessment centers – as well as the number of evaluators, their professional status, and the weight of every evaluation in the hiring decision.

Given the organizational and industry’s specific nature, the strategy can contain other elements or details considered to be significant. You can set quantitative and qualitative objectives, estimated time periods or even optimization methods for some actions that had a low efficiency in the past.

Do not forget: not even the highly invoked economic crisis does exonerate you from thinking strategically! Maybe the mass of candidates will balance but soon the new challenges will appear.