Your staff are the heart of your business, with a strong and diverse team, there’s no limit to your creativity and success. Finding the perfect staff is essential to building a strong and healthy business. More importantly, your company should have an excellent strategy to retain the talent that you hire. For some useful pointers on finding and retaining the perfect staff, try following these nine simple steps.

1 . A well-crafted job description

To find yourself the perfect staff, it starts with a well-crafted job description. The quality and the details of a job description should never be underestimated.

First off, you’ll want to paint a clear picture of the essential qualifications and responsibilities, the more specific you are about who you are looking for, the less likely you are to attract unsuitable applicants. To add another layer to the sift after you’ve written a job description, you could consider attaching a skills test to the application process in order to only screen candidates who’ve shown aptitude in the areas the role requires.

Secondly, ensure that your job description reflects your company in tone of voice and style. You’ll want candidates who can fit into your company culture, so the values and personality of your business should be clear from the get-go. Besides this, be sure to mention the perks that you can offer the employee (remember you need the talent as much as the talent needs you)!

2. Advertise in the right places

To find the right people, you’ve got to advertise in the right places. Generally speaking, social sites like LinkedIn and Facebook are a great place to advertise jobs and connect with potential candidates across a wide range of professions.

Depending on your industry, you may want to advertise on sites that are specific to your sector. By targeting the sites that your industry professionals are most likely to use, you’ll also speed up the hiring process. It can be tempting to put job descriptions everywhere to extend your reach.

Remember, though; you’re looking for quality over quantity.

3. Promote your company culture

Your company culture is all about the values and behaviours of your company, beyond your business operations alone.

Your culture is reflected in your interactions and relationships, between staff and with the general public. It’s further reflected in your beliefs, values, ethics, perks, office set-up and more.

The perfect staff will be able to fit in with your company culture, so it’s essential to promote that culture throughout the hiring process. From the job description to the interview stages, tell your candidates what company culture means to you and what will be expected of them.

4. A top agency

To support your hiring process, it can be a good idea to use a recruitment agency. A professional agency will have much expertise and experience to bring to the hiring process. An agency can advertise, vet candidates and conduct first stage interviews on your behalf. 

Finding the perfect employees can be a lengthy process, plus there is plenty of paperwork to complete. Using an agency, you’ll get a great team of professionals to do the hard work while you reap the benefits. DSC Personnel is a high performing recruitment agency who supports hiring across a wide range of industries.

From transport and logistics to hospitality, DSC has plenty of expertise to offer.

5. Creative interviews

Interview processes can be a little repetitive, you ask all the key questions, yet do you really get a chance to know the candidates?

Often, an overly formal setting can make it challenging to gain a full picture of your potential employee.

To shake things up a little consider a creative interview format, you could meet for coffee in an informal setting? Or conduct a group interview involving a creative project?

Adding a zest of originality to your interview process means you have more chance of gaining extra insights about your candidates. It’s useful to set candidates a performance task such as a mini project or a presentation. Doing so, you’ll gain an idea of how they would deal with the practical aspects of the role.

6. Training opportunities

Once you’ve found the perfect staff, you’ll want to do all that you can to keep them around. One of the things that you can do to retain staff is to offer attractive training opportunities. Employees want the opportunity to grow and learn within their role. If staff feel stuck at a dead-end, they will likely look for opportunities with other companies. By providing ongoing training, you’ll allow your team to gain new skills and take on new responsibilities.

7. Company perks

Company perks can make a world of difference to how attractive your business is to your staff. Offer all the perks that you can, from health plans to on-site gyms, flexible working hours and birthday days-off. Offer training workshops, Kindles for learning, remote working opportunities and social activities.

The perks that you offer will contribute to improving your company culture and keeping your staff happy and motivated.

8. Regular feedback

Ask your staff for regular feedback so that you can hear their needs and put their ideas into practice. Meet for regular one-on-ones to ask them how they are feeling within their role. Ask if they are coming across any issues or if there is any extra support that they need. When you take enough time to gain feedback from your staff, you can help to improve the efficiency of your business overall.

When staff feel listened to and valued, this does wonders for retention and company morale too. Feedback sessions are also useful for you to offer staff advice on how they can seek to improve and grow within their position.

9. A social workplace

Seek to encourage a social atmosphere within your workplace; you can do this by arranging regular work social events, from drinks or dinners to group charity work or book clubs.

When your teams have the chance to interact socially, beyond the space of work, you’ll promote stronger relationships, happier staff and a more unified workforce. When staff members feel distant from their peers, this atmosphere is unlikely to produce innovative or creative work.

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