2021 Recruitment Trends and Forecast

The Trends and Business Initiatives Staffing and Recruiting Firms Need to Know for 2021

With over 70% of survey respondents expecting their business and revenue to grow significantly, 2021 is not the year to retreat. Staffing and recruiting firms across industries and cities will need to pay close attention to their recruitment strategy, processes, infrastructure, technology, and more. 

Additionally, we should consider the industry specific growth factors, according to the American Staffing Association, including “an aging population—which will likely contribute to an increasing number of chronic health conditions; rising enrollments in postsecondary education; an increase in construction laborers; more food preparation and serving-related jobs; and continued demand for computer systems design, consulting, and staffing services.”

Keep scrolling for our breakdown of the top implementations of growth anticipated in 2021.

Automation Technology and Streamlined Recruitment Processes go hand-in-hand with the right recruitment and staffing tools.  When a firm utilizes automation sequences and integrated technology to streamline processes, they are able to give their production teams hours back in their day, so they can spend more time impacting the bottom line.

Further, steamlined processes for any team help create standard protocols that take the guesswork out of what to do next. Using your ATS or CRM to do this allows every recruiter and sales person to follow a pre-defined process and use standardized (and often automated) flows to increase productivity and reduce admin time.

According to statistics from G2, “over 98% of fortune 500 companies use recruitment software.”

Successful firms will continue to build on their marketing and sales programs; utilizing technology and software to do this will be key.

From candidate sourcing, to applicant management and onboarding, staffing and recruitment firms need these processes integrated and as automated as possible. With the right ATS/CRM, teams can utilize features such as job board integrated searches, watchdogs, and onboarding automation sequences to save time, streamline processes, scale and grow. 

With sales and marketing automation integrated into your businesses CRM, firms are able to expertly match open job reqs to candidates, as well as implement automation sequences and drip campaigns to nurture sales leads as well as passive candidates.

In order to stay competitive in 2021, firms will have to embrace technology for scalable automation that will amplify the impact of each recruiter (and salesperson).

Automation increases the productivity of your recruiters by streamlining repetitive tasks such as follow-up emails, contact or candidate status updates, onboarding communication sequences, data entry, and so on.

Think…

• Automate Standard Communications
• Utilize Workflow Automations
• Automatically Source Candidates (Watchdogs)

The results of this question show a shift in focus for many in the recruitment and staffing industry.

“68% of recruiting professionals say that the best way to improve recruiting performance over the next five years is by investing in new recruiting technology,” according to data from G2.

We are seeing less intent on more traditional recruitment methods like direct mail and job fairs, and much more significance in company website and digital recruitment methods.  Firms are seeing that they need to invest in the equity of their own job postings and digital assets.

Powering your digital recruitment strategy.

The best way to power these digital assets is through integration with an intuitive and connected recruitment software that includes functionality for applicant tracking (ATS) as well as integrated sales CRM.

The results of this question show a more direct and personal sales and business development approach versus a blanket approach.

With inbound marketing and sales becoming more well understood as an approach, a companies website and content promotion (through social media, email, and more), is going to continue to be important for client prospect awareness, consideration and conversions.

Bonus points for using technology to help customize and personalize your segmentation, targeting and messaging.

What are the implications?

The forced working-from-home arrangement brought on by the pandemic of 2020 will continue to have lasting impressions on staffing and recruiting firms.  Many leadership teams are finding production to be just-as-good or better than when everyone was in the office. And, according to insight from Flexjobs, “businesses lose $600 billion a year to workplace distractions, and that remote workers are 35% to 40% more productive than their in-office counterparts.” 

Productivity is extremely important. 

But, how about the implications on candidate and client experience? How do we create the same warm engagements and assessments when we are remote, while staying productive and remote? Many staffing and recruiting firms are leaning on technology for creating better relationships through strategic and personalized nurturing, digital transformation, video interview software, and more.

With 83% of staffing and recruiting firm survey respondents ranking relationship building as “extremely important” and another 12% ranking it “very important”, it is no surprise that we are in an era that is hyper focused on candidate experience and satisfaction.

This is terrific news.

The question (and opportunity) becomes how do you maximize candidate experience when you are working from home, not traveling or interviewing in person, and working in a technology-centric world.

Here are some tips:

• Personalize messages and workflows with the right software / tech
• Incorporate video interviewing that is built into your ATS
• Utilize a mobile optimized ATS to stay connected
• Build customized messaging sequences for recruitment steps
• Use watchdogs and auto match to get jobs in front of eager candidates more quickly

Building better relationships through technology is key.

As reported by G2, “63% of job seekers will likely reject a job offer because of a bad candidate experience.” This is huge as most staffing and recruiting firms have a finite talent pool to work from, plus with social media and reviews, no one can afford a bad experience.

So how to make sure all candidates and applicants have a great experience? Technology can help. The right technology can really help.

Using recruitment software to streamline and automate standard communications paths and personalize sequences can ensure no candidate falls through the cracks, gets a bad email, or misses out on a new job opportunity with your firm. Further, the right software will save your recruiters tons of time.