“Companies’ recruitment strategy: A drastic shift from tradition to virtual platform amidst COVID-19 contengion” | Ravendra Mishra | President HR | Garware Technical Fibres Ltd

“How Companies’ recruitment strategies are having a drastic shift from tradition to virtual platform amidst COVID-19”

In the time before the coronavirus epidemic, the virtual interviewing process was mostly limited to overseas recruitment or in the IT and IT enabled services sectors. These sectors led the practice of reducing face-to-face interviews to optimise time and monies. More particularly, it was useful for candidates to reduce the hassle of travel and companies to reduce spends for a first stage interview.

However, today due to the coronavirus disruption, virtually all organisations are now compelled to make virtual platforms their primary hiring tool. For some, it is a completely new model, and they are learning to use various modes of instantaneous communication that are available today to conduct interviews instead of face to face meetings. The current situation has brought about a change in the mind-set of such companies.

The HR industry is witnessing a complete change in the hiring process. It is moving towards a virtual world, right from candidate search to screening and even on boarding. The swathe of digital platforms are aiding candidates know more about companies and herein social media is playing a pivotal role. While many other HR processes have already under gone IT enablement, the bastion of physical interviews were bound to fall and the current pandemic is assisting this transformation.

Organisations are now even hiring the services of virtual tracking agencies to check travel, medical, credit histories of potential candidates. Another trend in hiring that is seeing a surge in usage as part of the recruitment process is online assessment in order to quickly filter candidates based on skill sets and internal assessment criteria.

In the era of social distancing, virtual meeting platforms and other adaptive working practices are helping companies avoid in-person interviews for the safety of both candidates and their own team members. The one challenge some companies are facing is once the candidate is on boarded, how he/she will begin work, since they will not have access to company laptops, VPN etc.

Many businesses in India hiring for top level positions have maintained an open minded approach to recruiting and leveraged technology by using various virtual platforms that are available over the internet.

However, some companies are treading cautiously keeping security and other risks in mind depending on the nature of the business they operate in and are still reluctant to have e- induction and e-joinees. Others have either postponed or cancelled interviews where there is no urgency to hire for a particular vacancy and have opted for interviews through virtual platforms for urgent and critical posts.

Companies who had issued offer letters before the pandemic lockdown have taken on boarding as an opportunity for employer branding. They have ensured that the onboarding for their new joinees and interns has taken place thus showing that they have stayed true to their promises. These companies have effectively used social media to broadcast their onboarding stories thus ultimately leading to creating a good employer brand image.

The world as we knew it has changed forever. With this being the case, the human resource landscape will see a virtual transformation in the way it recruits in the post Covid-19 world.