The top high-volume hiring challenges and how to stay ahead of them

High-volume hiring is a unique and fascinating subset of the recruitment space. Rather than thinking about roles that need filling on an individual level, high-volume recruiting teams are often handling hundreds of positions at a time for the likes of large hospitality organizations, call centers, and more. Hundreds!

Because of the significant scale of these initiatives, high-volume hiring has a specific set of challenges that need to be addressed in order to make the process more effective. Otherwise, recruiters risk losing candidates to competitors that have invested more time and money in refining their approach and adopting the right technologies to support them. In today’s challenging talent market, that’s something they can’t really afford to do.

In this article, we’re exploring some of the core challenges in high-volume hiring today, and how they can be mitigated with the right strategies and technology partners.

3 challenges that get in the way of high-volume hiring

The high-volume hiring funnel is broken. Between complex application processes and large numbers of interview no-shows, hiring at scale is currently plagued by a number of inefficiencies. This means that recruiters are often left spinning their wheels without making much impact on their hiring stats, and candidates suffer a poor experience as a result. Below are three of the primary challenges that hinder high-volume recruiters.

Challenge #1: Current processes are complex and inefficient

Consider you have 250 people show interest in a role by starting their application. Only 100 are likely to end up submitting the application. This is because many hiring teams have complex and extensive application forms, prompting 60% of candidates to drop off from applying. For example, no one likes an application system that requests a resume upload and then also asks for employment details in a separate form. Other issues in applications include unnecessary questions, multiple pages of queries, and clunky experiences where pages don’t load quickly. In research by Fountain, one third of companies stated that their applications for high-volume roles take 30 minutes or more — that needs to change.

This isn’t the only place in the process where candidates are likely to step away. The same research by Fountain indicates that 43% of candidates drop off early in the hiring process because they either found another job or had a poor candidate experience. This tells us that high-volume recruiters are likely spending too much time between each stage of the process, not communicating effectively, and negatively impacting candidates as a result.

Challenge #2: A high rate of no-shows

So, once those 43% of candidates have dropped out of the hiring process, you now have 57 candidates on your list of interviews for the high-volume role. However, it’s likely that many of those candidates won’t show up. Interview no-shows are an ongoing issue across the recruiting space (even for executive roles!), but they’re particularly problematic in high-volume hiring. Research from Indeed tells us that 46% of interviewees don’t show up for their scheduled meetings — and that number could be higher for in roles that are entry-level or lower paying.

For recruiters, this means a lot of time is wasted preparing for interviews and waiting for candidates to show up, only to get ghosted. It’s inefficient at best, and an expensive use of resources that could be better utilized. Now, you just have 31 candidates to review.

Challenge #3: Getting access to high-quality candidates

Of those 31 candidates, there are probably only going to be a handful that are really worth pursuing. Today, 48% of high-volume recruiters say they struggle to find quality hires. This is influenced by the fact that unemployment is at the lowest it’s been in over 50 years — even with unstable economic conditions — and, as a result, the best candidates are off the market in as little as 10 days. With all of these trends impacting the availability of hires, of those 250 original candidates, you’re likely to be left with just two job offers sent out and only one acceptance.

Considering that you might have been looking for 25 people to fill those roles, that makes the current high-volume hiring process woefully inefficient. Not only are you losing a lot of people in the process, you have to run it all over again just to fill the roles you need.

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How to host more effective high-volume hiring initiatives

Did you see all the steps that are currently in the high-volume hiring funnel? They’re a lot — and as most of these steps are often conducted inefficiently, they each add a lot of time to the process. That’s time high-volume recruiters don’t have. In a competitive talent market, recruiting teams hiring at scale need to be agile and get in front of candidates faster than their industry peers. So what does that look like? Here are three things your team can do to reduce the challenges in high-volume hiring.

1. Revisit your application process

With so many people dropping off at the apply stage, this is a no brainer. Your application for high-volume roles should be simple to navigate and take no longer than five minutes to fill. Not only will this make life easier for your candidates, it will also make it easier for recruiters to review the applications.

The other thing to consider is to extend the reach of your postings. Leveraging tools that let you post job applications or promote high-volume hiring events across multiple channels will be key to reaching a larger audience of viable candidates.

2. Introduce automation to streamline steps in the process

Teams that are looking to do away with traditional high-volume hiring challenges need to operate more efficiently — that’s a given. Automation can help here. For instance, using tools that allow for automated communication with candidates based on their activities and behaviors can help ensure that candidates are getting relevant messaging at the right time. In addition, automated resume parsers can also be key in reducing the time spent finding qualified candidates for a role.

3. Leverage on-demand video interviews

For candidates in a high-volume hiring process, it can be easy to feel like they’re just one person in a herd of potential hires getting ushered from one step to the next. This is exacerbated by teams that rely too heavily on automated recruitment features such as autonomous interviews. While these automations may save time, they sometimes do so at the cost of human experiences and interactions. The thing is, this could impact whether a qualified candidate decides to drop off or accept a role that’s offered to them.

Leveraging on-demand video interviews during high-volume hiring events ensures that candidates and recruiters have a real-time conversation where the recruiter can get a better sense of the applicant, and the candidate can learn more about the company. Modern on-demand video interview software offers a seamless in-browser experience and connects directly to your team’s ATS, making life much easier for your recruiters. Plus, because it’s timely, it vastly reduces no-shows and drop offs, and helps you hire 23 times more candidates than you would with the traditional high-volume hiring model.

Related resource: How to implement video interviews in your volume hiring process

High-volume hiring doesn’t need to be challenging

We’ve talked about how high-volume recruiting is a complex process — but it doesn’t have to be. By revisiting the current approach, identifying where the gaps are, and leveraging the right technology partners, your team can become a competitive force when it comes to attracting qualified candidates.

At Withe, we’re helping high-volume recruiters move faster and better with our on-demand video interview software. Learn how on our home page.