Recruiting – Remotely or Face-to-Face?

Productivity among employees improves when they are allowed to work remotely. Other benefits for companies that allow their workforce to work away from the office include cost savings, and a 25% lower staff turnover rate. However he key issue facing employers and recruiting teams is establishing that initial bond of trust without conventional interviews before making the final decision to hire.

Of course the past year of social distancing has forced upon us a drastic change in convention. Millions more people now work remotely than before 2020 with an estimated 88% of organizations worldwide encouraging staff to work from home since last year.

As a result we’ve had to surrender to, even embrace, the shift to recruiting and employing a workforce that might never actually set foot in a physical office.

Can remote recruiting replace face-to-face interviews?

The transition to remote everything has been surprisingly successful according to various surveys and polls conducted by industry analysts over the past twelve months or so.

About 16% of companies now exclusively hire remote workers. Those recruiters might never see the candidate’s faces and they could be located anywhere in the world with a good internet connection.

The trend in remote recruiting is only expected to grow as an overwhelming majority of people currently working remotely say they prefer having a flexible schedule and would only work remotely in future.

Easily conduct online video interviews

Using video conferencing software is an efficient way to conduct long-distance interviews as part of your remote recruiting process. You and the applicants save a great deal of time and expense by simply arranging an online interview time slot.

Free software such as Skype and Zoom can work well enough for making casual video interview arrangements with one or two applicants but you can’t rely on each candidate having the same software installed on their own devices.

To streamline your remote hiring in a structured and professional way that’s easily accessible to all candidates you should use a dedicated video interview platform to automate scheduling and other aspects of the remote recruiting process. 

Vid Cruiter is used by large international corporations such as Samsung, Kraft Heinz and KPMG to co-ordinate entire teams of interviewers remotely.

My Interview is a much simpler piece of video interviewing software for small businesses which can be easily added to your website as a widget.

Spark Hire is ‘simple video interviewing software’ aimed at small and medium sized businesses. It’s quick and easy to set up to begin remote recruiting within an hour.  Volkswagen, Ikea, and BAE also use this software.

Remote Recruiting Eliminates Unconscious Bias

Almost every decision we make comes from an unconscious bias. It’s fundamentally essential to our survival but an internal bias that we are not ‘conscious’ of can cause us to make bad judgements based on personal belief rather than pragmatic decision-making based purely on the facts presented to us.

Of course any contemporary recruiter would naturally aspire to be an equal opportunities employer but us humans are rarely completely free of bias toward other individuals. Our decisions are always influenced by those biases so HR professionals must do everything within their power to avoid unconscious bias influencing hiring decisions.

Here are six unconscious bias traits prevalent in conventional face-to-face meetings which can be eliminated with remote recruiting.

Affinity bias is simply liking someone and feeling an affinity with them because they are similar to you. We unconsciously prefer being around people with similar qualities that are familiar and we can relate to.

Attribution bias is the often conflicting way we perceive our own actions compared to those of others when judging success or failure. It’s when we blame external factors for our own failures but will blame someone’s personal qualities for his or her failures.

Beauty bias is deep rooted within us in many complex ways. We automatically make assumptions about people based on their appearance or physical attractiveness. An individual applicant might have a physical feature which you unconsciously like or dislike. You might not agree with the way the candidate has dressed for the interview. Neither reflect their skills and professionalism.

Conformity bias is especially prevalent among groups of recruiters where your views as an individual can be swayed by others forming a majority opinion in the group about a particular candidate.

Confirmation bias can occur when we focus on aspects of a candidate’s interview performance to back up an opinion or preference rather than their actual ability or suitability for the job based on their skills and experience.  

Gender bias is simply a personal preference or belief that a particular gender is best suited to the job because of the qualities we subconsciously associate with that gender.

Streamline Your Remote Recruiting with Robust Background Screening

Conducting background screening checks on candidates complements remote hiring. It gives you another layer of protection against the risk of interviewers being influenced by their own unconscious bias.

Ideally you should interview candidates only after conducting thorough background screening checks on the applicants to determine those suitable for progressing through your hiring procedure.

Intelimasters provides turnkey solutions for remote recruiting needs large and small. Find out more about our background screening here.

***Disclaimer***
Intelimasters is a background screening agency, not a law firm. This article is for informational purposes only. Nothing in it should be considered as legal advice. We encourage you to consult with legal counsel regarding your specific business and/or individual needs.