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By Jeremy Eskenazi

The interview process has become more complex in the age of social distancing. You may find your organization must now go through this process virtually or remotely out of necessity. There is a big drawback, though: simply relying on virtual interviews takes the “candidate experience” out of the equation. In-person touches are not possible, and many teams are forgetting to put in the effort to make up for this change. Don’t fall into this trap.

The candidate experience is something you must consider. It is what candidates see, feel, and perceive of a potential employer based on their interactions through the entire recruitment lifecycle, from initial contact to onboarding. As we adjust to a new approach to the candidate experience and laying the right foundation, your efforts can remove a lot of the guesswork as to whether candidates will accept an invitation to interview and, down the line, a potential offer.

At the earliest stages of the candidate experience, it is important to keep engaged with the top talent you are approaching. Here are a few ways to improve your virtual candidate experience.

Focus on the relationship – To do this at a distance means finding new ways to stay connected. Develop a process to check in with candidates at regular intervals. Ask how the interviews went, and be clear and proactive about the next steps and how long each step will take. Share what their level of effort will be at each step. This builds trust and shows the candidate what kind of organization they will be joining.

Optimize your tools – There are some wonderful tools available to facilitate a virtual meeting. The first hurdle is ensuring you are technically set up so your video and audio are easy to join and will work consistently. You would be surprised how much time is wasted on poor connections and the kind of impression it leaves when the first portion of your interview is spent troubleshooting. The second part of this equation is training the recruiting and hiring managers to use the tools smoothly. When they are comfortable, it greatly enhances the candidate experience … and theirs too.

Keep “success” practices – As you spend more time interacting with candidates remotely, consistency is critically important. Find ways to create the same kind of touchpoints you have for candidates that come into your office. Ensure recruiters and hiring managers have positive stories to share and are prepared to talk about how your company makes money and about media coverage they may have seen recently. Consistency in your recruiting practices, virtual and in-person, help ensure that you are not losing out on great talent by having vast differences in how candidates connect with you and your team.

When meeting candidates virtually, ask consistent questions at the interview so evaluating them with hiring managers can be expedited. Hiring managers can watch the interviews and stop the videos early if they see a candidate is not a fit. It would be rude and bad for your brand to cut an interview short in person if the first response is not desirable. With a virtual candidate experience and recorded video interviewing, you might get 10 hours of interviews from 10 candidates but may be able to vet them in as little as two hours. This is a boon to your company and to the candidates. Everyone who interviews for your company deserves a response within a reasonable time with your decision to move forward or a thank-you for their efforts and a decline.

Coordinating interviews with candidates from any quiet, comfortable location will often be a much faster process than coordinating travel time, working around their obligations if they are currently employed, and reducing the risk of travel delays – or mandatory distancing, as we are now experiencing. Interviewing candidates that a vendor may be providing to you for part-time or short-term contracts may be effectively done through this method, and can also give you a chance to provide more input and feedback to the types of skills you’d like your candidates to have for roles where the ideal candidate hasn’t been fully described (or met yet).

Regardless of the scenario, the virtual candidate experience should showcase your brand in its best light. Good planning, clear expectation setting, and proper follow-up and closing out of candidates is expected, but it is often lost when moving to a virtual experience. Do not let candidates feel like they are unimportant. It is up to your team to invest in building relationships and communicating in a way that reflects your brand. As hiring practices evolve, having an outstanding virtual candidate experience will be a differentiator for your company by giving candidates a positive feeling about meeting you and wanting to receive an offer from you.

Jeremy Eskenazi is founder of Riviera Advisors, a recruitment/talent acquisition management and optimization consulting firm. For more information, visit www.RivieraAdvisors.com.

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