2024 Hiring Playbook

Introduction

January sees more people looking for work than any other time of year. With hiring plans & budgets being signed off, for talent teams, it represents one of the biggest opportunities to get ahead on your hiring plans.

This article is a playbook that brings together core learnings from '23, plus some exclusive new insights to help companies kick-start their '24 hiring. Learning from these data-backed insights can create an effective hiring strategy target quality and diverse hires, and fill your positions quickly.

Understand the hiring market

2023 saw a huge shift in the typical hiring market, that many talent teams weren’t prepared for. Heading into 2024, being aware of these new trends can put you ahead of the rest of the market.

Be prepared for more applications

The biggest shift we saw in the market last year was the huge increase in application volume.

In January 2022, 74% of messages sent were from companies, and applications made up just 26%.

Over 2023, the market switched to being more application-dominated. Whilst the effects of this were starting to be felt last January, this year is set to be even more extreme, with applications making up 88% of first messages sent in recent months.

How to prepare:

• Before you hire, ensure you’ve prepared capacity in your team for the high volume of applications expected.

• Set clear success criteria so you’re able to process your applications quickly and keep a positive candidate experience.

• Ensure you’re replying to each application, even those you’re declining, to maintain your company’s reputation.

Take advantage of the sourcing opportunity

With the market being heavily application-dominated, we saw a significant decrease in sourcing efforts, with many companies choosing to focus on applications to fill their positions.

Whilst applications are a great passive way to get candidates into your pipeline, sourcing has now become less competitive, so offers a great opportunity to get more return on your time investment than ever before.

For those companies who have continued to source, their message acceptance rate has increased over the year, peaking at an average 51% of messages being accepted in Q4 2023. This is a 38% higher response rate to what you would have experienced in Q1 2022.

Don’t miss out on the whole market

Whilst applications have increased, there is still a portion of the market who don’t apply for positions and are only therefore accessible through sourcing. Our previous research indicated these people were more likely to be the top, in-demand talent.

Over the last 3 months, on average 19% of the market never sent an application on cord, so you would simply miss out on this talent by not sourcing.

Summary of the market:

• You’re likely to get significantly more applications in January 2024 compared to previous years

• Sourcing is less competitive and gives you a better return on your time investment compared to last year

• 19% of the market aren’t applying for positions and are only accessible through sourcing

Read more about the hiring market in our updated Applications Vs Sourcing report.

Elevate your sourcing

Whilst spending time sourcing can be time-consuming, ensuring you’re following best practices can increase the return you get on your messages, meaning you can spend less time sourcing for the same number of candidates in your pipeline.

We recently studied the behaviours of the top user group on cord who received a 90% acceptance rate and compared these to the user group with the lowest acceptance rate of 25%.

Send personalised and detailed messages

The top users had more references to the candidate profiles, included more details about their position, and gave clear next steps to the next stage in their process.

Be concise

The top users send shorter messages, with 557 characters and 3 paragraphs on average

Follow up on your initial message

Messages sent with a follow-up result in a 5% higher response rate, with a strong correlation between follow-ups and an increased acceptance rate too.

Send an interview invite

The top users were more likely to attach an interview invite to their message for the candidate to directly book in their calendar.

Be proactive with people new to the market

On average, the group of top users contacted candidates within the first day of them starting to look for work on cord, within 15 hours to be exact. In comparison, the users with the worst response rate on average messaged people nearly 27 days after they started to look for work.

Send messages during working hours, towards the start of the week

The highest acceptance rate was seen on messages sent in the morning and afternoon, and the quickest response time to messages sent earlier in the week.

Learn more about improving your message acceptance rate here.

Pitch your positions to attract more candidates

With many companies overwhelmed by application numbers, we investigated how companies can improve the quality of the applications they receive, as well as what candidates are looking for from your job adverts.

Why candidates apply

When asked about the most important factor that makes them apply for a position, the top response for candidates was career progression.

This was followed by role & responsibilities and remote working opportunities.

Make sure to address these areas in your job adverts:

• Stand out to the most ambitious candidates by including the progression route for the position within the job description, as well as L&D opportunities

• Be detailed about the core responsibilities of the position. Clarity matters to candidates.

• Being upfront about remote working opportunities is essential. If you’re able to offer your position remotely, do so to increase the number of candidates who can apply.

What deters candidates from applying

We also asked candidates the biggest factors that stop them from applying for a position. The top response was a complicated or lengthy application process.

The other top factors were unclear job responsibilities, and poor response rates or time.

Improve the likelihood of someone applying by following these steps:

• Be upfront about your application process and condense this into short and simple steps

• Lay out your job description clearly so the candidates have clarity on if the role is right for them to apply

• Responding quickly to every candidate will increase the number and quality of your applications

Explore attracting quality applications in more depth.

Improve your gender diversity in 2024

Now is a great time to review your hiring goals and design a strategy to match. Given the chronic underrepresentation of women in tech, a key priority for the majority of companies is improving their gender diversity.

In 2023 we focused 3 of our articles on the state of gender diversity in tech and how companies can actively improve this. One of the most effective strategies we discovered was through focusing on sourcing.

You won’t receive as many applications from women

One reason sourcing can boost your gender diversity is that the applications you receive will likely feature fewer female candidates.

• Women are underrepresented in the tech industry already, with the average representation being 23.1%. Because of this, you’re naturally going to get fewer applications from women

• Women on an individual level are less likely to apply. Women send on average 2.79 applications, whereas men send 3.33.

Not only are women underrepresented, they’re also less likely to send applications.

The most diverse companies target their sourcing

Looking at the top 5% of companies on cord when it comes to diversity, they are actively targeting their sourcing to women.

• The most diverse companies send 62% of their messages to women, compared to just 21% sent by the rest of the market

A consciously targeted approach can help increase the representation within your company.

Bias-free sourcing makes an impact

There are products available that remove unconscious bias by masking personal identifiers from candidate profiles, such as cord’s Source Without Bias tool.

• Companies implementing bias-free sourcing had twice as many conversations with women.

Summary of gender diversity:

• You will receive fewer applications from women, due to underrepresentation in the industry and the fact women are less likely to apply

• Targeted sourcing can be an effective tool to increase gender diversity

• Removing unconscious bias is effective in increasing the number of women in your pipeline

Read more about gender diversity and how to improve here.

Lead with the right salaries

Trying to hire with the wrong salary for your requirements will waste your time and lead to a lot of frustration in not being able to attract the right person to your position.

By benchmarking your salaries before you hire, you’re able to hit the ground running, save time, attract the best talent, and be confident you’re paying a fair wage for the position.

Below, we have benchmarked the 10 most popular positions on cord, showing you the expected candidate salary, as well as the average advertised salary from companies.

You can perform more in-depth salary analysis using our salary benchmarking tool.

Conclusion

Being prepared for the January recruitment surge ensures you get the most out of your time investment and allows you to make successful hires quickly.

The key steps to follow are:

• Understand the hiring market: prepare for high application numbers, take advantage of a lack of competition, and source to reach the entire market

• Elevate your sourcing: write personalised and detailed messages, attach a follow-up and calendar invite, prioritise new candidates to the market, and send your messages at the right time

• Pitch your positions: build you job descriptions to appeal to candidates by highlighting career progression, giving clarity on responsibilities, and being clear on remote working options

• Build a diverse strategy: focus on diversity when building your strategy and boost gender inclusion by implementing a sourcing-led campaign, as well as utilising bias-free tools

• Lead with the right salaries: benchmark your positions to ensure you’re not wasting time fishing in the wrong candidate pool

cord is the hiring tool used by technology-led companies to find active people, fill their pipelines and make direct hires. To understand how cord can help you make hires in 2024, book to speak with one of our team.