A lot of people who respond to job ads are surprised when
they don’t hear back from the employer right away. It isn’t surprising that many job seekers
really don’t understand the hiring cycle and the length of time it takes an
employer to get to a new person hired.
In reality it might take 1 – 3 months for an employer to hire the right
candidate.
Let me spell it out for you.
An employer has a job vacancy arise.
It is either expected or unexpected.
In reality an unexpected opening can occur when an employee suddenly
informs you that they are leaving for another position. In reality most employees are only required
to give 2 weeks’ notice. During the 2
week notice period (usually 10 business days) an employer has to deal with some
basic realities. The first steps are
deciding who can take over that person’s work load in the interim and secondly deciding
if that person will be replaced?
In weeks 2 - 3, the usual process is to get an ad
together. In addition the job
description needs to be reviewed and updated.
Depending upon how many staff are involved in this process it can often
take a few days. Once the ad is ready,
it is sent off to the newspaper and on-line job sites etc. Postings put onto on- line sites are usually
posted within 24 hours but newspaper insertions are expensive so timing is
important. Certain days of the week can
get more exposure than others and there are often a variety of papers to
consider. Deadlines for desired dates
may have passed.
It is common to allow a week or two for job seekers to
respond to an ad. We are now in week 4 -
5.
By week 6 the resumes are in and someone has to go through
them all and make a short list. Keep in
mind not every employer has an HR department.
There may be over 100 applicants to your position. Usually the short
list is sent to a second person. Job
interviews are scheduled and interviewees contacted.
Week7 is when the interviews are held. If you decide to interview a number of
candidates the interviews can take 2 days.
If you need to do some testing prior to the interview it can take 4
days.
Week 8 can be used for 2nd interviews or
reference checking. Often the references
of the top 2 candidates are checked. Some
references are easy to contact and others may take several days to return calls.
Week 9 is often when the final decisions made. The successful candidate is contacted. Often they need a day or two to think it
over. If they accept, they may need to
give 2 weeks’ notice to their employer.
If they decline, the employer may go to the second candidate or start
over.
If all goes well the successful employee arrives for their
first day of work in week 11.
The bottom line for job seekers is to realize that hiring
takes time. Don’t put all your hopes in one position and wait for the results. Keep networking, keep talking with employers
and your key contacts. Keep job
searching until you get that call to say that you have been the successful
candidate.
