The Role of Automation in Transforming Manufacturing Recruitment

As roles become more technical and demanding, the competitive war for talent in the manufacturing industry is reaching a crucial turning point.

Salaries in manufacturing are good, and the future of manufacturing is brighter than ever. Despite this, recruiters are finding it difficult to attract the right talent, especially from the younger generation. The manufacturing job market is competitive, and finding the right candidates and then ensuring you attract and retain them is a critical part of running this type of business. Moreover, doing all this on a tight budget makes the process challenging. With this in mind, let's take a look at how recruitment automation is emerging as the unsung hero of HR departments worldwide.

Understanding the Recruitment Challenges of the Manufacturing Industry

The manufacturing workforce is diverse, with each function area possessing its own distinct set of skills, responsibilities, and contributions to the manufacturing process. People work in the production department, supply chain management, handling technical and engineering parts, and maintenance.

Hiring managers are now taking proactive steps to address the long-standing issue of critical labor shortages in the manufacturing industry. By combining automation's prowess with human creativity, recruiters have crafted a groundbreaking formula to propel operational efficiency, bridge the manufacturing skills gap, and prevent potential economic stagnation.

To stay ahead of the competition and recruit top-of-the-line talent, recruiters must race against time to find the best candidate before all of their competitors. They don't have the luxury of wasting time on menial tasks or people who don't fit. These challenging times require a recruiter to become intensely hyperfocused on only those potential candidates who meet the requirements of the job description and the cultural fit. This is where tech and automation play a crucial role. From sifting through thousands of resumes to sending communication for engaging with potential candidates, automation significantly optimizes the recruitment process with minimal human input.

How Automation Is Ramping Up Recruitment in the Manufacturing Industry

Over the past year, the manufacturing industry has faced a whirlwind of shifting talent acquisition expectations, opportunities, and shortages. The widening skill gap due to an aging workforce is further exacerbating recruiters' challenges in finding qualified applicants. Here’s how automating the recruitment process helps.

1. Screening Before Pre-screening

An additional layer of screening before pre-screening allows you to ask predefined ‘killer questions’ at the very start of your application journey. These questions allow hiring managers to automatically reject candidates based on a yes/no answer. Examples could be: ‘Do you have a work permit to work in the US?’ or ‘Do you have US citizenship?’

Recruiters can use AI-powered candidate assessment tools to "gamify" pre-employment skills assessment. Current employees can be presented with a series of tests that mimic video games. The algorithm will then use their scores to build a persona of a potential new hire who would fit an open position based on your employees' scores. Similar tests can then be presented to candidates to assess if they are a good fit.

2. One-way Video Interviewing

Phone interviews can be time-consuming and repetitive and give only a basic impression of the candidate’s quality. There is also a chance that the interviewer may not have the same level of energy as during the first interview. It leads to the candidate experience being compromised, which could reduce your quality of hire as the best candidates sign up elsewhere.

An automated phone or video interview allows recruiters to write questions once, no matter how many candidates are being interviewed. Questions such as "Tell us about yourself" and "Would you be willing to relocate?" can be asked during this round. This helps recruiters find better-quality people through a more consistent process.

Recruiters can use AI and automation to streamline the hiring process by reviewing video responses to pre-set questions. Sentiment analysis and the Al algorithm thoroughly analyze a candidate's facial expressions, speech patterns, and non-verbal cues and offer objective insight into a candidate's suitability.

3. Automated Translations for International Recruitment

Automation ensures that international recruitment reflects the same great candidate experience and delivers the same quality of hire as local recruitment. With real-time automated speech translations, candidates can interact in a language they are comfortable with, eliminating the need for a translator or manual translation.

4. Interview Scheduling

The manufacturing industry often deals with high-volume recruitment. Under such circumstances, interview scheduling back and forth can consume significant time for recruiters. An automation-powered recruitment process uses automatic scheduling functionality. This allows recruiters to pre-set their availability and candidates to self-book any slot at their convenience.

AI assistants and interview scheduling tools can automate and simplify the process of scheduling interviews. They allow recruiters to sync their calendars with the calendars of candidates and other relevant stakeholders and send them invitations and reminders via email or text. They may also establish guidelines and preferences for the ideal times and formats for interviews and easily manage rescheduling and cancellations.

5. Candidate Communication

A crucial component for staying ahead in the talent race is keeping potential candidates engaged throughout the recruitment cycle. A candidate might also be interviewing at other companies in the industry. It takes honest, frequent, engaging communication to keep them interested in your company.

You can craft messages for customized pre-written templates. Share insights and industry-related information (such as salary benchmark or growth prospects in the sector/industry) that candidates may find useful in deciding the prospective employer. Communicate regularly with candidates, updating them about their application status. Automating this part of the process makes engagement consistent and effective. With automation, nothing goes forgotten, and there are no delays or accidental miscommunication.

6. Creating and Posting Job Advertisements

Applicant volume, applicant quality, and quality of hire greatly depend on the job post quality.

Automation can help companies maintain a huge library of job adverts and, whenever required, automatically populate them into relevant jobs. This saves recruiters trawling through their desktops to find the most recent version of an old ad or spending hours drafting the same post over and again.

7. Internal Recruitment Workflows

Recruitment involves a series of manual tasks and permissions, such as getting authorization to post a new job, prompting managers to review a shortlist, or chasing hiring managers for feedback. Automation can help the hiring team implement a standard approval workflow or create a customized one. This ensures that stakeholders are automatically notified of the next steps and action items throughout the process, keeping everyone on the same page.

8. Running a Background Check

A candidate’s background verification involves checking previous employment, education, qualification, criminal record, etc., and necessitates due diligence to avoid future repercussions. Automating the process allows you to receive the details at whatever point in your recruitment process you define.

9. Recruitment Reporting

Automated recruitment reporting software constantly reviews new and old data, helping managers identify areas for improvement and improve their business’s recruitment function. It also makes it easier to build reports upfront and have them delivered to the people who need them.

10. Effective Onboarding

Great onboarding serves as the final stage for a successful recruitment cycle. This stage makes candidates feel valued and supported as they acclimatize to the company's hierarchy, culture, goals and principles. Automating onboarding can help organizations manage tasks such as completing HR paperwork, on-the-job training, notifying IT to create user accounts, etc., so you don't miss a beat, and your new hire doesn't feel left in the dark.

Jumping on the Bandwagon with Caution

Automation technology is­ not simply a buzzword; it is an esse­ntial part of the recruitment ecosystem.

Automating repetitive­ tasks improves the candidate's e­xperience. Howe­ver, advancements bring comple­xity, intensifying debates on pros and cons. While­ technology analyzes data faster than humans and offe­rs valuable insights, the human touch remains crucial for judging cultural fit and te­amwork. The automated recruitme­nt process requires human input for mainte­nance, updates, ethical conside­rations, and ensuring relevant, accurate­ data.

Get More Done in Less Time with PERSOLKELLY

Automating recruitment streamline­s workflows by minimizing human process errors and de­lays, keeping the proce­ss lean, efficient, and productive­. While higher efficiency and result optimization are typically the unique selling points of automation, there’s much to be said for its competitive advantage in creating a better candidate experience.

Leading recruitment firms like PERSOLKELLY understand the impact automation has had on transforming the recruitment process and optimizing hiring results. Thus, PERSOLKELLY turbocharges the recruitment process with cutting-edge technology and revolutionary processes to deliver unparalleled results for clients and candidates alike.