How Can Employers Find the Best Engineers on the Market?

With the demand for engineers increasing and quality candidates being few and far between, the competition for engineers is at an all-time high. To meet your resourcing needs and keep crucial projects moving, employers now need to think about how to attract the best engineering talent in an environment where speed is crucial.

Read on to discover our tried-and-tested strategies for how to hire the best engineers in a tight candidate market.

Position Yourself as an Employer of Choice

If you’re looking to attract top-quality engineers, your business needs to be

the type of company they want to work for. Does your company’s culture make it a great place to work, and are you conveying that to potential candidates?

Consider your company’s website and social media presence. How is your culture demonstrated to the potential hires? Using the company’s social media channels to show photos and videos of your teams working together and socialising can project a positive image to sought-after talent. Don’t be afraid to show the ‘human’ side of your business. You could also share examples of projects your teams have recently carried out, to highlight the type of work new hires might get to be a part of.

Another important thing to highlight is your organisation’s story and mission. Think about what impact the business is having on its customers, industry, the environment or even the wider community. Can you demonstrate these impacts through your social media, company website, job advertisements and key internal documents? When evaluating a role, many good engineers want to see how their values align with the company and to feel their work has meaning.

Highlight Perks and Benefits

Top engineers will often have their pick of roles to choose from, so a competitive salary (while important) is just the starting point. Anyone who is highly sought-after in their field will want to work in environments that make the most out of their experiences and build on their skillsets.

Intellectual stimulation and the potential for career advancement are key selling points to top talent, so don’t forget to highlight the non-salary perks and benefits you have on offer, such as professional development opportunities (e.g. paid training, accreditations), and the chance to work with innovative technologies on interesting projects.

Also factor in other benefits that people are on the lookout for, such as a flexible work policy, healthcare benefits, maternity packages, and an additional holiday allowance.

The easiest way to draw attention to these perks is by highlighting them in your job advertisements and communicating them to your recruiter. This will ensure the most in-demand engineering talent is aware of everything you have to offer as an employer before the interview stage.

Hire for Potential

In a highly competitive candidate market, it pays for employers to be flexible in their approach. Being overly rigid with hiring criteria often prevents employers from finding great people. It’s possible to be flexible without compromising on the basics.

Some candidates might not meet every requirement for the role but have strong potential to grow with the business and be a true asset in the long term. So, how do you identify these candidates? The key is to broaden your search by looking beyond the basics of technical skill and qualifications, and instead evaluate the candidate’s motivation and cultural fit.

A candidate’s attitude and their demonstrated ability to learn new things can make all the difference between a good hire and an exceptional hire in the long run. Also, consider their transferable skills and/or experience in relevant industries – they could possess useful knowledge that might be missing from within your current team.

Seal the Deal Quickly

An efficient recruitment process is essential in any market where quality candidates are in short supply, as the best engineers are likely to be juggling several potential job offers at once. Any delay in making an offer increases the risk of losing out to a competitor, so be sure to act quickly when you’ve found the right person.

By ensuring you have the relevant permissions in place and establishing a budget beforehand, your business will be able to make a job offer as soon as possible. Similarly, make sure everyone involved are clear on their responsibilities. Frequent communication between hiring managers and recruiters are essential.

One way you can speed up the hiring process after the interview is to make the job offer conditional on a satisfactory outcome of the candidate’s reference checks – this way, you can lock them in as soon as possible. A robust recruitment process will also give you a shortlist of several good candidates to choose from. It’s a good idea to identify a ‘backup’ candidate you can hire if your first choice falls through.

Summary

Hiring the best engineers calls for a holistic approach to recruitment. Always think about what would be attractive to potential candidates and what you can do to position your company as an employer of choice. It’s a long term strategy – there are no short cuts!

But attracting the right people is just one step towards success. To ensure you’ve got the best engineers in your shortlist, it pays to partner with a specialist engineering recruitment agency, such as CV Consulting. Our established industry relationships, deep market knowledge and extensive networks will give you an edge in the hunt for top engineering talent.

Need more advice on how to hire engineers or simply want to discuss how we can support your business? Get in touch with our engineering & manufacturing team of recruiters based in Milton Keynes today to learn more.