If someone told you sports and recruitment have something in common, you would probably find that idea unbelievable. What possible similarities can the process of identifying, attracting and hiring people and competitive physical activities have?

Diving deep beneath the surface and using the compatible context will reveal various similarities. NCAA March Madness is, perhaps, the best example for drawing an analogy between recruitment and sports.

March Madness is a men’s basketball tournament that features 68 college basketball teams fighting for the national championship. As an event, the NCAA receives almost equal attention in the U.S. as the Super Bowl and Olympics.

Even those who dislike college basketball and sports gather and follow this tournament, making it one of the most significant sporting events every spring. It’s no wonder the NCAA generates astonishing revenues and has one of the most prominent brands.

As a profession, HR requires more than technical knowledge and strategies. It also invites recruiters to get creative and think out of the box. Human resources professionals can use the framework of The Big Dance to get a better understanding of recruitment and its stages.

With these insights, they can attract more compatible job applicants and enhance their candidate experience. Here’s how you can leverage NCAA Madness to improve your recruitment game:

Take the Lead, Maintain Control

To be successful in basketball, you can’t take your eyes off the ball and you have to learn how to control it. Otherwise, the game is already lost. 

In the HR world, recruiters have to control the recruitment process and candidate experience by being consistent, attentive and engaged. First, you should ensure you can keep communication steady and straightforward. 

Establish a message that explains the company culture and what it would be like to work in your workplace. Hence, everything you communicate should manifest the unique value proposition of the organization.

That requires taking the lead and controlling the process to make it swift and streamlined. Moreover, implement effective communication across different channels, targeting the most compatible candidates, including search optimization. 

Remember to make the candidate experience look more authentic by adding compelling visuals, storytelling and testimonials. Reach different career sites and identify where your ideal job applicants like to spend their time to ensure they can hear about your company and want to be a part of the game.

Make the Most Of Your Powers

Focus on your company’s strengths and leverage them. For instance, use relevant hiring marketing material from previous cycles to shorten the time and money you spend on advertisements and new products. 

However, if you’re reusing ads, email marketing or other similar content, keep it up-to-date. Check the language and optimize your communication and practices. That way, you’ll have material that still feels fresh while also being easy to share and understand. 

You can also repurpose high-quality content or ignite old conversations that still need addressing. Avoid creating new products or data if your company already possesses something that can help you accelerate recruitment.

Get to Know Your Enemy

All sports players need to know their enemies to understand which strategies, moves and actions could defeat them. It’s not much different in recruitment. 

Ensure your strategies are top-notch by comparing them to those of your most successful competitors. Identify which procedures they leverage, what kind of content they post and how their time-to-hire rate compares to their quality-of-hire. 

That can help you discover their weaknesses and gaps your recruitment can fill to reach the best candidates. If you crack their game, you’ll always be a step ahead.

Include Emotions in Your Recruitment

Sports fans are highly passionate when it comes to their favorite competition, team, or player. They get excited about the game because it makes them feel like they are a part of something larger than life. The same happens once March Madness kicks in.

It’s why you should make your candidate experience more human-centric and include emotions. Strive to develop job ads, content and application processes that help job seekers establish a bond with the company or the need to know more. 

Share how employees feel working in your company, what experiences candidates can expect and how you nurture a sense of belonging. That will take your recruitment and candidate experience to a whole new level.

Boost HR Technology

Without advanced tech, the public wouldn’t see close-ups of significant moments during the game or replay the best moves. Thus, it allows everyone, despite their geographical location, to see the game and enjoy it.

That’s why you can never make a mistake if you leverage HR technology. Use it to streamline the process and personalize the candidate experience. HR technology allows you to track and measure your results or search for the most compatible job applicants using artificial intelligence. 

Recruitment Technology

Moreover, efficient recruitment requires keeping up with time and recruiters have to align hiring with automation. Thanks to HR technology, you can automate your recruitment process, speed it up and mitigate tedious tasks and activities. 

Thinking outside the box and borrowing techniques and lessons from seemingly unrelated industries are among the most efficient ingredients of reaching the goal. Recruitment may appear to be worlds apart from the world of sports, but these two often use similar strategies, albeit in a different form.

As a result, you’ll improve your game substantially, resulting in an improved candidate experience and employee journey. 


Authors
Lovepreet Dhaliwal

Lovepreet Dhaliwal works with RChilli Inc, a leading CV parsing software provider which helps in speeding up your recruitment process. An MBA in HR and marketing, he has over seven years of work experience in business development and strategic sales.