How Do Virtual Remote Teams Help Recruiters?

The virtual remote teams approach can take you all the way up to the interview.

There’s no need to read any further if your reason for retaining virtual remote teams is only to cut costs. You’ll see savings —but it’s not always immediate, and it also might not present itself the way you expect. How do you value efficiency?

The team’s value and how they can help you is much like the word itself. The definition changes depending on how you look at it. Ultimately, you will see the return on your investment. Are you cutting costs or creating value—and which effort is more important in the long run?

Taking a Closer Look 

What are virtual remote teams, anyway? You’ll likely get a different answer from each of the next five people you ask. None of them may be incorrect, and here’s why:

Something that’s virtual means that it’s almost or nearly as described, but not completely or according to strict definition. The most common synonyms attributed to virtual are essential and practical. Mesh this definition and those synonyms with someone who you’d hire as a resource to help you with recruiting. 

The fact that they’re virtual may only mean they’re not physically at your office. Or, it could mean that you needed someone who would comb through a huge database to find candidates with a highly specific qualification. It’s a temporary need, best suited for virtual remote teams. What you may need is a database professional—not an HR professional.

That’s the beauty of bringing in virtual remote teams to help you with recruiting. Since they can be almost, nearly, or not completely recruitment specialists, you also have the flexibility to assign those administrative tasks to them that would otherwise consume the time of your existing staff. 

Recruiters are trained to be resources that help organizations find and retain talent. It’s a process that requires us to actually interact with people. But what did those people you depend on to help you keep a steady stream of recruited talent walking through the front door do today? How much time did they spend on the interactive part versus username-password admin stuff, or simply sifting through potential candidates online?

The Numbers Game

The administrative requirements to source and screen candidates for any company with ongoing needs caused by growth are overwhelming to existing recruiting staff. Both in terms of the sheer number of candidates available, as well as the constant demoralizing self-questioning of, “Did I decide to get into HR or recruiting to sit in front of a computer screen and look at resumes all day?”

Your virtual remote teams, on the other hand, actually did set out to specialize in database management and extraction, as well as candidate sourcing. Or any of the administrative responsibilities you plan for them to work on. It’s extremely important—this part of the search—but it’s not where you want to involve well-compensated people with extensive recruitment experience. You want virtual remote teams who cultivate the specialized skills of building resume databases, and the administrative efforts involved. 

You’re only compensating these virtual remote teams to focus on the specific tasks they accomplish. It creates a huge efficiency even if it means you’re paying someone else to do something an existing employee could have done. You won’t do it if you only look at this from a cost standpoint. You will, however, if you look at it from the standpoint of the efficient use of your company’s internal resources.

Virtual = Scalable

There’s a bit of the “physician, heal thyself” theme that runs along with recruitment and using the services of virtual remote teams. How capable and effective are you at filling your own recruitment positions? What if, tomorrow, your company landed a contract that doubled or tripled your employee recruitment needs? Could you hire permanent staff fast enough to keep up with the demand?

A virtual remote team can keep up with it. Think of how much of the recruitment process remains administrative. From preliminary screening to shortlisting, the virtual approach can take you all the way up to the interview. Scale up—or down—as fast as you need. Your virtual remote team is there to do specific jobs. They don’t come with the same set of expectations that an in-house employee brings to the table. 

That’s the true value proposition of a virtual remote team in the recruitment arena. It’s all about intelligence gathering, sorting, and preparation. Then it’s you and your staff’s turn to make the connection – and make the hire.

To learn how RPO outsourcing can help you discover top talent, contact Noon Dalton.

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