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How to shortlist advertising response

A definition: Recruitment = ‘refers to the process of attracting, screening, and selecting qualified people for a job at an organisation or firm.’ – Wikipedia

This is one of a series of articles by Andrew Fisher – CEO of Media C2C

Advertising can sometimes generate too much response – much of which is inappropriate. This short article looks at how you can use pre-response questions to reduce the response to the most relevant and suitable applicants. Good pre-response questions can also add another level of professionalism to the advertisement by demonstrating the thought and effort put into the candidate attraction and selection process. Once the CVs are received, we then look at a simple but effective short listing / cv sifting process.

How to ‘shortlist’ advertising response

Pre-response questions

Pre-response questions appear at the bottom of the online advertisement and candidates can be forced to answer prior to applying for the role. These are increasingly used to pre-qualify candidates and dissuade those who are unsuitable. Any number of questions can be asked at this stage and simple yes / no answers can be sought such as - ‘do you live within easy commuting distance of xxxx?’ or ‘are you regularly able and happy to work away from home?’. Alternatively more open questions could be asked such as – ‘list your 3 key strengths?’, ‘describe your greatest achievement?’ or ‘how would you describe your personal management style?’

Please beware of any pre-response questions that could be considered to be discriminate in any way.

Shortlisting the appropriate CVs

When dealing with large scale advertising response the simplest way to draw up a shortlist is as follows:

• Detail your essential and desirable skills and experience.
• Sort into yes / no / maybe – this is dependent on the key essential criteria.
• Revisit all the ‘maybe’ and move most to either ‘yes’ or ‘no’.
• Depending on the numbers involved email all yeses and any undecided maybes – with a question or two. This could be a broad sweeping question such as ‘what attracted you to the role and why do you feel that you are a good fit?’ – this can reduce the numbers by half. Some will simply not respond, others will respond unconvincingly and the best will shine through.
• The best can then enter the usual recruitment and selection process.

Media C2C is the employer only job board and candidate database specialising in Media Jobs in the UK.

To learn more: http://www.mediac2c.co.uk/
To upload your cv: http://www.mediac2c.co.uk/candidates/register.aspx
To advertise and search: http://www.mediac2c.co.uk/recruiters/register.aspx