3 out of 4 organisations believe they can effectively hire employees remotely: CareerNet Survey
Bengaluru: The novel coronavirus outbreak has profoundly altered the traditional structure of businesses across sectors and after months of maneuvering through the crisis, companies are embracing remote hiring, suggests the recent survey by CareerNet Consulting. The Hiring Outlook in India report cites that 3 out of 4 organisations believe they can effectively hire employees remotely. The study reveals that companies from e-Commerce, IT/ITES, Services, Science and Technology and Telecommunications sectors exhibit a higher readiness (82%) for virtual hiring.
More than half of the employers have partially active hiring plans for the next 3 months. In Q3, it is expected to gradually open. 18% of organizations have active hiring plans for Q2 which increases significantly to 25% in Q3. Meanwhile, 18% companies that said their hiring is completely paused for Q2 gets reduced to 8% in Q3.
“The past 3 months has been a time of reflection and reprioritization for businesses and have brought a new wave of change in the way businesses operate,” said Anshuman Das, CEO and Co-founder, CareerNet Technologies. “The report suggests that the hiring momentum should touch pre-Covid-19 levels by April 2021, primarily driven by remote hiring. That being said, this would be at a lower base considering the downsizing over the last six months. The pandemic has also disrupted the academic calendar this year impacting the campus hiring process. We expect this to be more phased out and not concentrated on a few days. When the economic recovery begins, organizations will re-start their plans.”
More than 50% decision makers surveyed expect hiring to become fully active after January 2021. It is expected to take up to April 2021 for hiring to be at par with that of April 2020. 43% of organizations expect their hiring to become fully active from January while 12% expect it from April 2021.
Additionally, the study finds that 57% of companies forecast their hiring volume to be less than 500 in next one year. About 1 in 4 companies puts this number to be less than 50.
While campus hiring will witness a decline in the overall hiring volume, it is not going to be very high. The campus hiring cycle this year is anticipated to be longer and not concentrated over a few days. 1/3rd of employers foresees no change from their original campus hiring plans, 36% of companies expect a decline in this year.
114 HR /TA decision makers were surveyed from companies across cities and sectors in the country. The respondents shed light on remote hiring, impact of COVID-19 on the business, campus hiring and honouring offers that were rolled out.
Additional findings:
3 out of 4 employers are honouring offers that are rolled out and on-boarding employees
1/3rd of employers foresees no change in their original campus hiring plans, 36% of companies expects a decline in this year
50% employers faced a medium impact of the pandemic in their business. While 23% of mid-sized companies (501-5,000 employees) have seen a high impact, 27% of all companies have faced low or no impact. Sectors which recorded low impact include e-Commerce and FMCG
HR/TA leaders are using technology-driven solutions such as remote online assessments and video interviews to enable a great candidate experience and achieve hiring efficiencies
8 in 10 organizations are ready to embrace virtual hiring/digital recruitment. Only 2% feel that they are not ready
e-Commerce, IT/ITES, Services, Science and Technology and Telecommunications exhibit a higher readiness (82%) for remote hiring than the companies in other sectors (68%)