Top accounting and finance organizations are reporting that it is challenging to source employees with the necessary skillset.

Due to a high demand and a limited supply, finding qualified accounting and finance specialists is difficult. It’s critical now more than ever that financial recruiters understand how to locate and hire talent in today’s competitive employment market given that jobs in the finance industry are predicted to grow to 50% hiring intention rate.

According to CPA Ireland who estimates a shortfall of almost 15,000 trainees in the accountancy profession over the last decade. This has led to a shortage in quality qualified candidates in the market.

To help you in your search for excellent hires, we’ve broken down the main recruitment challenges such as:

1. Lack of qualified candidates
2. Skills shortages
3. Intense competition for talent
4. Quick and ever evolving digital landscape

In this article we will share tips to overcome these challenges and land great hires for your business.

Develop Your Company Employer Brand:

If you want to compete for top talent and stand out in the financial industry, you must invest in your company’s employment brand name. Find out how your potential new hires view your brand and what information they are most interested in learning.

Recognize how it differs from what you are demonstrating to them. Try to alter their presumptions as much as you can to ultimately draw in more prospects.

Keep in mind that you’re competing with fledgling fintech start-ups, who probably have a fun, interesting employer brand. You must promote your business to your ideal candidates if you want to be truly competitive.

Use Recruitment Marketing Techniques For Hiring

The process of hiring continues after you establish your employer brand. To create a sizable pool of qualified candidates for present and future job openings and prospects, you should concentrate on targeted tactics.

Using recruitment marketing methods is a sure-fire way to draw in interested job seekers, but in order to do it successfully, you need to be innovative and think outside the box. It is a great technique to get and keep their attention to offer them pertinent electronic content and interesting employment ads.

Additionally, you can utilize technological tools like programmatic job advertising (often known as recruiting “bots”) to help you get your job openings in front of the appropriate candidates. This will enable you to target your ideal clients.

In order to significantly increase their ability to attract digital talent, 24% of firms in the financial services sector change brand perception through marketing and advertising according to PWC

Expand Your Sourcing Processes

You need to be looking in all the right places if you want to find the best financial services experts out there. Expanding your sourcing options is a terrific place to start because of this, but it might be easier said than done.

Make sure to promote your opportunities in as many pertinent locations as you can, including social media platforms and online job boards. Additionally, you can use LinkedIn to upload positions and try to source people.

Use as many different sources as you can to find prospects. A terrific way to meet entry-level applicants is to attend college and university graduation fairs and other recruiting events.

Establish a Graduate Employment Strategy.

One of the largest employers of entry-level workers is the financial solutions industry. Because of this, the majority of financial companies today use a graduate employment strategy to identify recent graduates who are just starting their careers.

While it is a great start, it is insufficient to retain momentum after you get them on board or to compete in such a competitive employment market. Establish a process for employing graduates from universities, but don’t just stop there.

Continuously work to improve their abilities and develop them into future leaders who will undoubtedly advance your business. “Train people well enough so they may leave, treat them well enough so they don’t want,” as Richard Branson once famously said.

Apply Inclusive Hiring Practices

It is clear that the finance sector has diversity issues. According to a recent study, fewer than 25% of people are aware that their companies are actively working to hire more women and people from ethnic minorities. There is always room for improvement even if finance organizations are making slow but steady progress in hiring even more diverse candidates.

You can utilize a variety of techniques to make your efforts at inclusive employment better. For instance, try crafting thorough job postings to attract a diverse pool of applicants and employ the principles of blind hiring to eliminate unconscious bias.

Make it a point to hire people based on their qualifications and skill sets to make sure they closely match what you’re looking for.

It’s critical to keep in mind that communicating your initiatives to both current and potential employees can help your inclusion and diversity policies as you grow your workforce. There is still a long way to go, but financial organizations are attempting to increase diversity in their workforce.

Create A Network of Corporate Alumni

When it comes to recruitment there should be a heavy emphasis on hiring experienced professionals and mid-career professionals not just young personnel and recent graduates. Due to their anxiety that history would repeat itself, many former employees left the sector during the economic downturn and never returned.

But why cut all ties with experienced finance specialists when lines of communication can easily be put in place. Maintaining contact with outstanding individuals is a great idea if you want to create a corporate alumni network that enables you to connect with former workers who left under favourable circumstances.

Consider creating a networking group on Facebook or LinkedIn that you can use to connect with former employees who might be hired again.

Job and Employee Growth Programmes.

It’s fantastic for your company to find and hire the appropriate people, but what do you do with them once they start working? You must have a suitable program for ongoing professional development that benefits you, your new hires, and your current personnel.

The foundation of your company’s employee growth  proposition is a well-functioning development program, which is a great method to show your dedication to assisting employees in advancing their roles and careers.

Remember that having thorough hiring procedures in place is not enough; you also need to provide your team with the tools, resources, and opportunities necessary for them to grow professionally. Your commitment to creating an inclusive workplace must be genuine and sincere.

Connect Online

We have access to a variety of technology tools, therefore it only makes sense to use them while making employment decisions. It is quite effective to connect with job candidates via email and social media platforms, 

Social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn are excellent places to engage with potential customers. According to a LinkedIn research, 49% of professionals contact with businesses on social media networks primarily to advance their job search. Why not therefore find them there where they are already actively looking?

Set Up an Employee Referral Programme.

Employee recommendations are a great approach to recruit new employees. By saving costs on candidate sourcing, this method shortens the time needed to fill a vacancy. Additionally, you’ll hire new workers that already fit in well with your current team and company culture, making the situation all around advantageous.

Use A Trusted Specialist Finance Recruitment Agency.

Competition is fierce and talent is scarce. To find the best individuals for finance jobs, you must be confident in your recruitment strategies. Everything starts with explaining to them what it means for your company to hire both recent graduates and seasoned employees.

The simple solution is to leave it to the specialists, like us, If you think you lack the specialized knowledge or just don’t have the time since you are already juggling many jobs already, Once you’ve done that, everything else will be simple to arrange, and you’ll soon be recruiting A-list employees.

Our Solutions

Martina Quinn Finance Recruitment specialises in the placement of qualified accountants up to executive level nationwide, Our teams have extensive experience (67 years combined) recruiting in the Irish Market. Reach out to the team here in Martina Quinn Finance Recruitment for the best advice and support in building your finance teams contact us today.