Why hiring takes so long

Why hiring takes so long Getty Images There’s an urgency to hiring, for both parties involved. Logistical issues, industry-specific processes or factors unique to a given job all feed into the turnaround time from job ‘All about retention’ Hiring processes that feel endless have “been a long-standing issue, even pre-pandemic”, says Theresa Adams, senior knowledge advisor at the Society for Human Resource Management. Managers typically have their own job, and when they have an open position, technically may have two jobs – Theresa Adams In 2017, when researchers from US job-search platform Glassdoor analysed the results of more than 83,000 job interviews across industries in 25 countries, they found the average interview process took 23.7 days. Bigger companies tend to “have larger, more powerful HR departments, which leads to more centralisation and structure in hiring”, says Michael Gibbs, clinical professor of economics at Booth School of Business, University of Chicago. “More than ever, recruitment is a question of fit: companies want to make sure they are getting the right people, but also want to make sure that they are the right company for those people,” says Michael Smets, professor of management at University of Oxford’s Saïd Business School.