Emma O'Brien, from Cooper Lomaz, with five top tips on finding applicants for those 'hard to fill' roles

When you’re hiring, you want the best person fast. But when you’re hiring for one of 'those' roles – the highly technical or otherwise arcane ones – and nobody with the relevant skills/experience is even applying, how do you find any person, ever?

Many hard-to-fill roles didn’t even exist a decade ago.

Others are incredibly specialised. Or they’re just mildly specialised, but you’re located in the middle of nowhere.

Roles like these require a different approach. Here are five effective ways to fill them.

1. Expand Your Social Media Networks

You probably have a company LinkedIn, but do you also have Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube? Create active accounts on all these and start using them for recruiting and networking. Show prospective new hires what working with you is like and why your people love it.

2. Encourage Employee Referrals

Research by SHRM found that employee referrals deliver faster, better-quality hires and more employee retention than any other method. Offer everyone in your organisation training in online networking and bonuses if they connect you with a successful candidate.

3. Use Content Marketing

Blog posts or emails can help candidates find you and get them interested. Try inviting people to a virtual recruiting happy hour to build interest and get to know potential new hires.

4. Rewrite Job Descriptions

Are the requirements realistic – can you compromise? And do your job descriptions work as job ads? Include perks, benefits, opportunities for career advancement, and exciting projects. Link to your social media and Glassdoor profiles.

5. Recruit New Graduates

Use internships, job shadowing programmes and college recruiting drives to find brilliant young graduates to fit the bill. Note that 80 per cent of Millennials focus on people and culture fit when looking for a job, while 60 per cent consider growth opportunities the most important.

Of course, the above is difficult to put in place immediately, and should you have a current requirement, then finding that person is something that can be very easily achieved by using a recruitment agency. They will have spent years building up their database and have access to those hard to find candidates.

Emma O'Brien, HR Manager Cooper Lomaz