As we settle into 2024, the recruitment landscape within social housing proves complex.
We remain in a ‘candidate-led’ market, whereby the number of vacancies outweighs the number of available candidates, resulting in candidates having more options to choose from, and companies battling to attract and retain talent.
The feedback from conversations with social housing providers is consistent – retention of staff is a challenge, and the number of housing professionals is in short-supply, particularly for niche positions.
Below we analyse social housing staff attraction and retention, providing you with actionable steps to help you win the war for talent.
Retention
Employee retention is crucial for maintaining a skilled and experienced workforce, fostering organisational stability and ensuring the effective delivery of services to tenants.
Retention issues can often sneak up on you. It’s important to start the retention process when the person is still open to staying, and not when they’ve already told you they are leaving.
It’s also important to remember that people work for money, but often go the extra mile for praise, recognition and rewards.
The most common retention areas to consider are as follows:
Hybrid / Remote Working
In the modern, post-COVID workplace, hybrid working, flexibility around hours and remote working are perhaps the common reasons why employees switch jobs. As a recruiter, it is often the first question we are asked by applicants.
Promoting a healthy work-life balance to prevent burnout and enhance employee well-being is a huge consideration for businesses looking to increase their staff retention.
If after training the post is viable to working from home, consider offering a transition into hybrid or remote working. Of course, not all roles would have capability for remote working, however more often than not within the housing sector, they can be.
Professional Development
Consider supporting employees in gaining new skills and qualifications relevant to their roles within social housing. Whilst the Social Housing (Regulation) Bill will introduce a requirement for senior housing managers and senior housing executives to have or be working towards a Level 4 or 5 housing management qualification, we should be looking to engage qualifications earlier on.
It is important to extend growth opportunities across the organisation and utilise the skills from people wishing to step into more senior posts. Let the employees grow with you.
Salary
It goes without say that offering competitive salaries and benefits is a sure-fire way to attract and retain talented individuals. Whilst this may be hard to offer to due to budget constraints, the cost of living crisis is having a demonstrable impact on people’s employment decisions.
We recommend you regularly review your benefits and where possible, provide incremental salary increases, along with fostering a great place of work. As a minimum, salaries must keep up with inflation.
Benefits & Wellbeing
For many, benefits and employee wellbeing perks are considered just as strongly as salary and flexible working. It is important not to overlook how additions such as holiday allowance, pension, workplace schemes, support networks and free financial advice can be valued by employees.
Do you know the salaries of your local competitors? It may be possible that you cannot compete on salary so can your benefits be re-aligned to make your overall package too good to leave?
Consider conducting a benefits survey to achieve a deeper understanding of your workforce. This not only gives your staff the opportunity to voice benefits that align with their personal needs but may mean that you don’t have to increase spend.
Realign benefits by removing those which are rarely utilised and introducing benefits that will be greatly appreciated company wide. There is no reason why one or two valued individuals can’t retain a specific benefit if necessary.
Attracting Talent
Engaging promptly with standout housing professionals has been a challenge for many housing organisations in the last year.
With candidates in short supply, we review what steps you can take to help increase your chances of securing the best available housing talent.
Interview Process
This is talked about frequently within Social Housing and is often a recurring theme in other public sector organisations.
Elongated interview processes, even for interim positions, can put off housing professionals and put you at risk of missing out on good candidates. On countless occasions we have witnessed candidates conduct one interview and be offered with one company, whilst another company is planning a second stage interview.
As part of an internal review, ask the following questions:
How many stages do you go through when hiring?
Do you conduct too many interview stages for level of role which you are recruiting?
Can the assessment process be improved by new interview questions?
Can the interview process be shortened by conducting panel interviews (assuming all current interviewers are deemed necessary)?
Do you miss out on talent due to screening interviews and should the actual hiring manager be in the first interview?
What is likely to impact the bottom line more – time spent without talent or time spent interviewing?
Are second-round site visits strictly necessary for all roles / scenarios, or can the process be completed completely remotely?
We recognise that answers to these questions will vary greatly depending on the seniority and nature of the role (temporary, permanent, fixed-term), however a “one size fits all” approach to hiring does not work.
The battle for talent is very real in the sector and those thriving have streamlined their interview process to ensure a seamless supply of professionals.
Attraction
From first contact through to final interview, it is important to sell your opportunity to prospective employees.
Consider the following:
Is your website and careers page attractive to prospective employees?
Who makes first contact with the candidate and has that person been briefed on the selling points of your business?
How do external agencies pitch your business?
Have interviewers been trained on selling the role, the organisation and its benefits?
How does any written engagement / content represent your business?
Everyone in the process must be well-informed and be singing from the same hymn sheet to give you the best chance of success.
Internal Recruitment
Internal recruiters are a hugely valuable asset to any business, much like strong relationships with specialist recruiters.
By way of an example, we recently held talks with a Housing Association who utilise an ATS system as an integral part of their recruitment process. Interestingly, this ATS system was the only means of sourcing for the internal recruitment team.
As you would expect, the system advertised job openings across many job boards, however the next step was to wait for applications. What’s more, the candidate then had to complete a lengthy process through the website, just to get their CV in front of the recruitment team.
Consider the following:
Do your internal recruitment team have all the necessary tools to conduct their roles effectively?
Are they reactive or proactive and why?
Is your application process discriminating or off-putting?
Should your recruitment team be filtering the applications, rather than your ATS?
Who or what should be selling your opportunities to the applicants?
A successful internal recruitment team will combine the following:
Manage all external hiring processes to include advertising, screening, arranging interviews, providing feedback and so on
Proactively source for current and possible future vacancies
Managed and build good relationships with recruitment agencies, ready for when you need them
Effectively sell your organisation to every applicant they speak with, whether they are in process or not
Make the process as seamless as possible for the applicant and the hiring manager
Recruitment Agencies
Partnering with external ‘trusted advisors’ is crucial for the success of any organisation.
As well as filling vacancies, a good recruitment consultant should add value in the following ways:
Access to housing professionals that are not actively applying for jobs
Quick reaction to interim and temporary recruitment needs
A head-hunting service for senior professionals
Advice on process, attraction, salaries, interviews and the general market
Years of experience in the housing market and correctly briefing candidates
It is also important to consider what you are offering any agency partners, to get the best return on your investment.
For example, do you provide plentiful information to help them source, and are you timely with feedback? Can you offer any exclusivity or lead time, rather than create an agency race?
Furthermore, are your rates comparable to their other clients / the market? Whilst negotiating rates to cut-price levels may seem a worthwhile task, will you get the best candidates and service if you are paying 5% less than other organisations?
We recommend asking these questions and building agency relationships ahead of time, so you know where to turn in urgent moments and can continue to provide seamless, high-quality service.
Spirehouse are a specialist provider of social housing recruitment.
We connect housing associations, local authorities, ALMOs and charities with experienced professionals across all aspects of housing management, supported housing and private sector housing.
To speak with our team in more detail, please contact Kim Parsons:
0770 015 7018
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