5 Reasons the Best Candidates Reject Your Offer for Scrum Master Jobs

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Start Selling Your Company to the Candidate

Employing the most talented candidates into Scrum Master jobs is crucial for the performance of your scrum teams. They ensure that the scrum framework is implemented correctly and that the team delivers outcomes effectively.

Despite your best efforts, though, you’re finding it hard to hire the Scrum Master you need. You make the offer, but it gets rejected. You learn that the candidate accepted an offer elsewhere. According to PwC, half of jobseekers in high-demand roles like Scrum Master jobs have rejected a job offer. Why? What is it that you’re doing wrong?

Here are five reasons your candidates aren’t signing on the dotted line.

1.    Your Compensation Package Isn’t Competitive

Salary is not the deciding factor for most candidates, but there is one thing that is certain: if the compensation you offer isn’t in line with market rates, you won’t get the signature you want.

Accompanying your salary with the right set of benefits – healthcare, flexible time, bonuses, and so on – is crucial. You’ll need to remain aware of competing packages in the market and your location, and listen to your candidate for their unique expectations during the interviewing process. If your offer doesn’t meet these expectations, you’ll be disappointed by the answer the candidate gives you.

2.    Your Hiring Process Turned Off the Candidate

This may be the first time that a candidate for your Scrum Master job has had experience of your company. You best ensure that it’s a good experience. If you don’t keep the candidate informed, or need to cancel an interview, or ask poor questions of the candidate, they will form a poor impression of your company.

It’s important to provide feedback to candidates, communicate frequently, and keep them informed of the hiring timeline and their progress along it.

3.    You Took Too Long to Make an Offer

We recently published an article discussing how fast you should make an offer for a Project Manager job. You may be surprised just how fast the best candidates must be offered the position. For most, within a week after their last interview is the norm, and if you are slower than this you risk them accepting an offer elsewhere.

If you identify the righty candidate, you must move quickly to secure their signature.

4.    They Received a Counteroffer from Their Current Employer

The better the candidate, the more likely they are to receive a counteroffer from their current employer when they resign. Here’s where you need to be decisive. Do you counter the counteroffer, or do you accept defeat? If the candidate is considering the counteroffer, what does this say for your overall offer? Is there a tweak you could make, or other persuasive tactics that you could pursue?

5.    You Didn’t Sell Your Company to the Candidate

During the hiring process, you’ll be assessing the candidate’s credentials to fill your Scrum Master job. You’ll expect them to sell themselves to you. The candidate is doing the same in reverse. You must sell your company to a candidate for hiring success.

The best candidates want to know that they will fit in. They want to know that people progress at your company, and that they will benefit from the training and development that will help them progress.

For today’s most motivated candidates, cultural fit matters. Make sure that you sell who you are as well as what the job is. One way to do this is to expose them to your team early in the hiring process, and let them experience your team’s personality and reason for being in the flesh.

In Summary

When hiring for Scrum Master jobs, and all other jobs, it’s crucial that you sell to the candidate – the role, your culture, and the opportunity.

It is crucial to have a streamlined and effective hiring process, and that you keep in touch with candidates and offer feedback to them. Your efficiency, the questions you ask, and the interaction you have with a candidate outside of the interview room will all shape the candidate’s impression of you.

When it comes to making the offer:

  • Ensure that you offer a market-competitive salary and benefits package – one that meets the candidate’s expectations
  • Be prepared to negotiate
  • Move fast

Do these things, and you should move your hiring process to where you need it to be to attract, hire, and retain the most talented candidates.

To learn how our clients benefit from some of the most talented Scrum Masters and project management candidates available today, contact TotalTek.