Experienced Candidates vs Fresh Candidates: Which One To Hire?

When it comes to hiring new employees, businesses face a significant challenge: should they go for fresh candidates who bring a burst of energy and innovative ideas, or should they opt for experienced candidates with expertise and a proven track record of success? Hire Fresh graduates or Experienced Candidates is often the biggest dilemma.

There is no easy answer to this question, as both fresh and experienced candidates have their advantages and disadvantages. A new candidate adds new energy but is like a newborn baby who needs the training to help achieve your goals. An experienced candidate, on the other hand, is equipped with skills and knowledge but is resistant to change and charges more.

In this blog post, we will learn the pros and cons of hiring experienced candidates vs fresh candidates and help you decide which one to hire for your business?

Benefits of Hiring Fresh Candidates

Fresh candidates are usually recent graduates or individuals who don’t have much experience in the field. Even though they lack experience, there are several advantages of hiring fresh graduates. Let’s have a look the benefits of hiring fresh candidates:

Bring New Ideas and Perspectives

Fresh candidates come with new ideas and perspectives that can help your business grow. As they are not bound by old ways of thinking, they can bring innovative solutions to the table. Also, since they have recently graduated, they are up-to-date on the latest technology and trends, which can give your business a competitive edge.

Facebook is a real example that prioritized recent graduates with little or no experience. This strategy has allowed it to bring fresh perspectives and innovative ideas to its operations.

Eager to Learn

Jobseekers who are new are open to training and learning the tricks of the trade. As they are not set in their ways, they are more likely to take on new challenges and be proactive in learning. This means they are adaptable to the culture and show more flexibility to the changes in the business environment.

More Affordable

Hiring fresh candidates is more affordable than experienced ones. As they have less experience in the field, they don’t have high salary expectations. More than the salary, they are willing to learn and gain experience. This is beneficial for businesses that may not have the budget to hire experienced candidates and want to save money on their employee compensation expenses.

Carry Enthusiasm and Energy

The enthusiasm and energy that the fresh candidates bring to the workplace are incomparable. They are excited to start their careers and eager to make a positive impact. Their get-up-and-go attitude is infectious, and encouraging for other team members.

Grow with Your Business

When you hire someone new to your business, they grow with your business. As they gain experience and develop new skills, they can take on more responsibility and become valuable assets to your team.

“According to Deloitte, 84% of executives believe their company’s future success depends on millennials and Gen Z employees.”

Flexible

Most recent college graduates have flexible schedules and availability. As young job seekers don’t have many responsibilities like family and kids, they can work for longer hours and can potentially relocate and move without any hesitation.

Also, Watch: Where can recruiters find good Java developers?

Loyal and True to The Company

If you bring on board new candidates unfamiliar with your industry, it can lead to a strong bond that inspires loyalty to your company. And if you provide proper training and resources, they feel more content working for you as their initial employer or mentor.

Cons of Hiring Fresh Candidates

While there are several benefits of working with newcomers, there are a few cons of hiring fresh candidates too, such as:

Make Mistakes

Newcomers are likely to make more mistakes due to their lack of experience. Also, predicting when they’ll complete the task is difficult. This may disrupt your schedule and delivery dates and hamper productivity.

Take Time to Settle In

Newcomers who have not worked in real work environments may have difficulty understanding their roles and responsibilities. So, you will need to give guidance or instructions and help them settle into their role.

Need Training

When you hire new candidates, you should be ready to train and mentor them too. To make them comfortable in their new positions, you must be patient and invest your time and effort.

Also, read: Why Do Tech Companies Not Hire Recent Computer Science Graduates?

Benefits of Hiring Experienced Candidates

Now, let’s look at the benefits of hiring experienced candidates and how they can benefit your business:

Quick Onboarding

Seasoned employees have a proven track record of working in various environments, which helps them start the ball rolling. This experience is beneficial for businesses that need to see results quickly.

Offer Expertise and Knowledge

When you hire experienced candidates, they come with a wealth of expertise and knowledge. Their deep industry knowledge helps them innovate and stay ahead of the curve. Plus, their experience of working in similar roles or industries gives them an edge in integrating the best practices and industry trends.

Require Less Training

Experienced candidates don’t need much training as they already possess the skills and knowledge to perform their roles. They don’t require hand-holding from management to get them going.

Mentor and Train Others

Hiring experienced candidates is useful for businesses that lack expertise. As mentors and guides, they train other team members and prepare a team that can help meet your business goals. IBM’s “Blue on Blue” initiative is a testament to how mentoring and training from experienced workers help improve employee retention and productivity.

Bring Industry Network

Having worked with many industry professionals before, they have plenty of contacts with industry professionals. Their networks and contacts are extremely valuable if you are looking to establish partnerships or collaborations.

Cons of Hiring Experienced Candidates

There are many pros to working with experienced candidates, but not without cons. Let’s have a look at the cons of hiring experienced candidates:

Cookie Cutter Attitude

The biggest con of working with experienced candidates is that they are not keen on trying new ideas. As they have years of industry experience, they tend to apply the same approaches and strategies and are entrenched in their go-to methods.

Lack flexibility

Experienced candidates find adjusting to the company’s culture tough since they aren’t flexible. Collaboration and managing experienced candidates is also a big challenge as they are not open to diverse ideas.

Costly

Seasoned candidates have a wealth of knowledge, but this knowledge always has a price tag. According to the Society for Human Resource Management study, the average cost-per-hire for experienced employees is $4,129, while for entry-level employees, it’s $1,209.

Unpredictable

As experienced candidates are more likely to land jobs due to their experience, developing loyalty is difficult for them. You can’t predict and be sure of them staying with you as they are not new to the industry and don’t need you to learn and grow.

How to Determine Which Type of Candidate is Best for Your Business?

So, now you have learned the pros and cons of hiring experienced candidates vs fresh candidates. However, when it comes to hiring, your decision should be made considering factors other than experience. Here are things you should consider when hiring a candidate for your business.

Skills and Experience Needed for the Role

A candidate with experience may be the best fit if your role requires specific technical skills. However, if the role requires less technical expertise, a fresh candidate may be suitable, as you can train them according to the role requirements.

Hiring budget

Experienced candidates are costly and demand higher compensation than fresh graduates. So, if you are low on budget, you should think of going with fresh candidates. They are less rigid in terms of compensation and less demanding too.

Culture of the Business

If you have a strong culture of collaboration and incorporate a diversity of ideas, you should consider hiring fresh candidates who are open to learning, adaptable, and have the energy and enthusiasm to mingle with teammates.

Business Goals and Objectives

Having seasoned candidates on board may help you achieve your expansion goals faster. If you focus on innovation and creativity, a fresh candidate is best since they offer a new vision.

Current Team

If your team consists of experienced individuals, a fresh candidate may bring new energy and ideas to the team. However, if your team is new and needs a mentor and guide, an experienced candidate will fit better.

Training Resources

Fresh candidates need training, and you need to invest time and money in them. So, consider hiring them only if you have the resources for training and development.

Strategies for Integrating Fresh and Experienced Candidates into Your Team

Integrating fresh and experienced candidates into your team can be challenging. But you can make the transition smoother by incorporating the following strategies:

• Provide clear expectations for the role and what is expected of the candidates to keep everyone on the same page and avoid confusion.
• Offer training and development opportunities to advance their skills and ensure that they are equipped to perform their roles effectively.
• Encourage collaboration between fresh and experienced candidates to facilitate knowledge sharing and ensure that everyone is working towards the same goals.
• Provide feedback and support to motivate your employees and ensure company goals are being met.
• Foster a positive work environment where inclusion and diversity are valued and offer a supportive and welcoming atmosphere for all team members.

How to Find The Right Candidate for Your Business?

To find the right candidates in today’s job market, you need to have a well-planned strategy in place. Partnering with a reliable IT staffing and tech upskill company such as SynergisticIT can help you find the best candidates for your business.

SynergisticIT possesses years of experience in the field of IT staffing and tech training to help you connect with the best talent, whether experienced or fresh candidates.

• It understands your hiring needs and helps you connect with individuals for full-time, part-time, and contract roles.
• It has an extensive database of skilled candidates, which helps find candidates much faster than using sources like job boards.
• Due to its excess to various hiring sources, it offers diverse candidates from different backgrounds.
• It recognizes the role requirements and matches you with candidates who have the skillsets you need.

Also, Watch: Why Tech Companies choose Synergisticit for their software programmers needs?

• SynergisticIT makes candidates work on various projects to gain work experience and offer the same value as experienced candidates.
• Its 1-2 years experienced candidates are as good as candidates with 4-5 years experience.
• As its candidates are already operational and have job-relevant certifications, they are less likely to make mistakes.
• It can help you get more value for your money with certified and skilled candidates, who are cheaper yet at par with experienced candidates.
• It offers industry-specific skill training to help fresh candidates perform with minimum downtime.
• It helps candidates get the latest certifications in technologies such as Azure, AWS, Java, Data Science, and Machine Learning to help them gain an edge.
• Its candidates have proven coding skills on Codelity and HackerRank and can hit the ground running from day one!

Conclusion

Take the time to carefully consider the type of candidate you need. Whether you hire a fresh candidate or an experienced one, remember to provide the training and development opportunities or other technology upskill programs essential to help them succeed. By investing in your team’s upskilling and training, you can drive growth and success for your business.

Operational in the tech space for more than 12 years, SynergisticIT has helped hundreds of clients reach their recruitment goals and built a reliable and trustworthy team of professionals. It has an incredible team of recruiters equipped with the latest tools and recruiting practices to help close direct, contract-to-hire, permanent hire, and temp-to-hire positions. Also, to meet your emerging technology needs, it helps your existing employees get skill enhancement in the latest technologies. Reach out to us. SynergisticIT- Home of the best Data Scientists and Software Programmers in they Bay Area!!