You got the candidate who fits in the role perfectly, the way you and your team wanted. Congratulations! But it’s not the end of the road to your ideal recruitment journey. The candidate is still your potential employee, not an employee. An offer letter is a document that will ultimately determine the potential employee’s status. How to write a good offer letter without much sweating on it? What are the variable pointers you must include in a job offer letter format?
We are discussing it in greater detail. But before we get to that, let’s first delve into the importance of employment offer letters – why are they so important?
Why Is Providing an Employee Offer Letter Format Necessity?
After putting candidates through many rounds of testing and taking personal interviews, hiring managers make verbal offers to candidates.
Yet, that leaves many questions unanswered. Of course, as a hiring manager, you would always ask candidates to put up questions. But for candidates, it’s not possible to express their doubts impromptu.
Sometimes, they are just hesitant – thinking they might be taking too much of your time.
Thus, it’s essential to provide a written offer letter to candidates to clear the air of doubts. Offer letters are helpful for you, too, as you already listed all the responsibilities and perks in the letter, leaving no room for potential misunderstanding.
Though offer letters do not have any legal backing, any party can reject the terms listed in them. Yet an offer letter is not a notional thing.
Apart from offering clarity to candidates, an offer letter shows the seriousness of both parties. Candidates extrapolate these gestures to understand how vital the positions are for the hiring company.
It’s also a good tool for measuring candidates’ seriousness and how quickly they respond with acknowledgement or further questions.
Now that we have established that providing an employee offer letter is not an option but a need, let’s address the elephant in the room—the offer letter format/ job offer letter template and the pointers to include in the letter.
Offer Letter Format: What to Include in an Employee Offer Letter?
The exact pointers of the offer letter vary from company to company. Where you stand as an organisation, the company culture, size, terms of employment, and the industry you operate in are variables that usually dictate what you can and cannot include in your employment offer letter.
Still, the overall format does not change, and there are key details that every organisation should have in their offer letter format, irrespective of their industry and size. So let’s have a look at them one by one:
Conditions of the employment
If there are any conditions attached to employment, state them in bold letters. These could include candidates proving their eligibility before joining or substantiating background check information. Mention the conditions and means to seek extensions.
Joining Date
Candidates who are already employed usually have notice periods to serve. So, you must mention the date of their joining, stating you are allowing them to serve their notice period with their current organisation as per discussion.
Job title
Explicitly mention the candidates ‘job titles along with a description of their roles and responsibilities. It would help if you could mention the details of their reporting manager.
Offer Letter Format: Form of employment
Candidates often confuse the type or form of employment an organisation offers. To avoid any potential misunderstanding, clearly mention the kind of employment, such as full-time, part-time, or ad hoc.
Location
If your organisation has many offices, it’s critical to define where the recruit will be working. The offer letter should also state whether the employment will be in the office remotely or hybrid. When it comes to hybrid, the letter should also note the terms of the same.
Compensation
Mention the precise details of the compensation you are offering for the mutually agreed-upon role, such as the mode of calculation—yearly, monthly, or hourly. Also, outline any other perks and benefits attached to the part, like performance bonuses, insurance, sabbatical, etc.
Employee equity option
If you are offering equity as part of the compensation to candidates, remember to include it in the offer letter. In addition, mention the percentage of the total compensation you’ll be paying in the form of equity.
To sum up, the lessons are simple. The utility of written offer letters goes beyond formality or procedure. They clarify candidates and clear the air between both parties, leaving no scope for future conflicts. You can quickly develop an offer letter format for your company with the information above, aligning with your industry.
At CodeQuotient, we make tech recruiters’ lives easier by providing them with quality, trained tech talent ready to take on industry challenges through Software Engineering Bootcamp. To learn more about us, click here or contact us at info@codequotient.com. We’ll get back to you!
