Creating an Engaging Candidate Experience
The days of sitting back and waiting until the perfect candidate lands in your ATS are long gone. Now, it's crucial for companies to examine their hiring process and make necessary adjustments so that candidates will enjoy the process, no matter the outcome.
Candidate experience is the journey that a person takes through an organization's application and hiring process. Sounds simple right? It's not that easy though, especially in today's candidate-driven market. The days of sitting back and waiting until the perfect person lands in your ATS are long gone. Now, it's crucial for companies to examine their hiring process and make necessary adjustments so that candidates will enjoy the process, no matter the outcome.
In this time of instant access to information, a negative experience with an organization's hiring process can be shared with many people in seconds. The ramifications of this can be damaging not only to a company's brand, but it can also drive top talent away from opportunities presented by an organization.
In today's competitive talent market, employers must provide a positive candidate experience and most importantly, do what they say they will do.
- Tiffanie Ross, Senior Director, AIRS, powered by ADP
Employer branding is an important component of today's talent management landscape. Organizations that focus on improving their hiring process have the opportunity to turn candidates into advocates and make a positive impact on their brand and appeal to top talent.
Opportunities to make quick improvements to the hiring process include:
- Do what you say you're going to do. Sounds easy enough, but it doesn't always happen. If you tell a candidate they will hear back from you in a week, make sure they hear back from you in a week. Even if there is nothing to report on specifically, the communication itself is essential for making candidates feel valued.
- Stay in touch. High-touch is a key element to improving a candidate's experience. Send updates on a regular basis and be personal. Modern technology allows for AI tools and shortcuts in the recruiting process, but personal contact can go a long way toward improving the perception of the hiring process and upgrading a candidate's experience.
- Make it painless to apply. Don't require candidates to jump through unnecessary hoops when submitting their application. If possible, allow them to use cloud-based tools to submit their resume. Allow candidates to apply via mobile applications as well, this should be a ubiquitous part of the process today.
- Ask questions. Surveying candidates that were hired as well as those that weren't can go a long way towards identifying where further improvements can be made in the hiring process. This information can be invaluable for unearthing negative elements of the application, interviewing or onboarding process that were potentially not even considered previously.
- Have a differentiator. Offering something other competitor organizations don't can't make a significant impact. Providing jobseeker training for non-selected candidates can leave a positive impression and give recruiters a pipeline management tool.
- Provide Hiring Manager training. Ensuring your hiring managers are trained on selling the opportunity, understand interview best practices and are effective at managing candidate experience are critical to supporting the talent journey.
The candidate experience is important through all phases of the candidate's journey - this is true whether a candidate applies to a job or if they are a passive candidate being recruited. Evaluating each stage of a candidate's journey will impact candidate experience and help your organization become more attractive to top talent while improving brand perception.
From hello to goodbye, the candidate experience is critical to talent acquisition success today. From locating passive candidates and attracting them to the opportunity, to closing the deal or professionally turning down a candidate for a role, meaningful connections and a positive experience can have impact of creating brand ambassadors that impact the organization's future growth.
For More: Learn how RPO enables a national growth strategy for Belle Tire.
