The Complete Guide to Improving

Candidate Experience

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Contents

Why you should invest in candidate experience

Simple rules to improve your pre-hiring experience

Improving your onboarding experience

Measuring the success of your onboardingprogramme

• Assess your current onboarding programme• Ten steps to successful onboarding• Your employee onboarding roadmap

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Candidate experience refers to how job seekers perceive and react to employers’ sourcing, recruiting, interviewing, hiring and onboarding processes. With the competition for tech talents at an all-time high, companies are counting on using their candidateexperience to get ahead of the pack, and there are good reasons for them to do that:

1. Candidate is more likely to apply again

Even if a candidate is not suitable for a current position, he or she may be the ideal candidate for other positions or upcoming ones. Candidates are more likely to apply to a company again if the candidate experience had been positive. Not just that, they are also more likely to refer their peers.

 

2. Candidate is more likely to accept a job offer

The candidate experience is the first impression that your company makes. If the candidate has no prior experience working at your company, the candidate experience serves as an indication of what it’s like to work there. In a market where there’s a shortage of candidates, candidates have high bargaining power. As such, the candidate experience becomes an important factor for their acceptance of the offer.

Why you should invest incandidate experience

of candidates say the overallcandidate experience they receiveis an indicator of how a companyvalues its people.

78% 78%

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3. Candidate may be a customer

In a famous case study, Virgin Media conducted a “Rejected Candidate Survey” of people it had turned down for jobs. The results revealed that 18% of them were customers, and around 7500 (6%) of the total number of applicants switched to a Virgin competitor due to a poor recruitment experience. This translated to an astonishing £4.4million in lost revenue! On the other hand, a great candidate experience may have actually convert candidates into customers. 

4. It is easy to spread word about a bad candidate experience

An exceptional experience gets people talking and even sharing on social media. The same applies for a poor candidate experience. According to Talent Board, 36% of candidates use sites like Glassdoor to find out the inner workings of an organisation prior to applying. 

of hiring managers say they viewthe candidate experience as veryor extremely important.

82% 82%

Hiring managers are increasingly realising the far-reaching impacts the candidate experience have on the employer brand, job offer acceptance rates and even bottom lines since candidates are often customers too. It is no longer enough to simply fill roles, it is about attracting, retaining and engaging the right talent.

This ebook will help you assess,improve and measure yourcandidate experience. Read onfor actionable tips that you canapply right away!

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1. Show candidates that you appreciate their time

Simple Rules to improveyour pre-hiring experience

At the application stage:

On the job application webpage, state the amount of time required to complete the application process. You may want to indicate at the start, the list of materials they need to have with them to complete the registration.

Make the process easy for your applicants. Consider allowing them to just drop their CVs and fill out only the essential details.

At the interview stage:

Let the candidates know how long the interview process and hiring decision will take. For example, you may share with them the number of rounds of interview they will be expected to go through. You may also want to share with them who will be involved in decision-making at each stage and the estimated time they will require to make the decision.

If delays are expected to happen due to a manager travelling out of the country, share this with the candidate too.

Rule 1: Show candidatesthat you appreciatetheir time

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2. Keep your communication channels open for your candidates

Rule 2: Keep yourcommunication channelsopen for your candidates

CARD

At the application stage:

With technology, it’s easy to update the candidates about their application progress. For example, your hiring team can send an email to your candidates and let them know when they will hear from you on the interview.

Apart from email, your hiring team can offer other communication channels, such as web messaging or live chat, so candidates feel that they can speak to someone if they need to.

At the interview stage:

After the interviews have started, the same communication channels can be used by candidates to ask questions and get updates on the process. Continually engaging the candidates is important lest they think they have been dropped out of the race.

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Rule 3: Ask for feedback

Rule 4: Provide a proper closure

3. Ask for feedback

Ask candidates what they think about the candidate experience. This almost always offer insights into how you can improve it. Is your job application site obsolete? Are your candidates not accepting offers because your interview process is too long? Are you asking the right questions at the interviews? Are you explaining the job to your candidates well?

Surveys are a great way to get the feedback you need. At Evolution, we take candidate experience seriously. That is why we administer surveys to every candidate who went for interview with our clients. From the results, we understand how candidates feel about a client’s company, location, pre-interview greeting etc. We then work with the client to improve its candidate experience based on the feedback.

4. Provide a proper closure

Provide helpful and timely feedback to candidates whether or not you plan to offer them the job. The feedback should be constructive and help the candidates be better at their next interview. To help you with that, take notes during the interview to avoid forgetting important details about a candidate’s performance.

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Improving youronboarding programme

A well-designed onboarding programme makes good business sense. Here’s why:

Hiring new staff is expensive. It has been estimated to cost, on average, around US$4,129 per hire. You do not want your good hires to leave shortly after they were hired as this wastes precious time and money. Helping your new hires navigate transition, addressing their new job anxieties and introducing them to the company’s culture can help them get productive quicker.

Helping the new hire build positive working relationships with their colleagues will help him or her adjust better, encouraging collaboration in the workplace.

With the competition for talent on the rise, it is no surprise that your good hires will get opportunities knocking on their doors all the time. If you don’t keep them engaged, especially in their first year, they will leave.

Companies with a formal onboardingprogramme retain more than 90% ofnew employees, compared to just 30%at companies without a formal onboardingprogramme.

With a formal onboarding structure,62% of employees hired in the last12 months met first performancemilestones on time, compared to17% at organisations without aformal onboarding structure.

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In other words, having a good onboarding programme will improve your retention rate and productivity, boost your competitive edge and increase profits. It’s no wonder that onboarding ranks No. 2 out of 22 HR practices that have the highest business impact.

90% of employees decide whether ornot to stay with a company withinthe first year.

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Assess your current onboarding programme

Checklist

Before we begin improving your onboardng programme, it is useful to look at yoyour current programme. You may already have in place some good practices and just need to work on other areas.

Use the checklist on the following page to assess your current on boarding programme:

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Your onboarding process is formally documented or written down somewhere.

It is clear who owns each task in the onboarding process.

It is chronological.

Timeframes are clearly indicated for each task.

If someone departs your company, is it clear who will be taking over their tasks.

Documentation

Any content you use for onboarding is free of “insider” jargon or terms.

Training material is up-to-date

Format is easy-to-access, e.g. digital resources is easier to access compared to hardcopy resources.

Training Content

The programme plan addresses both cultural and technical onboarding.

There is a buddy or mentor system in place.

IT tasks are addressed in the programme plan and the IT department knows what their roles are.

Existing employees have ran through the plan and provided their feedback.

Checkpoints and feedback opportunities have been built into your programme plan.

The plan addresses the start to the end of the onboarding programme.

The plan also covers the time period after an employee accepts the job offer but before they start the job.

General

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Ten steps to successful onboarding

Take an interest in the candidate. Ask them what they want from the role. Use this information to help you sell your opportunity to them.

01 Explore & SellMake the candidate feel wanted. Impress them. Show them around the workplace and facilities. Introduce them to their potential new colleagues.

02 WOW FactorMove quickly with any offer. Send out contracts and required paperwork as soon as possible. Candidates in short supply will have more than your offer to consider.

03 Time Kills All Deals

Create a timetable to give to your new employee. This gives them an idea of what to expect and can help ease nerves, making their first few weeks more enjoyable.

06 TimetableWork with the new employee to create a plan. Ask for preferences on hardware and software. Discuss projects and future requirements to maintain their interest.

05 PlanBe in close communication with your new hire. Check in regularly and invite them for lunch. Invite some of the team members to start building relationships with new hire.

04 Communication

Be ready for your employee’s first day. Ensure that their workspace and equipment are set up. Don’t leave them to stand around feeling awkward.

07 FirstImpression Counts

Hold an initial 30-60 minute meeting to update on any changes. Discuss timetable and immediate requirements. Introduce to the new hire to colleagues and tour the workplace with them.

08 Plan

Partner them up with a buddy to help them with any problems or questions they may have. Arrange for them to take the new employee for lunch.

09 Use aBuddy System

Conduct regular reviews with the new staff members. Listen and take action. Don’t just give them lip service.

10 Listen

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Your employee onboarding roadmap

An employee onboarding roadmap contains a schedule of events and milestones the new hire goes through as part of onboarding. A sample roadmap may look something like this:

Before employee

starts

First30-90 days

Firstyear

Day 1

1. Share company mission, values and other key information via email

2. Send a personalised welcome. Include useful resources, e.g. URLs to company

intranet, information about parking, lunch options etc

3. Ensure new hire’s workspace is set up. Check the desk, phone and computer.

4. Ensure new hire’s entry access is granted and set up.

5. Host a “culture welcome”. Get to know the new hire outside of work.

6. Share the onboarding programme plan with the new hire.

7. Announce the new hire’s arrival in email.

8. Take the new hire for an office tour and introduce him or her to the peers.

 

17. Remind hire about the benefits and incentive programmes

18. Communicate ongoing learning/training opportunities

19. Recognise achievements

20. Stay connected with formal and informal two-way feedback

 

9. Introduce to key business partners/leaders

10. Make time for periodic one-on-one sessions and peer feedback

11. Provide opportunities for new hire to have customer, field and product

experiences

12. Allow for job shadowing

13. Monitor progress and performance of new hire

14. Survey new hire and direct manager

15. Honour monthly achievements* or special occasions, e.g. birthdays

16. Encourage participation in the company’s voluntary activities

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Measuring the success of your onboarding programme

Get feedback from the new hire’s direct managersAsk their views on the new hire’s performance, the one-to-one sessions with the new hire and other areas in the on boarding road map they have been involved in etc. You can have the same questionnaire or survey for all managers which would help you track responses and jot down in your on boarding programme’s progress report.

Get feedback from the new hireAsk their views on specific areas of the programme and how it can be improved. The new hire most likely would have experienced onboarding programmes at other companies and would able to give you new ideas!

Measure the company’s retention rateTrack the average length of time an employee stays at your company, how any changes to your onboarding programme have affected those numbers. The findings should be able to help you determine time points where the flight risk is greater. You would then be able to look into implementing interventions before that.

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Evolution Recruitment Solutions Pte Ltd

www.evolutionjobs.sg