In case your group is like most, you’re continually on the lookout for methods to strengthen your workforce by smarter expertise acquisition techniques. Though recruiting has shifted dramatically through the previous few years, some progressive practices from the pre-pandemic period are price one other look.
A Pre-Covid Lesson in Recruiting Innovation
One instance is the expertise acquisition course of at monetary companies supplier, TIAA. A number of years in the past when the corporate accomplished a full-scale recruiting revamp, we spoke with Angie Wesley, then SVP and Head of Expertise Acquisition.
TIAA has since promoted Wesley to Head of Workforce Methods and Individuals Operations. She has additionally been named one of many high 100 Girls in Enterprise by the Nationwide Girls’s Convention. And looking out again now at how she superior expertise acquisition at TIAA, we are able to see why she is acknowledged as a visionary. She clearly is forward of the curve.
As a result of TIAA is a well-established group, Wesley knew she wanted to provoke change in ways in which would encourage buy-in, significantly from the recruiting crew. Her method is a robust lesson in find out how to beef up enterprise processes with know-how and keep away from friction whereas getting everybody onboard.
Rethinking Recruiting for Trendy Enterprise Wants
There’s no query that next-level recruiting will depend on trendy know-how. However enterprise aspirations are terribly excessive. And trendy recruiting instruments, alone, will not be sufficient to drive a cultural sea-change. For instance, many employers need to:
All of those rely on a powerful tech stack. However as we’ve seen repeatedly, merely buying new instruments and bolting them onto current processes and ecosystems just isn’t enough. Integration and adoption are key — and that takes critical organizational perception, coaching, and adjustment.
Constructing a Higher Tech Stack For Everybody
That’s the place Wesley’s position got here in. She led the transformation of TIAA’s recruiting capabilities so crew members may higher navigate the fashionable candidate market.
(Temporary reminder: Earlier than the pandemic struck, recruitment was already going through critical strain. From a really tight expertise market to shifting candidate expectations concerning the hiring expertise, employers had been fielding loads of recruiting challenges. However none of us may think about the Covid curve ball coming our method.)
As Wesley instructed TalentCulture on the time, next-level recruitment was “both going to return to us, or we had been going to have to affix it.”
The instruments she chosen and applied helped TIAA’s recruiting crew in quite a few methods. Specifically, they considerably improved the candidate expertise and paved the best way for a extra streamlined, compliant hiring course of.
What’s extra, Wesley’s developments didn’t get mired in resistance. All too typically, organizations meet change with pushback at quite a few ranges, from workers who don’t need to regulate their workflows to senior leaders who aren’t bought on the ROI of a brand new recruiting tech rollout.
In TIAA’s case, what made the distinction? Two clear aims…
Keys to Recruiting Transformation Success
1. Present Coaching to Construct Familiarity and Confidence
Wesley famous that recruiters voiced extra considerations than anybody else. “Loads of these recruiters are seasoned, in order that they have their very own method of shifting candidates by the method,” she defined. “We needed to present them how know-how truly helps them, as an alternative of inhibiting them.”
To encourage adoption, TIAA instituted each in-person and distant (web-based) coaching. The content material included loads of context and real-world examples from different organizations. This method helped workers members agree that the brand new instruments may assist enhance their productiveness and efficiency.
As well as, TIAA began monitoring who makes use of the instruments, to allow them to discover and repair particular person points. “If we have now of us that aren’t utilizing a sure know-how or device in our recruiting course of, we’re in a position to establish them and work with them to know and resolve the issue,” Wesley defined.
2. Give attention to Candidate Expertise
Many recruiting know-how upgrades are meant to enhance the candidate expertise, however typically they miss the mark. Wesley made certain candidates remained a high precedence all through the planning and implementation course of.
As of late, a few of TIAA’s modifications could seem to be desk stakes. However a number of years in the past, these recruitment necessities weren’t a given. (Know-how evolves quick!) For instance:
- On-line Purposes
TIAA made certain its employment web site and profession pages had been mobile-friendly and candidates may full the appliance course of on any system.
- Digital Assessments
The corporate started providing assessments that candidates may full on-line at their comfort — one other forward-thinking functionality that’s now thought-about a finest observe.
- Textual content-Based mostly Communication
Recruiters started relying extra closely on textual content messaging to conduct conversations in real-time. This led to extra frequent candidate communication that helped the recruitment course of really feel extra instant, personalised, and significant. Finally, this sort of responsiveness made a giant distinction that translated into higher hiring outcomes.
- Video Interviewing
The hiring crew additionally instituted video interviews. Once more, this was as soon as a modern technique that positioned the TIAA employer model forward of others. However the group wanted a greater approach to attain the passive expertise market. At the moment, probably the most enticing potential candidates had been employed elsewhere. Video interviews supplied extra comfort and fewer disruption. In fact, throughout Covid, video interviewing turned the brand new norm. Now, many organizations nonetheless depend on video instruments to increase recruiting attain and streamline the hiring course of.
Reinforcing the Human Facet of Recruiting
Does TIAA’s recruiting recreation plan recommend that know-how ought to substitute human interactions? Under no circumstances. Really, that is one other lesson to recollect for the way forward for expertise acquisition. The human component counts, all the time.
In line with Wesley, “What we’re discovering is candidates nonetheless need that human contact within the course of someplace. They don’t need know-how to handle all the things.”
Employers should strike a steadiness within the recruiting journey. Candidates need to expertise the human aspect of your group, particularly with regards to your organization’s historical past, tradition and values. Potential workers recognize private conversations with individuals who can communicate on behalf of your model.
Then again, candidates additionally worth employers who shortly course of their purposes and supply a hiring course of that’s moderately easy and painless.
So by all means, deploy one of the best and most progressive recruiting know-how to make the entire journey simpler and enhance the general candidate expertise. However don’t overlook the human contact. In spite of everything, these private moments alongside the best way could provide you with a bonus in hiring one of the best expertise.