it's ALL about the experience

Why collect feedback when we’re not actively hiring?

In this recent webcast we talked about the candidate as customer, and the role that feedback plays in that context.  Here's another follow up question from the audience.

 

I love this question, but isn’t it a lot like asking if you should put off digging a well until you’re thirsty?  In business, measured feedback is a means to a very specific end: the influence of results.  You know, those things that make your business stronger, better, faster, more efficient, more competitive.  Or the ones that drive profit, reduce expense, increase efficiency, and generate loyalty in customers and employees.  Yeah, those things.

 

I like candidate feedback all the time, because I get to see my efforts from a third party perspective - which is illuminating at best and entertaining at worst.  I also find it helpful to think about candidate feedback from two perspectives: reactive and proactive.  Both are important, and each provides data to influence different aspects of your business goals and objectives.

 

Reactive Feedback

 

Reactive feedback is about creating tactical data you need for hiring today. It helps you to analyze how candidates respond to information and interactions you plan for them, data they gather about your company that is outside of your control, and the value judgments they make as a result.  It is useful, on the aggregate, to improve process, brand, and outreach.

 

For example, your established hiring process includes the advertisement of jobs, collecting resumes, screening and interviewing applicants, extending job offers, and onboarding new employees.  Your intentions are clear in terms of what you need to accomplish.  You also may have given significant thought to the experience you’d like to provide for your candidates.  The collection of reactive feedback provides a gap analysis between your intentions and the actual experience of your target audience, as well as confirmation that you are (or aren’t) reaching the desired demographic pool (companies with EEOC plans know exactly what I mean by this last one).

 

And just because you’re not hiring doesn’t mean that candidates stop knocking at the door of your career or corporate website, or stop talking about you at the water cooler, or stop reading about you in the news.  Things that make you say, “Hmmm….”

 

Proactive Feedback

 

Proactive feedback is about creating strategic data you’ll need for hiring in the future.  It helps you to analyze trends in candidate perception and behavior specifically to anticipate and prepare for short and long term talent market shifts, disruptions, and growth.

 

Examples of this kind of feedback relate to perceptions of your company’s job opportunities, pay and benefits, products and services, business reputation, and industry competition.  Sound like marketing 101?  You bet it is.  There is method to the madness of our friends in marketing, I’m telling you.

 

We all recognize that if we’re not hiring today, unless we’re dead or dying we’ll eventually reenter that marketplace: opportunity will come knocking, innovation will occur, or a market shift will cause us to rethink the strength of the employee base.  Any idea how quickly you’ll be able to respond?   Collecting both proactive and reactive candidate feedback positions you to act quickly and with a confidence that comes from data rather than assumption.

 

What are your thoughts?

 

About Claudia Faust:

In my day job I’m the CEO and Head of Products at Improved Experience, where we help companies leverage feedback to engage and retain both employees and customers. Learn more about us here.

The Candidate as Customer: A Follow-up Discussion

In this recent webcast for HCI, I spoke about improving selection in talent pipelines through the implementation of strategic candidate feedback initiatives.  For those who were unable to join us, the concept draws from marketing practices of measuring customer loyalty, which research shows is a key driver of business profitability.

 

The topic raised some excellent questions from the audience, many of which required significantly more time than we had in the webcast to address fully.  For example:

• Why is it important to measure the satisfaction of those who aren’t hired?
• What are the implications of treating internal vs. external candidates as customers?
• What is the best way to get feedback from candidates that were not hired?
• What specific feedback should be collected to address the problem of high turnover?
• Is it important to collect feedback when we’re not actively hiring?
• How does availability or lack of talent influence the need to collect candidate feedback?
• What are some best practices regarding the types of questions to include in a candidate survey?
• Do most companies develop their own candidate surveys, or are there pre-packaged resources available?
• How should small companies implement a feedback strategy?
• Where and how does one start a candidate feedback initiative?
• Which demographics are important to collect with the feedback?
• How does anonymity fit into a feedback model that stresses transparency?

There’s some really good stuff in here, don’t you think?  As a result I’ve moved the discussion to this forum, and in the coming weeks will address each of the questions in a blog post of its own.  In doing so I encourage your participation through comments and further questions, which only improves the learning for all.  Thanks in advance for playing.

 

Why is it important to measure the satisfaction of those who aren’t hired?

 

In short, because expectation, experience, and perception (those elements which engage and engender loyalty), are common to all candidates, not just those who are hired.  And measuring the perception of one group without considering the broader context of all creates a fertile ground for assumptions and ignorance – two very dangerous business management principles.

 

The conversation with candidates begins at the moment an individual becomes aware of your company - either as a potential employer, or as a provider of products and services.  Keep in mind that in many industries the role of candidate and customer are interchangeable, which only adds complexity to this discussion.

 

The conversation continues for candidates as they choose to engage with your company in a series of predictable hiring checkpoints: when they apply for a job, at the interview stage, as an offer is extended, and after onboarding is complete.

 

These earliest stages of contact provide fuel that feeds the scope and quality of your talent pipeline: the people who will ultimately influence, either directly or indirectly, the satisfaction and loyalty of your customers and the profitability of your business.  Measuring and managing satisfaction of all candidates in this stage ensures that your company competes more effectively for the best talent, and that you continue to positively influence the perceptions of those who are not selected for hire. The growing influence and viral nature of mobile and internet technologies only add compelling reasons to manage employer brand intentionally at this stage.

 

 

Take off the blinders.

 

Context is the answer to this question; without it, you learn only part of what you need to know to attract, acquire, and retain the very best employees for your company. You also take big (and, I might add unnecessary) risks in allocating resources to meet your hiring objectives, and further hinder your ability to manage employer brand beyond the simplest of good intentions.

 

What are your thoughts?

 

 

Additional resources:

Customer Loyalty: How to measure it, understand it, and use it to drive business success

 

Involved, Interested, then Applicant: Candidate-Friendly Recruiting Technologies

 

 

About the author:

Claudia Faust is the CEO and Head of Products at Improved Experience, a software-as-a-service provider that helps companies measure and leverage feedback to engage and retain employees and customers. Learn more here.

Diversity in Recruiting - A Panel and Party, to Boot!

Serving on the Board of the Dallas-Fort Worth Staffing Management Association as the VP of Professional Development and Diversity, I have a key initiative on my plate this year:  I get to chair the annual Diversity Event panel, cocktail reception mixer, and silent auction.  The event will take place Thursday September 16th from 3:30 to 6:30 CST at the Gaylord Texan Resort and Convention Center.  And I know this may sound crazy, especially considering this is a volunteer/non-paid role, but I'm kinda excited about the whole thing. 

This year, the SMA, which is a special interest SHRM chapter, is partnering again with Mid Cities HR and National Association of African Americans in Human Resources or NAAAHR to organize and execute the event.  And great partners they are!  Already, we have most of our panelists in place and several sponsors committed.  Our mission is to showcase what top DFW employers are doing to ensure a diverse candidate slate for their hiring managers and why this is important to the business bottom line.  So far our panel includes , Jim Schnyder of PepsiCo-Frito Lay, Jason Leonard of JC Penney, and Debbie Herd of Comerica.  A few other panelists are being vetted by the committee as we speak.

As for sponsors, Insala, a talent management firm, has joined us an early sponsor.  They understand the importance of diversity in the recruitment process and have in fact recently released a white paper that addresses the connection between diversity and real business results.  Also sponsoring is Elevated Resources, which provides unique workforce solution/vendor management solutions.

The silent auction portion of the event, which takes place during the Happy Hour / Mixer after the panel discussion, will benefit the SHRM Foundation.  So far, contributing donors are:  Checkster, JC Penney, and QuestPro/QTEMPS.   

If you're not a DFW resident, I am sure many other SHRM-affiliated chapters are conducting Diversity events in your own back yard. I encourage you to check them out!  Meanwhile, I look forward to seeing my local brothers and sisters at this year's event.  If you have questions or want to get involved, please contact me:  alise (at) improvedexperience (dot) com.

About Alise Cortez:  My day job is VP of Sales & Marketing at Improved Experience where our online feedback portal products provide subscribing HR/Recruiting customers data to make a business case for change or improvement in these areas:  recruitment process effectiveness, employer brand, candidate experience, recruiter performance, early employee engagement, quality of hire, and retention.  What can I say? -- it's fun!

Did You Catch Sumser's Five Scenarios Recap from ERE?

I don't know about you, but I think it's a pretty interesting time to be in the Recruiting profession. Lots of changes and a whole lot of disruption.  John Sumser of the HR Examiner has spent the last several weeks addressing such things as the future of recruiting, trends, the marketplace, future matters, and guild cities, among several topics in the series.  And then he brought a room full of talented and engaged Recruiting professionals together at ERE in San Diego to debate the series topics.  All these efforts have culminated into a white paper summarizing the series and the debate.  Lots of good stuff to chew on.  Visit HR Examiner to register for the free white paper and Scenario Planning Guide.

About Alise Cortez:  My day job is VP of Sales & Marketing at Improved Experience where our online feedback portal products provide subscribing HR/Recruiting customers data to make a business case for change or improvement in these areas:  recruitment process effectiveness, employer brand, candidate experience, recruiter performance, early employee engagement, quality of hire, and retention.  What can I say? -- it's fun!

Going to ERE? Don't Miss Uranga on 'Putting Your Recruitment on a 12-Step Program'

I had occasion to speak today with William Uranga, Sr Director of Talent Acquisition at Tivo.  For those of you who don't know William, he's known for his intellect and dry sense of humor.  I also happen to think he's a great example of a well-developed human being who is thoughtful about his life's navigation, and also the strategic leadership he is providing to both Tivo and the HR/Recruiting community at large.  Take a peek at his blog "making fans" and you'll see what I mean. 

As we caught up on things, I asked what he'd be speaking about at the ERE Recruiting Expo in San Diego this month.  True to form, he told me he'll be addressing what the tough times have taught us in the Recruiting space.  So, while all of us have taken the recession seriously, William wants to make sure we're not too quick to put these hard times behind us at the expense of truly understanding what's required of Recruiting in order to stay on the new playing field. He suggests "putting your Recruitment on a 12-step program."  

Of course, I agree with William.  I don't think 2009 was a "bad year."  I think it was the beginning of the end as we all know it.  That is, business has changed probably forever due to the restructuring of the marketplace and some of its key players (think of the automotive and banking disasters of late as just a couple examples).  And in so doing, the new, ever more demanding requirements placed on Recruiting to be a true and strategic partner to the business have taken firm root.  Not sure what that new role looks like?  Come to ERE and hear what William has to say.  And if you can't make it to San Diego this month, well then, if I were you, I'd just keep checking his blog.

This is Alise Cortez signing out for another week.  In the meantime, consider how you need to change your game in order to be of the utmost value to your organization.  It's not just good for your company, it's gret for the health of your overall career.  As I've said many times before, the HR/Recruiting industry needs your passion, your innovation, and your quest for improvement.  Don't let us down.

 

About Alise Cortez:  My day job is VP of Sales & Marketing at Improved Experience where our online feedback portal products provide subscribing HR/Recruiting customers data to make a business case for change or improvement in these areas:  recruitment process effectiveness, employer brand, candidate experience, recruiter performance, early employee engagement, quality of hire, and retention.  What can I say? -- it's fun!