Personnel Today’s judges panel were full of admiration for Heathrow and PeopleScout’s approach to a challenging recruitment drive for security officers as overseas travel returned to normal last summer, calling it ‘creative and calculated’. Here, we profile the winning entry and those of the runners-up.
WINNER
Heathrow in partnership with PeopleScout
Heathrow Airport was struggling to fill security officer vacancies, with more than 80 million travellers passing through the airport each year. The role has high demands, an intense pre-employment scrutiny process and unsociable hours, and the recruitment process itself can take a minimum of 16 weeks. The airport wanted to reduce the time between application and offer, but Covid lockdowns meant many strategies – such as assessment centres – had become more challenging.
To overcome this, the airport re-engineered its security officer recruitment process so candidates could get through screening, interview and assessment in eight days. It built a virtual, video-rich solution to engage with candidates, as well as a recruitment and assessment site constructed around the different stages of the application process. Videos unpacked the purpose of each stage, making sure candidates knew what was coming next. The recruitment process was entirely virtual, including immersive, video-based tests that gave a realistic idea of what the job would entail. Interviews were a mixture of telephone, audio and video meetings, and the hiring team were able to make offers to 95 candidates per week, an increase in volume of 36%.
Since the changes, Heathrow has managed to deal with around 90,000 applications, with more than 12,000 candidates invited to assessment centres. Forty-eight percent of new hires were women, and the overwhelming majority of candidates gave positive feedback about interviews. The recruitment process is now more scalable and has helped the airport grow back since the pandemic in a competitive labour market.
RUNNERS-UP
bp retail in partnership with eArcu
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BP retail is a convenience business that includes its traditional fuel services, coffee shops, M&S food outlets and delivery services. It operates 311 service stations across 11 regions, each with a store manager, assistant manager and customer service assistants. When it came to attracting candidates, however, there was low recognition of the BP brand, with applicants often mistaken that the forecourt shops were part of Marks & Spencer. Long applications and manual processes also meant the recruitment team did not receive the volume of applications they needed.
The company wanted to improve candidate experience through back-end efficiencies, large recruitment campaigns and a rebrand of the careers site. It worked with eArcu to look at its social media channels and personalise interactions with candidates. A new careers site and campaign was targeted at its three key frontline roles. New content articulated the BP retail experience, creating more external awareness of the brand and its contributions towards reaching net zero.
Social media improvements led to a 38% rise in applications; there was a 42% increase in website visits across all devices; and 26% of users returned to the site. The new application process could be completed in seconds rather than a previous time of more than six minutes, and managers spend 90 minutes less a day on recruitment admin. Overall, applications have risen by 41.6%.
FreeAgent
FreeAgent is a provider of accounting software and its workforce has grown to around 280 employees since 2007. Because it is not a household name operating in a competitive candidate market, it needed to optimise its candidate experience to ensure it could access the best applicants. It decided there were three main drivers at play: to ensure all candidates have a great experience so they either join, reapply or recommend to others; to remove barriers to diversity or equality in hiring; and to use data as an integral part of decision making.
It redesigned its careers webpage to better reflect its values and inclusive culture, launched an employee referral programme where employees could match prizes with charity donations, and created a STEM ambassadors group to ensure it was reaching out to digital talent. On top of this, it enhanced its benefits package, supported people from underrepresented groups to attend tech meetups, careers fairs and conferences, and removed unnecessary barriers to applying, including the requirement for certain qualifications. Other measures included displaying salaries in job adverts, anonymising CVs and applications, allowing candidates to schedule their own interviews and a “pre-boarding” procedure that accompanies job offers.
Since making the adjustments, the company has received zero negative ratings, alongside Glassdoor reviews reflecting a positive candidate experience. Hiring managers rate new joiners more highly after their probation period, and representation of women in engineering roles has climbed to between 24% and 25%, above the 19% national average.
HSBC in partnership with Meet & Engage
HSBC’s Global Graduate programme consists of multiple streams running across different business areas. Recruits join from intern or industrial placement conversions or external hires. The bank wants candidates to feel prepared, supported and connected from the moment they apply, but found that work readiness and confidence had suffered due to the pandemic and a lack of access to work experience. It also wanted to reduce the level of drop-outs at key stages in the process, and ensure that those who ended up not receiving an offer also had a positive experience.
It worked with Meet & Engage’s social-style platform Timeline, which serves up automated branded content to help nurture candidates through each stage of the process. They can engage with chatbots and join live virtual events both when they apply and between an offer and when they start. Content delivery is automated and user experiences are personalised based on predefined information or what the candidate has already engaged with. Pre-boarding content is designed to build confidence for day one of the job. Assessor training is run alongside to ensure that those selecting candidates run the exercise smoothly and give unbiased assessment.
The impact has been significant, with a 36% reduction in reneges post-offer, 94% of candidates reporting they enjoy interacting with the platform, and live events given a 70 net promoter score. All candidates who engaged with the content once they had withdrawn from the process said they had found it useful for future job searches. As the platform is linked to HSBC’s applicant tracking system, it can see the efficacy of all aspects of the recruitment journey and gain vital data insights.
Southern Health & Social Care Trust in partnership with HealthSectorTalent
According to the King’s Fund, there were 165,000 social care vacancies in the UK in 2022, up 50% compared to 2021. Domiciliary care is a critical staff group in the NHS and plays an important role in patient flow from hospitals and in preventing further admissions by providing high quality care. In May 2023, Southern Health and Social Care Trust in Northern Ireland had approximately 600 care packages outstanding, each representing a patient and hospital bed.
It needed to recruit at scale and pace, identifying that the traditional routes through NI’s health and care system did not always suit the applicant group because they took too long. It partnered with HealthSector Talent on a project where it would host three large-scale recruitment open days over two months. The idea was to be a one-stop shop so candidates could walk into the events and complete all stages of the process from application to pre-employment checks and mandatory training. All stakeholders were engaged in making the event a success, from facilities management to occupational health practitioners who would manage health assessments.
The result was improved efficiency, enhanced creativity, increased motivation and better outcomes. A record number (302) of applications were received and 162 candidates attended one of the three events, a 700% increase on previous months using traditional recruitment approaches. Of those that attended, 157 received conditional offers, a 97% success rate, and 116 candidates were converted into hires. Candidate engagement also improved, with time to hire reduced by 13 days. Reliance on agency staff is down and cost per hire significantly decreased.
Tata Consultancy Services
As technology has advanced rapidly, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) has seen demand for staff increase substantially across multiple disciplines in a tight market for candidates. The company faced a restricted pool of qualified candidates who were receiving multiple offers, and was operating at an 80% joining ratio of those who were offered roles. It needed to enhance the process so it became the employer of choice for candidates.
Firstly it streamlined the structure of job descriptions to ensure they were gender neutral and reflected its inclusive hiring practices, following research from Glassdoor showing that 67% of job-seekers look at workforce diversity when evaluating an offer. It then introduced more cross-functional and diverse interview panels, and committed to providing quick feedback to candidates (within 24 hours ideally) so there is more efficient communication and enhanced transparency. It also captures candidate feedback at every milestone in the hiring process so it can improve its approach where necessary on areas such as the interviewer’s performance, how accessible the process was, the content of the role and the quality of the interview. After offer, candidates are contacted at regular intervals, and the onboarding process is virtual and interactive.
These measures have led to a 12 percentage point increase in the joining ratio, a candidate experience satisfaction rating of 85%, and 1,266 roles filled during the 2023 financial year. Almost three-quarters of recruitment has been completed through direct channels, saving £1.1 million in costs. There has also been a significant growth in terms of organisation mindshare, with followers on LinkedIn increasing from 8.7 million to more than 12.2 million, and increases in interactions with job posts.
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