Retail giant Tesco is building up staff profiles to target recruitment
campaigns more effectively.
David Fairhurst, Tesco global resourcing director, told Personnel Today the
company is using staff interviews to build up a database that will help
identify how best to recruit different types of employees.
Fairhurst said the supermarket chain, which is planning to take on 50,000
extra staff this year, has adopted this approach following the success of
customer profiling based on buying patterns revealed by reward cards and
customer research.
"We have segmented our employee base so we can look at the reasons why
our people come to work. It is about getting research to understand our
employee potential and help us recruit more actively.
"We use a mixture of quantative and qualitative research in the way we
do with customers. It makes recruiting much better, simpler and cheaper,"
said Fairhurst.
In a separate talent-spotting initiative, Tesco has produced a questionnaire
for its employees to identify aspirations of individuals and fill more
vacancies through internal recruitment.
"Organisations often over-emphasise the need to recruit externally. We
now know who we have got in the firm and can be more proactive in talent
planning," said Fairhurst.
The company has also launched a pilot project to increase staff diversity at
50 stores by targeting younger people, mature staff and job returners in its
recruitment campaign.
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"In some of the trial stores, for example, we were able to target
mothers wanting to return to work by, among other things, advertising in the
baby changing area," Fairhurst explained.
By Ross Wigham
