We all know that the larger a company gets the more difficult it is to manage all recruitment initiatives. In 2011, most recruiters were tasked with finding the right staff and helping to keep that staff productive and engaged. And, with the economy as it was/is, there were a few challenges that recruiters had to overcome in order to reach those goals. According to a 2011 article on ERE, some of the top challenges for corporate recruiting departments were:

1. Requisition Load
2. Incentive Structure
3. Recruiter Skill Set
4. Poor Recruiting Process - Disorganized Applicant Flow Process
5. Distractions

How are recruiters expected to find top talent and keep them productive when faced with the challenges above? Of course, they had to overcome them. According to a study by Deloitte:

70 percent of mid-size organizations that responded saw improved productivity during the time period study (since the onset of the recession). 62.2% attributed the increase in productivity to improvements in business processes and 50.3% attributed it to improvements in technology.

If we can take this data as any indication of what recruiters did to overcome these challenges and/or could have done, I think we would have seen a lot more productive recruiting (and employees for that matter) in 2011. But let’s not waste this valuable information. How can you improve your business processes for 2012 and what sort of technology could you leverage:

Business Processes: Eliminate administrative work. The more paperwork your recruiters have to sort through and fill out (especially at a mid-size+ company), the more likely things will get lost. Misplacing or misfiling paperwork could prolong the time it takes to respond to a candidate’s application. Poor communication during the initial pre-hire stages can dishearten a future employee, causing productivity to decrease. Excellent communication can prepare the future employee better - helping them reach expectations faster and surpass goals more quickly? Find a way to streamline the process from start to finish. How you ask? Well, have you written out your current process and documented it for all recruiters to follow or do you rely on word-of-mouth training. Creating a simple word document that’s available to all can help cut down on the communication gaps that can often happen in the recruitment process.

Communicate with candidates

Technology: Start implementing technology to drive those business processes. When you become a mid-size company, you can't get away with doing everything manual anymore. First analyze what your current processes are. Then see which areas could be automated. Perhaps resume collection? Maybe the onboarding process? Figure out which processes are seeing the biggest administrative challenges and improve them with technology.

What are you waiting for? It’s never too soon to start optimizing your recruitment program. What are some of the ways that you are improving your recruitment program? And, have you seen a positive impact on your productivity?

The New Year is right around the corner and about half of the working population is either physically or mentally out of the office. You know what that means…it’s a great time to sit down and think about your HR New Year’s resolution without any distractions (well minimal distractions). As an HR professional, you have probably compiled a long list of challenges you face throughout the year.  This week before the end of the year is always a good time to evaluate those challenges and create a “Not-to-Do” wish list or resolution for next year.

Every year at iCIMS, the company awards one employee with a “Not-to-Do” award. What does this mean? Employees are charged with eliminating a current process that is inefficient. The employee that comes up with the best process elimination/improvement is awarded at the end of the year. Why not have this same competition in your HR department. What are the challenges you are facing? Try listing out the processes you are currently doing and decide which of those you shouldn’t be doing.

How about non-compliance issues? Be honest, how many applications, resumes, and paperwork do you get in a day?? A ton. Paper storage is costly and inefficient. Loose paper can get lost or filed incorrectly.

What about trying to eliminate paper collection in 2012. How? Go electronic. Find a way to have staff and applicants complete all of their paperwork online. Use an online career site that funnels information into an online database that is easily searchable.

How about high turnover? Do you have trouble retaining personnel? Perhaps, it’s time to look at what inefficiencies are in your training program and eliminate those.

Eliminate costly training programs that employees don’t participate in and try new programs that provide staff with the right tools to power their career. Offer more training programs online so all employees can attend on their own time. The possibilities are endless, but the bottom line is, eliminate what isn’t working and try out more beneficial programs.

So what does your “Not-to-Do” wish list and New Year’s resolution look like?

Just two weeks ago, I attended a conference in Philadelphia regarding social media’s influence on the business world as we know it. It’s amazing to see how different departments are leveraging social media in their day-to-day tasks. In fact it’s great. However, for those of you who haven’t jumped on board the social media train, you are missing out. Let’s take HR for example. Recruiters know that they should get involved, so what’s stopping them? Simple. Those professionals have forgotten why they should get involved and thus, have delayed setting up their company profiles. Perhaps if we can remember the end goals of using social media in HR, recruiters won’t delay any longer.

Reason # 1 – It’s where your candidates are. In this day and age, top talent is moving around and in order to stay in touch with this talent you need to know where they are and where they are going. Social media sites also allow recruiters to engage and spread their talent net. Bottom line: recruiters have access to a much larger talent pool than they had before.

Reason # 2 – Everyone else is doing it. Your competitors are perusing their talent pool freely on LinkedIn and Facebook looking for their next game changer. What if you could find them first? Beats the heck out of passive recruiting via cold calling.

Reason # 3 – To improve your company image/brand. Top talent is pickier than ever. They want to know more about the company they are applying for. Make it easy for your candidates by providing this information on the social media sites they are already on. Give them a sneak peek into your company and what a great place it is. You can reel top talent in without even lifting a finger (well except for when you had to set up your profile).

Reason # 4 – Cutting down time-to-fill and cost-per-hire. Social media is free. Yes, I know what you are thinking. Social media is not free - it takes time and personnel resources. Which is very true. But, I promise that making the case for allocating time to social recruiting will be much easier (especially with finance) than using a sourcing firm that costs $x/month. Not that I have anything against sourcing firms. Social media is immediate and updated instantly, which allows you to find the appropriate candidates faster and cheaper. Further, if you are already using an applicant tracking system, even better. Some ATS allow you to post jobs out instantly to all of your social media sites – connecting the job seeker and open requisition faster.

Reason # 5 – And, so on. There are a ton of reasons why you should be on social media. Research a bit more if you don’t believe me.

So you know the reasons why you should do it…now on to the how. The conference provided some great tips on driving your social recruitment campaigns. Here are three starter tips to implement (I, of course, take zero credit for these tips).

1. Leverage only what you can handle. As a newbie to social media, optimize one platform at a time. Start with LinkedIn. Make sure your company’s profile is up to date. Have employees share their experiences in the group. Write up a quick snapshot of your benefits. Once you feel comfortable with your LinkedIn efforts, move on to another platform making sure to keep up with your LinkedIn as well.
2. Get your employees involved. Employee referral is one of the best ways to win new top talent. Why not have your employees participate and share news about your company via social media? Not only will their network see the news but your credibility as a good company to work for will increase. If you are shaking your head at this idea because you are concerned with what your employees will say, then maybe you have a bigger problem surrounding the culture and positive work environment of your company.
3. Create a social media policy. While getting your employees involved does open a lot of doors (if you are a good company you shouldn’t be afraid of that), you should take the necessary precautions. Lindsay Lebresco from Lilly Pulitzer made a great point in saying, make a simple social media policy and make it part of your new hire packet. By having employees see your social media policy from day one, you are encouraging them to think that employee involvement in social media is the norm.

Social recruiting is here to stay, so stop pushing it off and get started today. Hey, that rhymed. Good luck!!

Don't let this be you.

We all know that Healthcare recruiting is difficult to manage. Never mind the fact that you have to find the most qualified person for a position (as do most other industry professionals) you also have a ton of different hire types to manage and a slew of regulatory issues to comply with. It’s plain old difficult...so you should pat yourselves on the back for bringing in the talent you have thus far. But what if managing your recruitment program could be easier. Well, it can be with recruitment technology. With these solutions you can direct all of your candidates to an online application process, allowing you to store all data electronically (improving your compliance and facilitating your recruitment management).

If you clicked on this blog, you have probably already considered leveraging technology to facilitate the process. But since there are so many options out there, the idea of choosing just one is quite daunting. Well, Healthcare HR professionals - I’ve just the webinar for you! iCIMS is hosting a free webinar regarding what questions to ask when choosing a recruitment technology. Here are the details:

Healthcare Webinar: How to Choose a Recruitment Technology
When: Friday, November 18th at 1:00pm EST
Cost: FREE
Register: Click here to register for free.

Learn from iCIMS' Chief Strategic Officer Susan Vitale and Baptist Memorial Healthcare’s Director of Talent Acquisitions Lisa Mack to gain the knowledge you need to choose the right HR solution. Or, I’d be happy to register you - so just shoot me a quick email at karen.bucks@icims.com and I will gladly send you the webinar information. This is a webinar not to miss!

Many HR professionals partake in one of the most important branding initiatives a company must implement. That’s right, I said HR, not the marketing department…well in some cases, marketing may help…but anyway, this is HR’s branding baby. And what is it you ask? The employer brand.

According to Minchington (2005), an employer brand is:

“the image of your organisation as a ‘great place to work’ in the mind of current employees and key stakeholders in the external market (active and passive candidates, clients, customers and other key stakeholders). The art and science of employer branding is therefore concerned with the attraction, engagement and retention of initiatives targeted at enhancing your company's employer brand.”

Developing an employer brand is essential to any organization that desires to obtain quality talent to optimize the productivity and successfulness of a workforce and ultimately, a company.

So, what type of employer brand has been the most successful? Well, that may be an impossible question to answer, but recent trends seem to show that “putting a face to the company” can go a long way. In a recent article on ERE, BP did just that. Notoriously known for the 2010 oil spill that left a great deal of damage in the Gulf Coast region, BP has been able to bounce back with a rebranding campaign dedicated to showing the workers of BP. “Its recruitment advertising has changed, consistent with that brand, but using employees to describe it in human terms.” During this campaign, polls showed that, “more than 50% of people still had an interest in working for BP, and rated the quality of its workforce high.” Putting a face on BP may just be the trick they need to lessen the negativity once associated with them and ultimately, increase the number of quality candidates applying for positions.

McDonalds also leveraged their employer brand to drive recruitment. Back in April 2011, McDonalds made an announcement to hire 50,000 people nationwide during a time when unemployment was high. McDonalds attempted to show they were an employer of the people - striving to help out during desperate times. The ultimate goal being: an increase in candidate submission!

Employer brand is essential. But just having an employer brand isn’t good enough. HR professionals must actively promote this brand to show candidates just what it means to work for the company. Ask yourself the following two questions:

1. Is your career site up to date? Your career site should tell the candidate exactly what they can expect if they apply for a job within your company. Make sure it’s up to date and accurate. Make it fun (yet professional) too! This will increase candidate engagement. Also try leveraging technology to optimize your career site - this will also help candidate conversions.
   
2. What is your employee referral rate? If it’s low, maybe you should check your employee satisfaction rate. If that’s low, make sure employees know of all the benefits that your company offers. The truth of the matter is that most employees can’t name all of the benefits that their company offers. While this is not a set fix for low satisfaction - the more perks employees know they have, the happier they will be. And, the happier they are, the more likely they will be to refer top talent to your organization.
   

Conclusion? Know your employer brand and sell it! Show candidates what they want to see and I promise you will see an increase in top talent hires.

As an employee at iCIMS, I’ve seen a great deal of change and improvement over the past couple of years, but today’s announcement overshadows all of the top highlights I’ve seen in the past. Today, iCIMS announces that it has signed over 1,000 customers in a little over 10 years. This reaffirms the Company as a successful leader in the HR space. Many companies (especially technology companies) struggle to make their mark on the world largely due to their inability to make the value of their product known. So what about iCIMS is different? How has iCIMS been able to remain successful and sign 1,000 customers with a 97% retention rate?

Indicators seem to point to the total value of the Company’s offerings:

• Robust, yet easy-to-use technology.
• Flexible and configurable software to match HR processes and needs.
• Responsive and helpful customer support.   

People need a software solution that will integrate with their business processes, which they can find in iCIMS’ solution and service. Correction –they ARE finding it. Recruiters and HR professionals worldwide have realized the value of the iCIMS’ Talent Platform in helping to improve their HR programs - and this keep's those users renewing year after year.

Okay enough tooting our own horn as you can read the facts in today's press release. The point is iCIMS has made its mark on the HR space and will continue to do so year after year.

By the way, I expect to be posting a very similar blog in just a few years’ time, as HR professionals continue to acknowledge the value of the Talent Platform.

A couple of weeks ago, I got this notice in the mail that brightened my day, well week, well actually a good month. It was a jury summons! Wait what? Yes, you’ve heard me correctly…jury summons. I was so thoroughly excited to receive my jury summons notice that I told nearly everyone I knew. I would receive phone calls from vendors looking to schedule upcoming campaigns, and before we would get off the phone I would have to mention, “Oh, and just so you know, I’ve been selected for jury duty. So I would like to make sure the plan is up and running before I leave.” I would hang up the phone and find myself looking for the next new person I could tell. This kept up for the entire month before jury duty. Without even realizing it, I was making it a part of every conversation I had. Yes, I know there are probably very few people who are genuinely excited at the prospect of sitting in a courthouse for an unknown amount of time, waiting to find out if they would be selected for a trial. Okay fine. I may be the only person on earth who is excited at the prospect of reporting for jury duty.

(They make it sound like a bad thing...)

The day before I was scheduled to report, I said farewell to my coworkers reminding them once again, that I was off to jury duty. When I got home that night, I called the NJ courts telephone number and to my terrible disappointment, my juror number was not called. I had to wait another day to see if I had been selected to report. I was sure I would be. So the next day, after a long day at work, I wished my coworkers farewell again, and told them I would see them as soon as I completed my duty to the state! Again when I got home, I was not needed for the following day, but was required to call back. Then, the third day I was officially dismissed. I looked up to the sky and shook my fists, “why has the state forsaken me!” Okay, not really, but I was quite saddened that I would not be able to experience jury duty. You must be thinking, “Okay, she’s crazy, why would she want to go to jury duty and what is the point of this post?!?!” Well the truth is, while I was looking forward to hearing the case, I was more interested in listening in on the selection process.

Selecting the perfect juror is a difficult decision. You have to find someone that will be unbiased and fair, among many other things. But, how do you find that perfect juror? Well, the only way is to have day-long interviews of every candidate that has been called. This forces lawyers, judges, and court officials to hang around all day to interview every prospective juror available (well except me of course….okay fine, I’ll let it go) causing the jury selection process to be time-consuming and draining to all parties involved. What if the recruitment process was the same? Interviewing each resume you receive, and spending countless hours trying to decipher interview answers. Unfortunately, recruiters often face a challenge very similar: sorting through hundreds or in some cases, thousands of resumes and applicants in search of the perfect person for the job. How horribly inefficient is this!?! But recruiters have an advantage that courthouses do not. The people who are qualifying for the position actually want to get chosen, whereas most potential jurors try to think of excuses to get out of the selection process. Having applicants that will openly speak about their qualifications can help you filter faster and select the best candidate possible. But you may still get a lot of candidates. There are a few things that recruiters can do that the courthouses cannot do (at least at this point in time).

Review the job description.
As companies grow, positions change and job responsibilities move around. I know you know this but make sure you have the most accurate and up-to-date account of the position.  Schedule time semi-annually to review and update job descriptions - or, more often if necessary.

Filter by skills.
Once you have posted the job and after you’ve received a hundred resumes for one position, filter by exact skills. While this is not a sure-fire way to find the perfect candidate, it is a good place to start. Nine times out of ten there will only be a percentage of applicants who meet the criteria. This cuts down on the number of non-qualified candidates going through the interviewing process. This is a luxury that lawyers and judges do not have.

Have tiered interviews.
After the applicants get a chance to meet with the hiring manager, have them meet with high-performing employees around the company to measure how the person would fit culturally within the organization. This will help ensure that the candidate not only has the right technical skills, but also the right values that will align directly with the company’s.

Leverage technology.
Let's face it; recruitment technology is a part of the recruitment process now. Of course you can stick with a manual process, but if you do, you are not using your time efficiently. You are wasting too much time on administrative duties and interviewing too many candidates. Certain technologies, like applicant tracking systems, can track and manage candidate information online, allowing you to easily search for the candidate that has the skill sets you need. You can filter the unqualified applicants in a matter of seconds. 

You may be nervous about implementing technology, but there are plenty of resources that can help simplify this for you. If you are a mid-size company looking for recruitment software, here is a webinar to check out, “Choosing a Recruitment Technology for Mid-Sized Organizations.” And, if you aren’t a mid-size company, still feel free to listen in as a lot of the principles are universal to all sizes.

Recruiters have many more options when it comes to facilitating a hiring program. If there is anything we can learn from the jury selection process, it would be: don’t do it the courthouse way – it’s an inefficient use of your time. Okay, I’ve talked enough. What are you doing to find the perfect candidate?

P.S. Wish me luck on the next jury summons!

Is there still hope for hourly and salaried employment in the retail industry?? Yes….maybe…alright well who knows for sure! But at least one month ago things looked promising. In an article from USA Today, retailers experienced “the best June sales figures in the U.S. since 1999.” The increase in consumer spending had definitely confounded investors as they assumed there would be a decrease due to raising gas prices. Today, retailers aren’t so sure those numbers will hold.

Either way, retail is oh so used to the fluctuating nature of consumer spending. And, as HR professionals in the industry, you are also used to the ever-changing need for more or less staff (at least on the hourly end). The unfortunate thing about this is that regardless of if the economy is doing well or not, HR professionals have to manage and track candidate and employee data at all times in order to remain in compliance with labor regulations. What does that mean? Well…a lot of paper and a lot of organizing.

Here are three easy tips to ensure better organization (when hiring or not) in a retail HR department.

1. First and foremost, automate all of those HR documents that end up piling up on your desk or getting stuffed away in a filing cabinet. Using some sort of Software-as-a-Service to securely store reportable and searchable HR data will help you reduce costs associated with printing, storage, and administrative tasks, while improving organization.
2. Increase the number of quality applicants to open requisition. Finding the right candidate faster and filtering through the unqualified can help you close an open requisition sooner rather than later (never mind save you a lot of money). Okay so that’s the goal...how do you do it? I'd recommend first reviewing your job description. What has already been written may not be as clear as it needs to be to filter out the unqualified candidates. By better articulating the job description, you are giving potential candidates exact insight into the position and a better idea of if they would be a good fit or not. Set up another meeting with the appropriate hiring manager and work one-on-one to compile a list of exact skills needed for the job and a bulleted list of daily responsibilities.
3. In order to avoid disorganization and headaches, try separating your salaried and hourly job postings. You can even go as far as creating two applicant portals. This will enable you to create a separation of duties and tasks associated with each hiring type, allowing you to take one step towards simplifying and improving your processes. In addition to better organization, and I’ve said it before,  prospective hourly candidates and salaried applicants may require different targeted messaging. So in order to find the best fit and reduce unqualified candidates, write your recruitment marketing messages appropriately.

Whether the market is up or down or HR professionals are hiring or not, creating a perfectly organized recruitment program can help reduce costs and save recruiters time. What are your thoughts?

Can you believe it is almost July? As many of you get ready to kick-off your Fourth of July weekend celebration, I’m sure HR will be far from your mind. But as with most jobs, the workload will only increase with every day off. How do you handle work that piles up?

In the HR industry, we most often hear about the importance of creating a stress-free work environment to facilitate employee satisfaction. And while of course that is very important, industry leaders may be forgetting about the stress of a few very important people: the HR professionals. Of course, some could say that an HR professional is an employee and is therefore benefiting from the stress-management initiatives that HR is setting in motion. But unfortunately, HR professionals are often overwhelmed with stress when implementing and managing those employee satisfaction programs.

HR stress is too often underestimated or just plain-old forgotten about. So, while you are helping employees reduce their stress, who is helping you?

I came across an interesting article by Mark Gorkin that touches upon the stress HR professionals often have and five strategies on how to survive those situations. Developing a strategy to handle these strenuous situations is essential to reducing burnout (as Gorkin mentions) as well as increasing HR satisfaction and growth development. When stress is reduced, workers are happier – no question. HR employees who are happier tend to strive for greater goals which not only helps them in their own career growth but also their performance with their employer. What many corporate executives fail to see is that a stressed and burnt-out HR team can directly affect the performance of the company as a whole. A stressed to-the-max HR group can impact quality of hire, hinder training programs, and ultimately hurt employee satisfaction. I'd start “petitioning” your executive team to provide your HR team with the necessary funds and programs to support a stress-free department.

How are companies combating these high-stress HR environments? Some companies are leveraging HR solutions to handle the administrative tasks that can bog down productivity time. Others  are sending their HR professionals to training programs to learn how to optimize their current programs. And other companies are attending conferences and expos, like SHRM 2011 (you there?) to learn about the latest trends and what other people in the industry are doing.

What do you do to reduce your HR stress? How does your company help? If nothing else, one way you can reduce your stress is to relax and treat yourself to a yummy Fourth of July meal this weekend!

As June 26th approaches, HR professionals, industry thought leaders, technology vendors, and many others are getting excited. Excited for what you ask? The one and only SHRM 2011 Annual Conference and Exposition that is taking place in Las Vegas, Nevada. With a variety of sessions to attend and a number of exhibits to see, I think this year will provide all attendees with a great number of takeaways.

As you prepare to leave at the end of this week, I’m sure you will have some packing to do. After you finish stuffing the essentials into a bag, don’t forget that you still have to pack your HR suitcase. These conferences and exhibitions are only as good as what you can take away from it. So, in order to get the most for your money, I’d highly recommend bringing a few items in preparation.

1. A detailed list of your current HR processes.
2. Your corporate strategic plan.
3. A summary of the budgeted funds allocated to HR.
4. Your own HR expertise.

Okay let’s go into a bit more detail:

1. Do you know exactly what your HR process is from start to finish? I’m sure many of you do. But for those who are not entirely positive, it wouldn’t hurt to take a sheet of paper and detail exactly what happens from posting an open requisition all of the way through to succession planning and off boarding. Why every process? Well even if you focus on the recruitment side, inefficient training processes or lack of employee programs may cause higher turnover, which in turn may look like poor quality-of-hire (even if it isn’t). If you are able to bring detailed notes on all of your processes, you may be able to apply what you learn. This way you can improve the efficiency of your entire HR program as a whole, which will subsequently help your individual role.
2. For the longest time, HR departments struggled to show how they contributed to their company's success. But now, we all know, that is much easier. The employees that HR hires can either facilitate or hinder a company’s performance. Without the right, engaged people and programs in place, a company could struggle to improve. At SHRM, mingle with others so you can learn how they are relating their processes to their strategic plan. And, then take that feedback and apply it to your own. If you can do this, you will be able to see where you need to realign in order to meet those company goals.
3. Companies like to invest in their departments in order to augment growth. And sometimes, the best way to improve and even cut costs is to add funds towards programs or solutions that facilitate processes. How much can you spend on new programs? Know this number, so that when you sit in on conferences or walk around the exhibitions you can learn how to maximize your funds, while optimizing your HR programs.
4. Bring all of your HR expertise to the table. Something you might be doing just may help another SHRM attendee improve their HR program.

 
I think SHRM will be a great time! If you aren’t able to make it be sure to check out Kacie Frey’s blog post on how to search online for this type of information.

Well anyway, in case you’re interested in learning a little bit more about HR technology solutions, be sure to check out iCIMS at booth #2529. I even hear they are giving away free tote bags and offering a free raffle to win a $250 gift card. ;-)