In order to provide the best software, it is important to look for suggestions from those who are using it. While listening to all customer feedback may seem difficult in some industries, when it comes to HR technology, our customers are in fact our greatest assets!

Customers have first-hand knowledge and experience with the product and the potential to provide suggestions that the vendor would not have come up with internally. At iCIMS we make the customer experience a priority. Even our latest release was the result of our client’s input and submissions. However, feedback from polls and questions will only provide us with so much. In order to get the full customer perspective, we usually hold events to talk about our product in depth with some of our most active clients.

In 1 week, iCIMS will be hosting our 8th annual Customer Advisory Council – a user conference created to garner feedback and improve the customer experience. Each year, the CAC features software presentations from our technology department, roundtable discussions with our leadership team, and most importantly, forums for feedback from our customers. This year’s event will take place at the M Resort in Las Vegas and will focus on the Future of Recruitment. Keeping with agendas of the past, the conference will be split into three sections; Progress (improvements we’ve made since last year’s CAC), Innovation (customer input combined with technology’s actions), and Strategy (a look ahead at trends in talent management). We are expecting a wide range of attendees from companies including, Tiffany & Co., Whole Foods, L.L. Bean, FedEx and more.

The CAC is one of our most important events. We are able to obtain valuable advice from our customers that we can apply directly towards product improvements. We gain priceless insights into our offerings by hosting events of this sort and our clients can also benefit from sharing success stories, discussions, and networking with other attendees. We want to provide an optimal customer experience and this is one of the ways we can try to.

Bottom line: In order to attain higher satisfaction with your ATS, choose the company that is going to listen to your suggestions. Find the vendor who will provide opportunities to discuss exactly what you are looking for in your HR software!

If you’re somewhat familiar with our “everything HR” iblog, you know that we LOVE stories/articles/studies about customer service and the customer experience.  While it’s not always a direct HR focus on the candidate experience or employee satisfaction – we know that everyone, regardless of job function, has a “customer” to satisfy.  So whether it’s candidates, employees, or clients, I thought I’d take the time to explore some customer satisfaction best practices.  And with our Annual Customer Advisory Council just around the corner, I couldn’t help but brag on how iCIMS treats its customers… 

Focus on Communication

HR Focus:
Having a CRM tool in place is key: Whether its automated responses to candidates or sending out employee news, make communication frequent and clear. Consider having an open door policy in your office or instant messaging services installed on computers.

iCIMS Focus:
Here at iCIMS, our help desk is available 24/5. Call us, email us, or visit our brand-spanking-new Customer Care Site. This dedication to customer support and satisfaction has helped iCIMS maintain a near-perfect 97% client retention rate since 2003.

Train Train Train!

HR Focus:
User adoption starts with training. Whether it’s training a new employee or training a new client – the quicker they become familiar with what’s at hand, the quicker they become loyal to your company or product. Having a streamlined onboarding strategy helps ensure a new employee is amped up and ready to go the first few days on the job.

iCIMS Focus
Our staff of experienced training and education specialists ensures that every iCIMS' training session is tailored to the unique process flows and compliance needs of the client. We even offer a full training library of videos, guides and upcoming webinars to help maximize our clients’ knowledge of the system. iCIMS' commitment to client training and education has helped iCIMS achieve the highest user adoption ratings in the industry!

Offer Forums/Idea Exchanges

HR Focus:
Gathering candidate and employee feedback can be a great way to find out which HR functions are working and which just aren’t getting the message across. Consider holding forums with your employees to find out what they want.  Employee satisfaction = corporate success.

iCIMS Focus:
At iCIMS, we know our customers are our best engineers. That's why we take the time to listen to them, and provide forums for customers to exchange ideas. One of these forums is the iCIMS Customer Advisory Council (CAC). This user conference is comprised of a subset of iCIMS' customers that meet regularly to discuss HR issues, iCIMS' solutions, and ideas for product improvements.

 Today's guest blog post comes to you from Kimberly Paul, who is the Manager of Corporate Staffing at Continental Airlines. Continental has been using the iCIMS Talent Platform for over 5 years and recently attended iCIMS' 6th annual Customer Advisory Council.

Thank you for allowing me to share my experiences regarding the Customer Advisory Council (CAC). As the only iCIMS customer that has attended each and every CAC conference,  I can honestly say “You’ve come a long way, baby!”

When the CAC was first launched in the fall of 2004, the main topic focused on how to simply utilize our ATS (applicant tracking system).  Jump ahead 6 years later and the theme, “Beyond the ATS,” sincerely remarks on how the system is a well-integrated platform. The CAC allows iCIMS to gather some of the brightest professionals in the industry to network and share fresh ideas, as well as best practices. 

The first few CAC meetings were rather reserved and soft-spoken (hard to believe a room full of HR folks were barely talking!).  Now, we anxiously await the next CAC, eager to learn and share with those that specialize in the pushing the envelope of iCIMS technology.  From the informative presentations and guest speakers to the insightful conversations, Continental Airlines has definitely been able to implement many new and innovative strategies for our recruiting model and create great relationships with companies that share our interests. 

Notably, one of the best relationships we have formed as a result of attending the CAC is with the iCIMS partner company, Direct Employers (JobCentral and VetCentral).  Not only do they help keep us compliant with OFCCP posting regulations, but they offer outstanding conferences and additional products, such as free SEO implementation that greatly aids in keeping up with trending recruiting initiatives. 

Overall, iCIMS technology, customer service, and partnerships are truly top-notch and we are a proud member and supporter!

Why is there a picture of Play-Doh on this post?? Follow iCIMS client John Leech on Twitter and ask him!

“Great meeting with iCIMS Customer Advisory Council. Love seeing vendors paying attention to their customers. It shows!!” – Jason Averbook, Twitter: September 22, 2009

Well, we literally just wrapped up iCIMS’ annual Customer Advisory Council (CAC) and the notes I didn’t get to write down are still swirling around my head at about a mile a minute. I wanted to share some of my observations from this year’s CAC (held at iCIMS’ corporate headquarters in NJ, with entertainment in NYC) while the feedback is fresh in my mind.

First – a quick rundown of iCIMS’ CAC. Each year, about 25 of our customers across different verticals get together for roundtable discussions, iCIMS presentations (on our customer service strategy, our technology and product roadmap, and overall corporate vision) and client success stories presented by the customers themselves. We often bring in industry experts as well; this year Jason Averbook from Knowledge Infusion presented his views on HR Technology (more on that later).

We usually have a theme for the annual event and this year’s was Beyond the ATS, which covered using iCIMS’ technology as more than an applicant tracking system as well as on taking the platform’s capabilities beyond domestic recruitment and deploying the system internationally.  (Last year’s theme: recruiting a new generation and adopting Web 2.0 in talent acquisition.)

One of my favorite parts about this year’s CAC was the global representation. Our attendees and client companies have the map covered, with visitors flying in from the Netherlands, China,  Mexico, & Canada and client companies supporting recruitment anywhere from India to Luxumborg; Romania to Costa Rica. (Many of our international visitors had never been to New York City and literally ran to do some shopping in Times Square after dinner!)
The international representation was truly perfect for a lot of our discussions this week, which ranged from learning more about data privacy laws outside of the US, to translating career portals and employment forms into different languages for a positive candidate experience, to ensuring clients have access to talk to other customers who have “been there, done that” when it comes to international iCIMS deployments. Almost all clients agreed on a few best practices for these types of global roll-outs:

1. Whenever possible, go for a phased approach. Learn from your roadblocks and apply those findings towards your next phase. Each country obviously has differences that need to be considered, but even more specifically – your own organization’s global divisions have differences that need to be embraced during these rollouts. Going one-by-one helps ensure each of those areas get the dedicated resources necessary to get the job done well.
2. Give yourself plenty of time to deploy internationally. Then add extra time onto that for padding. Almost all of our customers who were given internal direction to get a full global implementation finished very aggressively said they wished they’d had more time to breathe, digest what they were doing & analyze their progress so they could fix issues along the way.
3. Training, training, training. iCIMS has always been a huge supporter of end-user training (we give 5 free training sessions every week!), but customers hammered at this point and how important it was to visit international locations to train end users and the local system admin. Many clients noticed that locations that received on-site training and education about iCIMS’ platform and the company’s overall recruiting process fared much better than those who opted for basic web training.

There were tons of other lessons learned at this year’s CAC, but I’ll save those for another post. (Specifically: holistic HR strategies…outside the marketing speak.) Additional CAC posts will be coming soon from some iCIMS clients so stay tuned.

Special thanks to all iCIMS CAC attendees, to our hostess with the mostess Katie Walsh, as well as to all of our clients who readily share feedback with us about our product, customer support, and more. We wouldn’t be where we are as an organization without you and hope you’ll continue to share.