Do we listen to candidates like we listen to our customers?
Disney Parks recently announced that they made some major ticketing and reservation changes at their U.S. theme parks. I immediately thought….well, here goes another price increase! But their reason for their change was simple; they listened to their customers complaints and adjusted to benefit their guests and to help reconnect back to their guests. The SHOCK! Don’t get me wrong, there are many more challenges with the Disney experience – but I appreciate that they listen to their customers and pivot.
The same can’t always be said for the candidate experience. What are we doing to listen to the complaints of our candidates and pivoting? There’s a lot of intel in candidate experience surveys and silver medalist questionnaires. Most companies have them, but what do they do with the data?
We’ve looked at the data with our Voice of the Candidate survey at Parsons Strategic Consulting. This is all public data and nothing company specific. Here’s what it told us as key insights to consider for 2023.
Candidates want transparency. No smoke and mirrors, no bait and switch. They want to know the goods and the bads of your company. Don’t make them guess. The worst is when you mislead them, they join, and then have buyer’s remorse.
So, kill ‘em with communication. I don’t think there is any possible way you can over-communicate to a candidate that has initiated their application process. They’ve already expressed interest; this isn’t a game of hard to get.
Inform them up front how long the process will take. If this isn’t in their timeframe, you’ll at least be aware of the importance to streamline or kindly let them know that this might not work for them.
Let them know where they stand. I can’t get over the pause of silence, when we expect candidates to just wait in the wings while companies make final decisions. The good candidates – the ones we want – are quick thinking and looking for opportunities. Keep them in the know on the status. Heck, even if there is no change, there’s nothing wrong with just saying that in an email.
I have yet to see a company that has truly mastered the art of visualization when it comes to where the candidate sits in the hiring process. For example, I order something online. I can visually see on my order number where it sits. Is it processing, is it en route, is it being delivered? No need to call customer service when I can visually see it. Why can’t we do this with CX?
Here are some quick tips we think could help:
Look at retention for the first 90 days of your hires. If turnover is high, investigate.
If you haven’t done so, gather silver medalists (read more on that here) and get their thoughts.
Outline your hiring process. I don’t mean the standard boiler plate. What are the nuances to your company? Give them to the candidate right away.
Enlist some help from the pros. Companies such as Culture HQ have mastered helping companies create quick and digestible user generate videos that employees can create themselves. Other companies like Stories Inc. can work with you to create polished videos that can be centered around your EVP and brand pillars.
Present the candidate with a culture guide. Give them information about your company and questions that might be asked in the interview. Why make them work for this? It saves both parties time. Hiring Managers and Recruiters should be looking at experience, cultural fit, skills and how they conduct themselves in the interview. Level the playing field a bit.
This is all about letting candidates in on what it’s like to be an employee at your company. I’m often suckered into ordering something because it’s a “no commitment – 90 day return” type thing, so what do I have to lose? I realize this isn’t practical from the candidate perspective, but what companies are doing with the customer experience is that they want the buyer to use the product and then they know they won’t change your mind (or in some worst-case scenarios, make it so dang hard to return it… don’t do that!). It’s no different for candidates who join up based on an incomplete or inaccurate picture of life at your company and then find themselves regretting it.
The point here is that we need candidates to experience what it’s like to work here without working here. There are plenty of options to improve your candidate experience, and the tips we’ve shared are just a start. It can be as simple as letting them shadow someone on your team for a few hours via zoom, interview people on the team via video and ask them questions about the team dynamic, project work, things that are challenging, what they do for fun. More than anything else, make a real effort to give them the personalized experience, and the outcome will be better for everyone involved.