Why aren’t you measuring your recruitment process?

What’s the biggest threat to your company? Here’s a clue: it’s not the competition, or even rising costs. In PwC’s latest Annual Global CEO Survey, 74% of CEOs said that the biggest threat to their company is not being able to attract and retain the talent they need for the future.

Yes, that’s right, recruitment officially is your biggest nightmare.

It’s also likely to be your biggest investment. UK companies spend a reported £4.4 billion a year on measures to address skill shortages through hiring, onboarding and retaining staff. But how many of them are measuring the ROI of their recruitment spend? If you’re failing at recruitment, it could be because you’re measuring everything in your business BUT the thing that threatens you the most.

It’s time to put some numbers on your recruitment process.

Measure what you spend

Do you know how much you’re spending on job ads, PPC, social media, onboarding and staff retention each year? If not, why not? Not only is talent acquisition one of your biggest expenditures, it’s also the only way to protect the future of your business. If you’re getting it wrong, you need to know.

Here’s an example. You might be spending the bulk of your recruiting budget on job boards that attract active candidates – people who are actively looking for a job. But what if you’ve historically not filled roles well with this approach? What if the best results for your industry come from social media, where you might attract a more passive candidate? Why are you still fishing in the wrong pond?

You need to know what you’re spending your money on – and what you’re getting from the process.

Keep data on who you hire

Another mistake you might be making is letting your success stories – the ‘good’ hires – go unnoticed. Using talent analytics on who you’ve already hired is key to improving your recruitment process.

So get data on your employees: where did they come from, which industry did they previously work in and how long have you retained them? It all adds up to a more targeted recruitment approach – because if you don’t know it, you can’t use it.

Talk to your staff

Of course, talent analytics isn’t just about the numbers. You need to know what people think as well as what they do.

Conduct focus groups and surveys to get qualitative data on what it’s like to work in your organisation. What’s important to your staff? Which benefits are the most attractive to them? How do they see their career progressing? Learning how your employees view the company, understanding your candidate experience and identifying skill gaps in your workforce will all help you build a bigger recruitment picture.

Recruitment doesn’t need to be a nightmare. If you treat it like any other measurable in your business – the more you measure, the more you can manage – you can turn your biggest threat into your greatest strength.

Are you measuring your recruitment process? I’d love to hear what you’re doing on social media, or drop me a line and I can chat through how talent analytics can transform your employer branding.