So, you poured your blood, sweat, and tears into crafting the perfect job description. You posted it everywhere under the sun. The applications started rolling in by the dozen, then hundred, then thousand. Before you could blink, you were buried under a mountain of shining resumes from eager candidates. You rubbed your hands together and dove in, certain your recruiting skills would land you the cream of the crop employee.
But after six months of lackluster interviews and near-hires-gone-awry, panic starts to set in. The state of your pipeline points to the uncomfortable possibility that your recruiting strategy needs some fresh insights. But where to start assessing and improving the beast?
While hiring new employees is certainly more art than science, there are key recruiting metrics that can indicate how to better attract and engage high caliber talent. Read on to unlock five ways to assess (and ultimately transform) your hiring.
Cost-Per-Hire Analysis
Let’s start with the cold hard cash. Calculating cost-per-hire sheds insight by tallying what it takes to convince each candidate to join your ranks. Tally up those flashy job board postings, employee referral bonuses, and hours your team sunk into screening and interviewing.
Divide this dollar amount by the number of eventual hires, and — voila — you have your cost-per-hire.
Now you can benchmark against industry averages to gauge recruiting efficiency. If your number wildly eclipses competitors, inefficiency likely lurks. Maybe you spread the net too wide or let the hiring process drag on. Either way, calculating this metric focuses the search for better strategies to reel in talent without breaking the bank.
Source of Hire Reporting
Like any good experiment, recruiting requires careful tracking to determine what works (and what doesn’t). Source of hire reporting unravels the mystery of what channels lure your prime candidates.
By tagging each applicant with their origin story – be it LinkedIn scrolling, employee referrals, or stumbling upon your irresistible Facebook advertisement – patterns emerge to guide your future strategy.
Maybe those flashy job board posts failed to catch many qualified eyes. Or hoards applied through LinkedIn while your social media links collected cyber dust. The data doesn’t lie.
Effective recruiting means more posts, engagement, and budget allocation for sourcing channels that resonate with your target audience. While casting a wide net has its advantages, source reporting connects budget to impact to avoid wasting time and money.
Candidate Attrition Rate
The story of your recruiting strategy doesn’t end when stellar candidates sign offer letters with starry eyes. The quest to understand and improve your process continues as new hires pass their one-year anniversary…or not.
Enter candidate attrition rate. This pivotal metric charts whether those top choices stick around by calculating the percentage of recruited candidates that either rejected offers or quit within twelve months of joining.
High attrition signals serious cracks in the candidate experience. Maybe the golden first impression tarnished after onboarding. Or perhaps slick recruiting tactics falsely advertised the job. Either way, dissatisfaction lurks.
Low attrition signals your recruiting strategy, and candidate experience inspires the dedication and loyalty your company craves. So track this over time, run exit interviews, and continue tweaking your strategy until attrition plummets.
Candidate Quality Scoring
Recruiting superstars requires determining what “superstar qualities” mean to your organization. Define these success criteria – whether technical skills, intelligence, culture fit, or potential – then rate candidates accordingly. Develop a scoring rubric to systematically assess candidate qualifications across these desired attributes. Track scores over time and analyze with other metrics to unravel recruiting mysteries.
If costs per hire skyrocket one quarter, perhaps candidate quality scores dropped simultaneously, signaling recruiters lowered the bar too hastily. Let data guide testing changes in strategy to lift quality back up. Scoring allows quantifying the impact of shifts in approach, channels, training, and tone through the numbers rather than gut feeling.
Employee Net Promoter Score (NPS) Surveys
A crucial yet often overlooked recruiting strategy pivot point emerges after candidates morph into employees. Launching anonymous Net Promoter Score check-ins with current staff offers a vital gut check on whether your enviable culture actually inspires day-to-day happiness.
Simply survey all hands with the burning question: “On a scale of 1 to 10, how likely are you to recommend our company culture and work experience to friends?”
Tally the 9 and 10 cheerleaders as your “promoters score” indicating strong cultural fit and workplace satisfaction. High detractor scores (6 through 0) signal something amiss between rosy recruitment rhetoric and on-the-ground reality that requires further probing if you hope to continue attracting top talent.
Wrapping Up
So there you have it – five analytics essentials transforming mere recruiting hobbyists into data-savvy talent magnets. Cost-per-hire, source reporting, attrition rates, quality scoring, eNPS surveys – start tracking these now if you hope to compete for top talent ahead of the curve.
Just remember – data without action will simply result in more frustration. Use these enhanced insights to develop an elevated recruiting process that finally actualizes your employer brand’s impressive potential.
