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World class college recruiting program
by Dr John Sullivan - Professor and Head of HR Mgmt at
SF State Univ.
Almost everyone in the employment field attempts to develop quality employment
programs and systems. After studying hundreds of employment systems from Fortune 500 firms we have come up with a comprehensive checklist to use to
assess the quality of any college recruitment system.
This checklist can be used as an audit tool or as a benchmark in order to ensure
that new College Recruitment systems are the best that they can be. Be aware that
no single system EVER meets all of these criteria and that any system must fit your
unique culture and set of needs.
Recruitment Specific WC Characteristics
- Identifies (and gets them to apply) students who are not actively
searching for a job.
- Does not rely solely on the candidates coming to us. We often find their
names without their active help.
- Our College Recruiters identify what "triggers" a particular
student to say "yes" to an offer.
- The College Hire Program utilizes "friends", family and
acquaintances to assist us in getting a college recruit to "yes".
- Hires "on campus" representatives (students in HR or the key
major) to help you gather information and interest students in our program.
- Finds the best candidates even at "no-name" universities and
during "off recruiting times" (Christmas, summer etc.).
- Involves Key Faculty in the identification and screening process.
- Involves Key Student Groups, their officers and opinion leaders in the
identification and screening process.
- Offers students/ faculty a referral bonus for referring other super
students (where the culture and ethics allow).
- Has programs to assess faculty referrals in order to allow us to focus our
resources on the faculty that refer successful hires.
- Offers programs to build faculty relationships including faculty
discounts, allowing faculty to sit in on company training, funding teaching
assistants for of the best professors, giving faculty feedback on the
curriculum and what students need "more of and less of", guarantee
interviews to a faculty members top __ students etc., get junior faculty
mentors at our company and donate $ to sponsor academic meetings.
- Offer junior faculty access to company data (and coauthor articles) to
assist them in meeting research quotas.
- De-emphasizes general university giving as well as President and Dean
contacts where data indicate they are not as helpful in building faculty
relationships as direct faculty contact.
- Offers to pay for a plant trip, equipment or give them a summer faculty
internship or a research project. The visits and projects will give them
stories to tell in class. Offer money and trips to student groups also in
order to get them to talk about your firm and to refer the best to you.
- Offer company employees as visiting evaluators for class projects as well
as for lectures and out of class activities.
- Set up an on-line chat room or list server to allow recent hires at your
company to build a rapport with still in college students.
- Utilizes the campus marketing/ PR club to build our on-campus image as an
employer of choice. Use class projects and clubs to identify the
"right" media to use and to do surveys/ focus groups on our image
on campus.
- Have early identification programs to capture the interest of Freshmen and
Sophomores. Tailor your efforts to this unique "culture".
- Minimizes the use of Career Centers and Career Fairs unless our data shows
that they are effective.
- Uses multiple sourcing tools (paper, people and electronic) to ensure all
"superstars" are identified.
- When possible recruits qualified and diverse candidates including
"cool" people and creative outside the box thinkers
- Produces a" higher "superstar, "qualified" applicant,
and a lower "turkey" recruit rate than our competitors (and then
last year)
- Utilizes technology (including the web, teleconferencing, multi-media,
on-line simulations/ games, telephone interviews and virtual reality)
to attract and excite high quality applicants.
- Offers an exciting but realistic "job-preview". It tells
applicants what they really want to know about. Their future team, projects
and job as well as providing and overview of the corporate culture and
mission.
- Hiring decisions, offers, acceptances and employee "sign-on's"
can all be done "on-line".
- Utilizes "subtle" recruiting tools like sponsoring professional
seminars, web pages, scholarship contests, speaking at seminars and classes
etc. designed to identify those "afraid" to be seen in the active
job market.
- Emphasizes effective "intra-recruiting" tools to identify and
place the sons and daughters of our current employees as well as using
alumni as mentors/ recruiters.
- Continually recruits and develops applicant pools and identifies
"soon to be qualified (not quite yet graduates)" applicants to
allow us to do emergency "instant hires".
- Has the capability to hire a "superstar student" as a
"corporate resource" instantly (even without a job opening) when a
World Class individual "suddenly" comes on the job market.
- The recruitment system attracts "superstar" applicants that do
not apply to your chief competitors as well as all of the qualified ones
that do apply to your competitors
- Continually communicates with applicants so the maintain their interest
and to reduce the likelihood that they will actively pursue other
opportunities. Possibilities include monthly E-Newsletters, discounts on our
products, periodic e-mails and calls)
- Identifies interns at competing companies that are dissatisfied and our
looking for other opportunities.
- It rejects applicants (or discourages applicants with a minimal chance) in
such a way that they maintain a positive image of us and when possible,
provides them with useful feedback on what they must do to become
"qualified". It treats rejects as future customers.
- Tracks turndowns, great graduating classes and high unemployment periods
to take advantage of emerging opportunities. We might actually increase our
hiring when others reduce college hires because more of the best will be
available.
- Fills "hard to hire" jobs (majors) at a higher rate than our
competitors.
- Surveys applicants and rejects to determine any problems and satisfaction
levels.
- Simplifies the application process and reduces "frustration"
barriers to increase "hits" by "hassle reluctant/ time
pressed" candidates.
- Through realistic and precise recruiting it discourages the unqualified
(Has a 10:1 or lower "qualified" selection ratio) and allows
potential candidates to" self assess" and self-select themselves
in order to minimize "bad fit" and unqualified applications.
- Goes to second "tier" and "international" universities
to "cherry pick" the top talent where there is little competition.
The talent is thinner but the top 1% are as good as all but the very best at
the top schools. Use contests, e-mails, Web sites, video interviews and
faculty referrals to avoid visits.
- WOWing them is essential in order to win the recruiting battle. WOW them
with Internet video interviews, WOW web pages and E-newsletters to targeted
students. Sponsor list servers, chat rooms, offer on-line mentors and give
WOW gifts like free software, diskettes, screen savers, free pizza and
coffee during exam week etc.
- Shares real company problems and opportunities with students through the
Internet. Offer exciting simulations and projects to allow students to test
their real world skills.
- Involves, measures and heavily reward managers who hire and retain the
best college hires. Make it the recruiters job to get the managers excited
about college hiring.
- Use search firms as well as surveys to determine competitive salary,
sign-on and relocation dollar levels.
- Develops WC orientation and transition systems to eliminate frustration
and speed "time to productivity" for new hires.
- Looks at "one year after" grads that rejected our offers to see
if they might want to work for us now.
Other World Class Characteristics
- not used
- Make the selection and offer process "fun and quick" so we don't
lose "easily bored" candidates.
- Student talent is assessed in ways in addition to interviews. Assessing
student talent can also be done in a more "fun" way through in
lass presentations, projects, contests, simulations and internships.
- Use computers, scanners and intranets to scan, screen & send
applications/ resumes immediately to managers.
- Only uses "knockout factors" that are valid, reliable, job
related and have little adverse impact.
- Selection criteria are weighted, or ranked depending on their ability to
predict.
- All KSA's and Competencies used are valid, reliable are directly job
related and have "face validity" with applicants & managers.
- Whenever possible "Content"/ hands on/ "show me"
selection tools are used rather than "Construct" "tell me
about it" tools.
- All questions asked during the process 1) Are directly related to this
job, 2) Have a range of benchmark answers (each of which has an assigned
score and 3) Are documented (along with the answers given).
- Current high performing employee's (resumes) are periodically used as
testers" and run (blind) through the system to "reverse test"
it's effectiveness.
- In cost cutting companies, there is a lower cost per hire than our goal.
- Hires "agile", flexible and multi-talented individuals that can
be rapidly redeployed to "other " areas of need.
- Hires the most qualified individuals at the lowest starting base salary,
relocation and sign-on cost.
- Employment systems meet all ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act), EEOC
Uniform Guidelines, EEO/AA, I-9, and applicant flow requirements.
- It quickly identifies : "turkeys", "lookie loo's", as
well as "serious" and 'superstar" candidates.
- Minimizes bad P.R., illegal questions, sexual harassment, negligent hiring
and discrimination "events" during the selection process.
- All selection decisions are well documented and are periodically reviewed
for legal issues.
- Manager and candidate satisfaction with the selection process are
periodically assessed.
- Assesses which managers do "well" with college hires. Redirects
hires when training doesn't work to "fix" the managers.
- Assesses the hires for the first __months in order to "weed" out
our mistakes before they do too much "damage".
- Where appropriate, involve customers in the selection process. Especially
for those College Hire positions that often have frequent contact with
customers.
Other General WC Characteristics of College Recruiting
- Hires students that perform at a significantly higher level than our
current best employee's. (Performance measures might include new hire
productivity, sales, forced ranking scores, performance appraisal scores, #
of raises, promotions, ideas and awards etc.).
- Hiring a significant number of College hires directly impacts the
profitability of the firm by increasing corporate competitiveness/
capability as a result of the added capabilities of our new college hires.
- College Recruiting Programs have a higher success rate, have a greater
impact on productivity and have a higher Return on Investment than other
recruiting systems and programs.
- The quality of our College hire system allows us to attract and hire
"the best and the brightest" so that "our" College
recruiting system is our main competitive advantage over our main
competitors. We are the best in The SIX Primary Employment Roles :
Finding
Convincing them to apply
Selecting the most productive
Convincing them to accept
Shortening the time to productivity for new hires
Rapidly Redeploying our college hires to the areas where they can help
the corporation the most.
- Sets and prioritizes goals for each major element of the college
recruitment system, and meets each of those goals.
- Is forward looking. It looks at future corp. needs/ college trends and
assesses future competencies that will be required.
- Continually improves every aspect of itself (10% per yr.) The College Hire
program continually tries innovative alternatives to existing systems. Every
system & assumption is continually questioned. "We've always done
it that way" is an unacceptable answer. We should mirror the speed of
change of our products and "obsolete out own "college
recruiting" tools.
- We continually measure every aspect of the College Hire system's
performance (using #'s and $'s). Especially which school provides the pest
performers.
- The College Hire Program has a high rate of customer satisfaction and
acceptance by managers, faculty, and students (both applicants and
non-applicants).
- The College Hire Program puts the primary responsibly on the managers and
the employees for recruitment and hiring.
- Each element of the College Hire Program selection process accurately
predicts future "on the job" performance and competencies (The
process is valid).
- Use side by side tests, "mystery shoppers", random sampling
surveys , focus groups and pilot tests to ensure new systems are refined
(and work) before (and after) they are implemented.
- Has "seamless" "one size fits one" International
capabilities (multi-lingual of multi-cultural).
- Has instant response to questions and problems (24 hours a day).
- College hires have a higher retention (tenure) rate than our target.
- Our The College Hire Program has a shorter cycle time, lower unit of
service costs, can handle a larger volume, and result in better performing
hires than the systems of our direct competitors.
- All employment systems and tools are simple to use, don't require manuals
or training (even though they are available on-line).
- Our College Hire Program provides high quality consulting advice to
managers to assist them in making quality employment decisions.
- Are at a minimum financially self supporting from fee for service
"charge backs" and often generate outside revenues.
- College hire selection systems focus on measuring present and future
capabilities. They don't overly focus on past performance or skills, #
of years of experience or # of years of education.
- The College Hire Program includes elements of product and corporate image
marketing. It helps improve the companies "image" in general and
positively impacts it's ability to sell products to non-applicants and
rejected applicants. It has a reciprocal agreement with the sales staff to
assist each other in finding names and selling the product.
- The College Hire Program has the capability to assist in other strategic
corporate initiatives such as : mergers, acquisitions divestitures,
strategic alliances, layoffs, expansion (international and national),
restructuring, head count maintenance, assessment centers, etc.
- Identifies and assesses Outsourcing and "special help" resources
(event planning, career fairs, initial screening, consultants etc.) to
handle situations where there is no advantage to having the capability
internally.
- Continuously benchmarks itself against the best in the world and
"audits" itself against our direct competitors. We recruit away
the competitors best recruiters.
- Recruitment and selection systems are dependable and consistent (reliable)
in different locations, "tiers" of schools and times.
- The College Hire Program uses changing technology (WWW, Intranet, video
conferencing etc.) to allow us to find, convince and evaluate candidates in
ways not possible before.
- Has JIT (just in time) capabilities to ensure we can be instantly
responsive to changing business needs. (instant hire, pre-grad hire, out of
term hire etc.)
- Minimizes the managers time spent on administrative employment functions.
- Eliminates the use of paper and minimizes the use of forms and approvals.
- Each employment system has multiple capabilities (fast/slow, cheap/first
class, acceptable/world class, regular/emergency etc.) so they can
"agilely" shift when the environment requires it.
- Minimizes complaints and lawsuits. And if challenged, we win a high number
(75% +).
- Does not require (extensive or any) job analysis, a job description or a
job requisition to begin the process.
- Because of their strategic impact, directors of The College Hire Program
are promoted to VP-HR more frequently than other directors.
- Minimizes the number of requirements, policies and rules put on line
managers and maximizes management flexibility.
- The College Hire Program continually identifies "factors" that
"cause" applicants to apply. They then influence top and middle
managers to provide the "best" working environment so that we can
become "the" Employer of Choice in our industry and area.
- Has Multi-approaches and customizes it's strategies to the particular job
or situation. It monitors the external environment and adjusts to meet the
changing (job) market.
- Is proactive and forward looking. It accurately forecasts future needs,
college graduation rates and the quality of future grads and changes systems
to be ready in time.
- Continually identifies College Recruitment best practices, opportunities,
problems/ errors (and their solutions).
- Involves and empowers all college applicants to "own" the
employment process.
- All "passing and reject" scores are determined by data analysis.
A few "Failures" are periodically allowed to "pass
through" to see if they "fail" as predicted.
- After the quality of College hire, "speed as a competitive
advantage" (in identifying and closing the deal )is the second most
important goal for the College Hire Program.
- There is a clear, written and communicated College Hire Plan (Multi-year)
that is an essential element of the over-all Strategic Business Plan.
- Integrates College Recruiting systems (people and computer) with
other HR and "corporate" systems to ensure cooperation and the
smooth flow of information to others outside of HR New hire performance is
tracked and success and failure data are continually "fed-back" to
refine recruiting and selection tools.
- Employment systems and professionals don't generalize about groups of
people, they "find out" for that particular individual.
- Has the same or higher ethical standards than those of the rest of the
industry.
- Utilizes reengineering, TQM, processes maps, pay at risk incentives and
other tools to continually improve.
- Develops systems to maintain security, confidentiality and privacy.
- Uses objective and measurable decision criteria, (rather than subjective
or "gut" criteria) whenever possible.
- Develops checklists, templates and guidelines to assist managers in making
College Hire decisions rather than rules, manuals, training classes and
policies that can overly restrict their need for flexibility.
- The College Hire Program continually builds it's internal strengths
by having a written plan to hire, retain, assess, train and continually
improve all employment systems (and people). It consciously compares itself
to the best employment systems in the industry/ world so that no competitor
will beat us in the "talent" market.
- Because of our extensive knowledge of the job market we assist management
in developing retention systems to minimize "poaching" and the
ability of competitors to "raid" our recent College Hires and
Interns.
- The College Recruitment Department continually identifies and evaluates
Employment information sources (journals, reference sources, on-line
sources, books and newsletters etc.). Information is continually shared with
the staff.
- Our internal training and self development programs help us
"grow" internal strength in recruiting and allows our best to
transfer into line management positions. We are the department everyone
wants to work at.
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Dr John Sullivan
Professor and Head of Human Resource Management at San Francisco State
University (JohnS@sfsu.edu)
Numerous articles by Dr Sullivan can be found at http://go.ourworld.nu/gately/sullivan.htm
Articles exclusively on recruiting can be found at http://www.erexchange.com/ere3/search.asp?SearchID=ARTCL&USERID=429912132
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