Socially-Responsible Recruiting Paper

A practical guide to employee retention, growth, and building an inclusive business for long-term success

Socially-responsible Recruitment Report 2016

@mykindafuture #MKFCSR #CSR

http://www.mykindacrowd.com/

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Contents

Executive summary ....................................................................02

The case for socially-responsible recruitment .........................02

Socially-responsible recruitment and EVP:

Where’s the line? ........................................................................05

The stages in socially-responsible recruitment ........................06

1. Green house

• Attraction and outreach .................................................07

2. Green room

• The overall selection process ..........................................10

• Pre-screening and online tests ........................................13

• Face-to-face assessment activities including

interviewing and assessment centres ............................14

3. Pre-boarding and Induction ...............................................15

Conclusion ..................................................................................19

About MyKindaFuture ................................................................20

References ..................................................................................21




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Executive summary

It is widely reported that socially diverse workforces significantly improve organisational productivity and overall company performance. Despite this, research shows that white graduates are 10% more likely to find full-time or part-time employment within a year of graduating than their black, Asian and minority ethnic peers (BAME).

The Bank of England has recently indicated that the UK is near ‘full employment’, which as a result means that competition for talent is going to increase. Employers cannot rely on salary and employer brand to attract and retain the best and most diverse talent. We are calling for employers to adopt socially-responsible recruitment practices through simple but effective actions that don’t just attract great talent, but also level the playing field for young people in the UK.

Be socially-responsible

The case for socially-responsible recruitment

Diversity recruitment continues to be one of the hottest topics in HR today. Recently trade press reported populace research firmly establishes that the demographic make-up of the UK is changing rapidly. Many corporate front-runners established diversity initiatives decades ago and seek to measure bottom-line results as well as demographics of women, minority group recruitment and retention. However, in an increasingly competitive global marketplace, businesses cannot afford to miss opportunities that will help them to succeed at home and abroad.

So how does having a diverse workforce progress a company’s ambitions? A mix of backgrounds, values, experiences, and influences brings contrasting perspectives to idea generation and problem-solving, which drives innovation and competitive advantage.

This paper has been created to assist HR leaders evaluate recruitment practices and evolve employer value proposition activities into sophisticated socially-responsible recruitment strategies. We look at the full recruitment life cycle: from attraction and outreach, interview, assessment and selection, through to pre-boarding and induction. At each stage there are tips and practical suggestions that build trust with candidates, remove barriers and ultimately create parity in the recruitment process.

At MyKindaFuture, 16–24 year olds are central to our mission and so this paper has a focus on this demographic.

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Socially-responsible Recruiting – Definition

Socially-responsible recruiting can be defined as ensuring every applicant, irrespective of their background, has the chance to demonstrate exactly what they would bring to a role by making certain every phase of recruitment is inclusive.

A diverse workforce delivers:

Deeper connection with customers:

The needs of diverse customers need to be understood and integrated. There is a positive correlation between customer awareness and increased financial performance.

Employee motivation:

Employees maintain productivity when they are treated with dignity and respect from the very first interaction, and arguably even prior to that.

Employee innovation:

A work environment open to diversity remains flexible and favourable in fostering and encouraging employee innovation.

Employee recruitment and retention:

A workplace that emphasises interest and concern for its employees as people first is able to attract a higher-quality workforce.

Continuous quality improvement:

An environment where employee talents are valued will help to continually improve quality and performance:

• Companies with the highest representation of women on their top management teams deliver 35% higher return on equity and 34% higher total return to shareholders than companies with the lowest representation according to a Catalyst study into financial performance of companies.

• Boards with majority women surpass all-male boards in their attention to factors critical to performance, audit, and risk oversight and control; essential for ethically operating organisations.

• Racial diversity within business is associated with increased market share.

• 80% of respondents with a diversity strategy cited significant improvement in business operations. C

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Despite the clear benefits from building workforces that reflect society at large, some companies are a long way from achieving equal representation and the rewards that this brings for individuals, business, and society overall. This is substantiated by the fact that currently, in the UK, on average 78% of company partners are male and 86% of company partners are white. A focused study on recruitment agencies revealed that BAME applicants were less likely to be offered a job (29% of successful applicants) in comparison to white applicants (44% of applicants). Specifically in the youth recruitment sphere, we have seen that graduates who went through private education receive higher starting salaries and benefit from faster pay rises in comparison to their colleagues from different backgrounds. Employers have a duty of care to ensure that processes within their attraction and recruitment operations help to create equal opportunities for all.

We see employers attempting to reach and recruit a wider and more diverse audience and they face significant operational challenges in the process.

Barriers to adopting socially- responsible recruitment practices

The degree to which internal stakeholders are willing to change and adopt unfamiliar recruitment practices

Openness to accept the presence and impact of individual biases

The time it takes to change organisation-wide processes

Inaccurate data grouping affects the quality of analysis and ability to reach target audiences

Lack of strategic direction to diversity-minded activities

We also work with companies who focus on defining and communicating their ‘value proposition’ to potential hires in order to attract diverse groups of individuals. This represents significant progress and internal drive in these organisations towards addressing the imbalance of representation in their workforce. More recently, and promisingly, we are now seeing organisations with ambitions to take further action by supporting their employer value proposition (EVP) with tangible, effective ‘socially-responsible recruitment’ strategies. We believe this is the way forward to address the diversity imbalance and ultimately bring strategic talent pipeline programmes together with corporate social responsibility initiatives.

86%of company partners are white.

78%of company partners are male

44%of white successful applicants offered a job

29%of successful BAME applicants offered a job

EVP

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Socially-responsible Recruitment and EVP: Where’s the line?

Employer Value Proposition (EVP) is a unique set of offerings, associations and values to positively influence target candidates and employees. Organisations who have embarked on the process of defining their employer value proposition have taken a vital first step towards communicating with and reaching target diverse audiences. In our current world of transparency and demanding consumer behaviour, from which future employees come, companies must take a proactive approach to managing their employer brand. Companies face the challenge of ‘define or be defined’. They must sell themselves to prospective employees, describing the ‘how’ both parties match in terms of values and ambitions. When handled well, an effective EVP significantly helps to attract and recruit the talent it requires and desires, including diverse individuals. Socially-responsible recruitment is the next step for organisations with a well-constructed and managed EVP in tackling diversity imbalances. Where companies have yet to achieve this clarity, building a socially-responsible recruitment strategy can be the practical catalyst for going on to define your EVP.

A socially-responsible recruitment strategy is the cornerstone for bringing change for the benefit of individuals and organisations. We conducted research in 2014 that provides valuable insight into the perceptions of students about their potential future employers. The majority of the young people we surveyed (>300) shared a perception that organisations could do more to create an inclusive workforce. Furthermore, 76% of respondents felt the workplace could be more diverse if companies recruited through different methods.

Employers have the opportunity to make a difference and take responsibility for their recruitment ecosystems. Many enlightened organisations are aware of the value of diversity, and many struggle to translate this into effective, meaningful practice. Where companies have implemented EVP practices and socially-responsible recruitment strategies, there is often a disconnection between the day-to-day operations and the reasons these practices are important. Furthermore there are significant barriers that inhibit the likelihood of diverse candidates successfully navigating the multiple stages of competitive recruitment processes. This paper explores practical tips to overcome these barriers at each stage of recruitment, leading to the foundation of a socially-responsible recruitment strategy.

It is vital that young people are able to access routes into a wide range of employers to ensure the widest possible skillsets

are tapped into by organisations. It is great that companies are working on improving diversity, and widening the pool of schools and universities they recruit from; this is a great way to start.

William Akerman, Managing Director of MyKindaFuture, said:

2014Research

76%…felt the workplace could be more diverse if companies recruited through different methods.

of respondents…

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The four stages of socially-responsible recruitment

Applicants move through varying degrees of psychological and emotional connection with employers during the recruitment process. At every step of the recruitment journey, candidates are evaluating their career options, deciding which employers to engage with, submitting applications, taking part in recruitment activities, deciding which offers to accept, aligning to

new organisations post offer, deflecting counter offers, and getting ready for their first day, all the while growing deep and lasting engagement with an organisation. Each of these points presents an opportunity for employers to support diverse candidates whilst helping all applicants move through the psychological process of connecting with an employer.

At MyKindaFuture

we see these activities grouping

into four distinct phases.

ONE‘Green Housing’

TWO ‘Green Room’

THREE Pre-boarding

FOUR Induction

This refers to the period of time before a candidate applies i.e. pre-application. At this point, people are finding out about career options, making career decisions, evaluating ind iv idual employers , and cons ider ing specific roles to apply for. The opportunity here is for employers to cultivate early interest in your company and start building brand awareness with a wider pool.

The time between accepting an offer and start day. It is worth thinking of pre-boarding as similar to the customer lounge experience of your favourite airline. In the highly competitive travel industry, this is where the airline welcomes travellers, offers refreshments, prepares them for their flight, and immerses passengers in the brand experience. This period of time is crucial in establishing deep fondness and connection with that carrier as well as making sure that everyone is equally ready for the journey ahead. For employers, the equivalent in recruitment terms is the essential time in which to cement company loyalty, to create and clarify expectations of the career paths and opportunities on offer, and to support personal development. All of this takes place before they “board” their “aircraft” for their “flight”, ensuring that new starters are primed and ready to succeed.

This is derived from the idea of the waiting room where performers stay before they are on stage. In recruitment this is the period between application and of fer where candidates have time between each stage in the

recruitment process. The opportunity here is to communicate with applicants

to deepen brand employer engagement, minimise dropouts,

and critically assist diverse candidates to be successful through each stage.

Refer r ing to the per iod of set t l ing into new ro les and

new organi sat ions . Th i s i s a more familiar phase to many. Here,

employers construct a first 90-day period where new joiners can safely find their feet in their roles, assess their vulnerabilities in terms of knowledge and skills, work out how to leverage their strengths, understand the organisational culture, and find out the ways ‘things get done around here’. Pre-boarding and induction experiences are remembered – for better or worse – for the entire duration of an employee’s tenure and are a significant component of decisions around retention and application of discretionary effort throughout the employee life cycle.

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Green Housing: Attraction and outreach

Fruitful socially-responsible outreach activities have a clear aim in encouraging students from backgrounds that are under-represented to understand and pursue available opportunities within organisations. This is achieved by building close working relationships with schools, colleges and universities and ensuring meticulous standards in employer outreach materials. We see first-hand how successful socially-responsible recruiting strategies result from investment in activities with young people that are conducted in-person, particularly when the audience can relate to the individuals delivering the sessions. Face-to-face channels are fundamental for word of mouth marketing and for inspiring generations of young people, and should be delivered alongside social media activities for maximum impact. When you consider that 95% of Generation Z visit social sites hourly, this could form a significant proportion of socially-responsible recruitment strategies.

In this paper, we evaluate how to recruit in a socially-responsible way through each of these stages. We focus on attraction and outreach activities in the green house stage. In the green room stage, we take a holistic look at the overall selection process followed by specific analysis of pre-screening and online testing, and face-to-face assessment activities. Lastly, we combine pre-boarding with induction to provide a seamless experience for your candidates in the final stages of the recruitment process as they transition into their roles.

Generation Z were born between 1995 and 2012 and are entering employment between 2011 and 2028.

Their generational traits in terms of social media behaviour are expecting instant responses, knowledge craving with a high degree of channel selectivity.

They are the first generation to grow up with easy, 24-hour access to the internet, smart phones, and social media.

They expect employers to mirror this in interactions with them.

They consume and share content simultaneously.

DID YOU KNOW?

Generation Z

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01Removing corporate ‘speak’: Advertising vacancies without jargon and acronyms aids applications from target groups, as it removes confusion. Test your ad copy with a range of diverse individuals.

03Adopt skills-based recruitment: Describe the strengths and skills needed to be successful, not just the experience required. Candidates who may have had social or educational disadvantages to gaining specific experience should still be encouraged to apply, as they may have developed the skills required in other roles they have had.

02Conduct objective job analysis:Clearly stating key competencies can lead to a more easily relatable job description where candidates can envisage themselves in the post and feel encouraged to apply.

04Communicate induction and training support:At an advanced level of socially- responsible recruitment, this is developing skills and languages or, at a more fundamental level, is giving examples of how you will support candidates to develop missing skills when they reach the role.

A social approach, combined with face-to-face campaigns, provides the strongest method for breaking down perceptions and barriers in attraction and recruitment processes because you can have real conversations in real time, directly with the people you want to reach. Examining outreach materials is a strong first step for those new to this way of building recruitment activities. Through these, employers have the opportunity to make a significant impact on the perception of their organisation and to encourage specific groups of individuals to consider opportunities within their business. The fundamental starting point is not simply the message that you communicate, but the impact that you wish it to have. Use research methods - focus groups, surveys, with external input - to understand the mindset of the audience, their perceptions, fears, and ambitions to define how they could and should relate to your employment proposition. From here, you can prioritise the message that you wish to convey to them through a mix of mediums and visual metaphors or representation.

Including an overt pro-diversity statement is a long standing and effective method of sending a clear message to potential candidates. Progressive organisations go further by creating and publishing ‘candidate charters’ or ‘candidate contracts’ that lay out their commitment to candidates and the applicant experience. Ensuring your statement supports your wider company vision and is consistent across your online and offline activity is a central element of a socially-responsible recruitment strategy, as candidates check numerous sources for validation and seek indicators that they will be successful in that business.

QUICK WINS: Four simple socially-responsible recruitment practices:

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Socially-responsible recruitment demands an offline and online approach to tackling the underlying social issues that affect your organisation or sector. This means balancing digital messaging and social media campaigns with face-to-face and in-person outreach. We recently researched the power and value of a face-to-face approach as a strategy alongside digital recruitment activities, revealing a surprisingly high level of demand for this type of interaction with employers.

OnlineOffline

Some 55% of 16 to 24-year-old respondents expressed a desire to receive employment inspiration and guidance with individuals from companies. They want this to help to build their confidence to apply for roles and shape the skills to be successful in the application process. Our research revealed that 94% of young people surveyed want employers to come to their education space and run interactive workshops, give advice, and promote career opportunities. Digging further into these initial findings, we found that these young people were seeking ‘mentoring’ and help from employers. In turn, this is fast becoming one of the top mechanisms for addressing diversity issues. Where it is geographically difficult for face-to-face meetings or there are resource challenges, technology can achieve this mentoring support in a digital format. We are increasingly delivering online mentor matching and digital chat forums for our employer partners to help young people, including under-represented target groups, to forge relationships with potential employers. These often complement face-to-face sessions that employers run with graduates via our university career societies, for example, that dispel myths about daunting career routes, such as science, engineering and technology careers.

55%of 16 to 24-year-old respondents expressed a desire to receive employment inspiration and guidance with individuals from companies.

94% of young people surveyed want employers to come to their education space and run interactive workshops, give advice, and promote career opportunities.

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Green Room: The overall selection process

Providing “green room” support means offering advice and information to enable candidates to be their best at each stage of the process and helping to grow the connection that is forming between candidate and employer. It is also an important space for sharing key EVP messages, raising general employer brand appreciation. Most critical of all, this is where the selection decisions take place and is the stage most susceptible to derailment in terms of social inclusion.

Socially-responsible recruitment activities in the green room phase help applicants prepare for each assessment stage, thereby levelling the playing field and creating equal opportunities for all. We hear consistently from university careers services that confidence when applying is still an issue for undergraduates, be that ‘why would X company want to hire me’, or ‘I will never get through the recruitment process’. If we are successfully going to attract and recruit a more diverse talent pool, we have to address this issue.

For many recruiters, the reason that diverse candidates drop out of the process is not always clear. It is a common situation for candidates to provide a generic reason rather than the real reason, or they simply to fall off the radar, becoming unresponsive to communication, and eventually drop out of the process altogether. We work closely with candidates on a day-to-day basis and have spotted a few common trends:

• Candidates drop out when their confidence in their suitability for the opportunity dips.

• Candidates doubt their match with the organisation in terms of values or their potential to flourish in that organisational culture.

• Candidates doubt career decisions as a result of unclear communication in the process.

These could be avoided through closer contact from the employer. Dropouts have obvious implications for organisations as they miss out on the perfect potential employees as well as hidden recruitment costs. Across all sectors, this trend is greater amongst women.

This gender trend plays out across the application process, for example it can take eight phone calls to persuade female candidates to submit an application in comparison to approximately two calls for male candidates. When you transcribe this to youth recruitment, particularly with volume programmes, these contact points are largely through online communication pushed out in the form of adverts and the information that is available in online portals. Companies who are ambitious for the benefits of diverse workforces can evaluate their communication and contact with diverse candidates, providing more of what the candidates need to ensure that they are motivated and offered support and encouragement.

Around 50% of women believe they would have advanced further in their career if they had deeper confidence around their contributions and value to the organisation.

50%C

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Common biases experienced in selection activities:

• When male and female assessors rate male candidates more favourably than female candidates.

• Where assessors are drawn to candidates that reflect their own styles and values.

• Interview fatigue typically sets in when conducting back-to-back assessments and confirmation bias or ‘selective hearing/reading’ occurs.

• Unstructured assessment activities lead to inconsistency in selection decisions based on personal preferences.

• Where applications are identical apart from the candidate name, those with typically ‘white’ names are more likely to be called back for the next stage.

As this is the stage where the selection decisions are made, eliminating unconscious bias is essential. The government is increasingly outspoken in its support for organisations and educational establishments who are removing names from application forms. For example, UCAS will be introducing this approach from 2017 as a step towards broadening the diversity of students being accepted into universities. This is significant shift towards overtly socially-responsible recruitment practices as well as part of a proactive employer branding activities. Our employer partners who have adopted this approach have seen successful candidates from a broader spread of universities and an increase in successful black, Asian and ethnic minority candidates. This change is a step in the right direction, but other alterations to the process still need to be addressed visibly and across the industry to make a substantial difference.

Bias awareness training is an integral part in a socially-responsible recruitment strategy. Assessors must be trained to understand, spot, and manage their own and others’ unconscious biases.

Everyone involved in selection should learn to recognise their own and others’ biases. Arguably, some biases may be helpful in identifying candidates that will or will not be successful in your culture. Others are deeply unhelpful and require careful challenge and management.

1 Assessor training

practical ways to eliminating unconscious bias

Starting with the job description, define the competencies required to be successful in role. Then decide which competencies to assess at each stage. Then select the most appropriate method – for example situational judgement tests, cognitive tests, video interview, telephone interview, presentation, group assessment, or panel interview.

2 Tiered assessment criteria

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Ensure that decisions are not based on subjective impressions, but use calibrated data across a number of observation points through the process. This will ensure that individual biases are challenged according to the assessment criteria.

3 Data-driven decisions

The assessing team should represent the desired target groups to minimise groupthink and social norming. Specifically, involve others who were not in the early assessments to help with the final hiring decision. Focussing on collecting information from the assessments, rather than making the decision during the assessment, allows for objective analysis afterwards rather than relying on unconscious filters.

4Mixed assessors

Responsibility for inclusion needs to be supported from the very top of an organisation. If employees are expected to change, then top management must lead the way. Diversity cannot be delegated to Human Resources, yet Human Resources is a powerful tool for helping the business to understand ethical and commercial drivers.

5 Senior Role Models

Rounded, socially-responsible recruitment strategies draw insight from candidate demographic data through applicant tracking systems or equivalent, and from activities delivered by external recruitment partners. This informs immediate near-term actions as well as changes to longer-term strategies in terms of target audiences, and evaluating successful or unsuccessful online or offline recruitment activities. For example, monitoring the progress of diversity candidates through the recruitment process is critical in order to evaluate the impact of the steps put in place and to focus attention on poorer-performing areas of the process. Annual recruitment campaigns should commence with a review of the previous year’s performance alongside strategic ambitions for the organisation. A heavy practical focus on the immediate impact is crucial whilst at the same time building year on year for sustained change towards the best practice socially-responsible recruitment operations.

Top tip: Use Precise Data.

Where applicants live, rather than their individual circumstances, is the data most commonly used to segment geographies and reach target audiences.

This presents an issue as these data sources group together thousands of households.

Organisations can draw on markers such as parental occupation and eligibility for free school meals for more precise assessment rather than ‘neighbourhood’ data.

The solution – across your green house and green room activities – is to openly provide tips and recommendations, with examples of what successful behaviour during the process looks like, alongside creating channels for dialogue between staff and candidates. Support this with training staff on unconscious bias, the importance of socially-responsible recruitment, and the impact of these on the organisation.

What:

Why:

How:

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Green Room Pre-screening and online tests

Organisations and educational establishments are moving away from screening applications based on A-Level and degree results and moving towards assessing candidates based on their own specific criteria to avoid missing outstanding talent who have not followed traditional routes. Recently publicised examples include PWC, EY and Clifford Chance. Such a trend has been prompted due to increasing evidence that academic entry criteria can disadvantage certain groups and is a change that we actively encourage employers to consider as a part of a wider socially- responsible recruitment strategy.

Often employers rely on online tests to filter candidates, particularly in high volume recruitment. Serious consideration should be taken with this approach as research has shown that online methods of assessment disadvantage candidates from lower socioeconomic and BAME groups. Unfortunately online tests, including cognitive and situational judgement tests, often have different validity measures for various subgroups that may therefore be disadvantaged in the process. Typically, adverse impact is much greater for reasoning tests than is it for situational or competency tests in the selection process. Situational tests themselves can reduce the level of adverse impact although are not completely free of bias. Robust socially-responsible processes evaluate pass rates against demographic data to make sure there is not an unfair elimination process occurring. Of course, correlation does not necessarily mean causation, but where issues arise it is critical to investigate further.

Another vital factor to consider is ensuring that any assessment technique used during a selection process must, as far as is reasonably possible, be free of any requirement that places a disabled person at a substantial disadvantage, unless that requirement can be justified. Most assessment techniques have some aspects that are likely to present difficulties to candidates with particular types of disability. To ensure assessment techniques are fair and available to all, there are several procedures that can be utilised:

• Voice recognition software or screen readers can make online tests and exercises accessible to candidates with some aspects of visual impairment.

• For those with visual disabilities, abstract and spatial tests should be avoided.

• In the case of specific learning difficulties (e.g. dyslexia), an employer should find out how an individual’s disability affects them and if this can be accommodated, such as by allowing extra time.

Online

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Green Room: Face-to-Face including interviewing and assessment centres

Four main types of bias in face-to-face recruitment activities that can be addressed through socially-responsible recruitment activities:

Confirmation bias – a tendency to seek out information that supports your pre-conceived belief about the applicant.

Affective heuristic bias – where assessor decisions are influenced by superficial evaluations, such as attractiveness, race, or gender.

Anchoring – the tendency to place an arbitrary anchor of expectation of a candidate, which influences the evaluation of the individual.

Intuition – this is a huge part of the decision process but is unfortunately unreliable as it is susceptible to being affected by emotion and memory.

Simple processes can be put in place to minimise the impact of these biases, such as allowing enough time for objective evaluation after the assessment itself reduces the occurrence of these biases. Structured interviews provide specific comparison criteria to evaluate judgements against, adding rigour and objectivity and thereby reducing bias. Creating assessment processes based on objective job analysis minimises the opportunities for personal biases to inform decision making. Another opportunity to increase accuracy and to reduce bias is by recording the interviews; this discourages assessors from acting on their biases, creates the opportunity for others to be involved in the decision, and enables decision makers to refer to ‘actual’ candidate responses rather than interpretation. It is essential that assessment panels are diverse and balanced. The challenge for organisations is to ensure that all these simple processes are consistent and rigorously applied.

Assessment centres form an important part of recruitment processes and are subject to the same biases listed previously. In group activities, research reports lower confidence in women during team work and that female candidates are talked down in group work. To combat this, set out the standards of behaviour expected in your workplace and the standards that are expected to be exhibited during the assessment when welcoming candidates to your assessment centre; politeness and respect towards all other participants. Be explicit that you will be assessing these behaviours and then do so. Prior to the assessment, spend time thinking about how you will allocate candidates to groups ensuring that when there is a small representation of minority individuals, the temptation may be that they are spread evenly across groups. In actual fact to avoid instances of being talked over or confidence dips, aim for 25-30% representation in a group, even if that means there are some groups with no representation.

Affective heuristic bias

Anchoring

Intuition

Confirmation bias

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As an echo of the themes throughout this paper, all employees involved in an assessment process should be trained on the importance of diversity and the impact of unconscious bias. Even a simple instruction to the interviewers before they make their decision around “judging on merit alone” and “making a fair decision”, could make a gentle nudge towards recruiting responsibly.

It is also important to look at assessing in non-traditional ways because we see how low confidence or fluctuating confidence in the process is a barrier to performance. Extremely stressful situations can disrupt cognitive performances. The situation consumes the candidates’ mental resources reducing their capacity to think quickly, articulate their thoughts, and adjust to the environment. This means they may not perform as well as in an interview as they would do in the role itself. Other research reported in the Journal of Experimental Psychology demonstrated that those most qualified to succeed are more likely to be affected by performance pressure, as their high working memory capacity is what drives the individual’s performance and is the first faculty affected by pressure. Obviously, it is a competitive process at the same time, and we want to support all candidates to be their best. The intention underpinning socially-responsible recruitment is to enable the best candidates for your opportunity to rise to the top whilst keeping the important competitive element and also removing inappropriate barriers.

There are ways to reduce this pressure and increase the likelihood of achieving the best from your candidates. Familiarity with the context and the situation helps to lessen anxiety, for example. Digital and face-to-face familiarisation of culture, location, norms, and key individuals all help candidates to align to the context prior to the assessment activity. Using a mix of assessment interactions - online assessments, situational judgement tests, real world simulations, interviews, presentations, group work, or individual project tasks - covers all of the essential assessment criteria without a heavy reliance on bias-prone interviews and more closely replicates the job itself.

Pre-boarding and induction

One in four graduates anticipate leaving their first job within 12 months of starting it, according to new research by the CEB.

One in four graduates anticipate leaving their first job within 12 months of starting it, according to new research by the CEB. Their findings reveal that 20% of graduates take jobs whilst they are not 100% certain about those career decisions. Retention problems can arise even prior to the first day in a role for new graduate and apprenticeship employees. Findings show that the average turndown rate for graduates was 14% in 2015, which has a considerable impact on business operations. Employers then face “sunken costs” on their recruitment programmes, as they pay a premium to attract target candidates. Then downstream, they face costs to replace candidates when they move on after a year, fail to meet performance expectations or fail to start. These all support the case for pre-planned pre-boarding activities to ensure that organisations do not lose the diverse candidates that they have worked hard to find, engage and recruit.

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A report carried out by independent global advisory firm Oxford Economics reveals that replacing members of staff incurs significant costs for employers at an average of £30,000 per person (lost performance plus recruitment fees are included in this). Many of our partner employers report that regular contact with new recruits is essential to deepen the relationship that has started to form during the green house and rreen room phases of recruitment. Research by the Association of Graduate Recruiters (AGR) recently revealed that one employer from the accountancy and professional services sector talked about their “keep warm strategy” for graduates, which involved inviting recruits to work functions, linking them to university ambassadors, and maintaining telephone communication with them at regular intervals. At MyKindaFuture, we are conducting practical studies – the results of which will be released in 2016 – into innovative methods and activities during this critical period to retain key hires and further the connection between recruit and recruiting organisation. The value and power of early engagement should not be underestimated: it can improve performance, increase speed to value, support long-term retention, and increase individual engagement with the organisations’ core purpose. Recent studies show that 77% of new hires that hit their first performance milestone had received formal pre-boarding and induction training. This is too important to be missed in the quest to retain diverse candidates.

It is clear that multifaceted socially-responsible recruitment strategies include pre-boarding and induction activities. In its lightest form, companies can start by ensuring that recruitment personnel or line managers call and email new starters monthly to stay in touch and answer specific questions. More advanced strategies incorporate information sharing around ‘what to expect’ from the role and impart key materials on the company history and values. Our employer partners tell us that whilst emailing documents with this type of content ‘ticks the box’, it does not deliver the value required at this stage in the recruitment cycle. The most sophisticated strategies use technology to distribute light-touch, engaging pre-training for the new recruits around skills. This includes insight and education that new starters typically feel they lack whilst also reemphasise critical information about company culture and work etiquette – the latter being particularly pertinent for early careers candidates. This type of digital content supports the objectives of induction programmes as well as company competency or behaviour frameworks. It can even reduce induction costs by bringing content up front and online, digested before day one rather than in precious face-to-face events. In terms of socially- responsible recruiting, this is also the opportunity for organisations to restate their diversity and inclusion principles that, through its consistency across the recruitment journey, reinforces the company’s integrity to new hires. Leveraging technology to make connections between new hires and buddies or mentors can help to minimise candidates that are at risk of dropping out as well as forging deeper connections and helping young people start to visualise their career in the business.

77%… of new hires that hit their first performance milestone had received formal

pre-boarding and induction training.

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From the first day in a role, the induction period plays a powerful role in the retainment of a diverse workforce. Incoming talent who receive a structured, welcoming, and personalised pre-boarding experience are 60% more likely to stay for three years or longer. Induction programmes that build on the messaging and communication during the pre-boarding phase, give new starters a comprehensive view of the organisational culture and work ethics. They equip them to quickly establish critical networks and to better integrate into the workplace. Socially-responsible recruitment strategies that include pre-boarding and induction are devised to support mixed learning styles, adopt adult learning techniques, are focused on just-in-time information sharing for immediate application. They also draw in a diverse mix of business sponsors as inspirational role models.

Top 10 skills graduates lack when they join their workplace

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01

05

10

04

09 03

08

02

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communication skills

team working

time management

to taking responsibility

the ability to cope under pressure

resilience to setbacks

taking initiative in a new role

self-awareness

work etiquette

level of business knowledge

60% more likely to stay for three years or longer

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Suggested typical pre-boarding content -

How pre-boarding and induction fit together:

Suggested typical induction content -

• Introduction to the company’s organisational structure and history.

• Explanation of company values and how they manifest in day-to-day operations.

• Enabling self-reflection on the skills the new starter has and needs to develop – linking the recruitment process, and all that was learned through that, with their personal development.

• Insight into personal learning styles.

• Tips on how others have made the most of the opportunities in the organisation.

• Short learning bursts that convey the essence of the professional skills those new starters need for their roles and to be successful in your company.

• Overview of necessary legal requirements and procedures (e.g. health and safety training).

• Introduction to specific job-role training

• General overview on company guidelines such as rules pertaining to email, computer, phone, and social media.

• Forge links to their buddy and also their mentor.

• Fostering relationships with other grads and key staff members.

• Practising key professional skills such as communication, project management, influencing skills.

• Inspiration sessions for new starters to build a vision for their future careers.

• How to make career goals happen – youth talent need to understand quickly that the need to drive and manage their own career is key to success in today’s workplace (and they need the skills to do this!).

• How to set their own development goals and fulfil these through development from ‘on the job’ experiences.

• Deeper exploration of the attitudes and mind-sets of successful individuals in your organisation.

• Overview of necessary legal requirements and procedures (preferably in an e-learning or m-learning format).

• Strategy insights from senior leaders from across the business and representing a diverse workforce.

• Specific job-role training.

• Guided tour of the company premises and key locations such as amenities, places to eat, break out area, meeting rooms, parking, transport, and first aid location.

• Arranging security and access to the building.

• Recap work health, hazards and safety information (e.g. evacuation plans and instructions, fire and earthquake drills, etc.)

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Conclusion

This paper has explored each stage of attraction, recruitment, pre-boarding and induction, highlighting simple and more complex changes that organisations can put in place to ensure socially-responsible recruitment is centre to your talent strategy. Organisations have an opportunity to embrace these measures to address the much larger national issue of imbalanced workplaces whilst reaping the rewards of these efforts in terms of commercial and market performance. Complementing established employer value proposition with a socially-responsible recruitment strategy enables businesses to consistently recruit diverse candidates.

Important takeaways are:

• Progress has been made towards more diverse and balanced workforces, but there is a long way to go.

• A socially-responsible recruitment strategy at the centre of organisation’s talent plan with supporting employer value proposition strategies provides the practical framework to drive change in workforce diversity.

• Socially-responsible recruitment is the next step on from defined and managed employer value propositions.

• Candidates go through different psychological stages as they engage with companies – green house, green room, pre-boarding and induction – and it is important to adjust recruitment activities to reflect these.

• Socially-responsible recruitment activities in each of these stages are made up of simple steps, repeated consistently.

• Sophisticated technologically enabled solutions simplify implementation through the four stages from attraction to recruitment, through to preparation for the first day in role and induction.

• Managing biases is at the heart of resolving organisational challenges around diversity and inclusion.

• Contextualising recruitment tackles biases by focusing on the context in which an applicant’s previous experiences or grades have been achieved.

• Practical changes with a commitment to the underpinning philosophy around socially-responsible recruitment can lead to a substantial impact and a huge step towards our combined goal of a more diverse workforce in the UK.

• Internal measures of successful socially-responsible recruitment strategies can be seen in increased retention, individual recruits delivering value faster, and longer-term engagement.

• Socially-responsible recruitment delivers diverse workforces that increase an organisation’s competitive edge through its ability to understand and relate to its global customer base.

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About MyKindaFuture

MyKindaFuture’s mission is to level the playing field for young people in the UK by inspiring them with career opportunities and connecting them with employers across all industries.

They work with over 4,500 schools and colleges and have student societies in over 50 university campuses. This network ensures employers reach the next generation of talent from school leavers to graduates for their work experience, internship, apprenticeship, and graduate programmes. MyKindaFuture are experts in providing attraction, engagement, recruitment and development services at every stage of socially-responsible recruitment, giving employers a competitive advantage in finding and retaining talent.

A mix of digital and face-to-face solutions enables employers to reach target audiences to unlock career aspirations, break down social barriers, and forge meaningful connections between young people and potential employers.

With over 32 years’ experience working with young people and their influencers, MyKindaFuture are trusted by students, employers and educators.

There are various useful tips throughout this paper, of which most can be easily implemented; however, we can help you further and provide insight into how socially responsible your recruitment procedures are, or how to improve your current processes. If you would like to discuss this, please contact

[email protected] MyKindaFuture’s Head of Business Development

4,500

schools and colleges

32 year experience

50 University campuses

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References

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www.mykindafuture.com


Socially-Responsible Recruiting Paper

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Transcript of Socially-Responsible Recruiting Paper