Putting the IT in recruitment

Recruitment utilises large chunks of time, money and paper in many HR departments. Teresa Russell talks with two organisations that have embraced recruitment technology solutions, and wonder how they ever managed without them

25 Jul 2006

Recruitment utilises large chunks of time, money and paper in many HR departments. Teresa Russell talks with two organisations that have used technology solutions to streamline recruitment

You’d be hard pressed to find two organisations more different than Lion Nathan and the City of Fremantle. Lion Nathan is a FMCG manufacturer of well-known brands such as Tooheys and Hahn beers, and Knappstien and Mitchelton wines. It employs over 3,000 people in Australia and New Zealand in diverse areas from brewing to corporate functions. Turnover averages 12-13 per cent per annum. Some sales roles attract 200 applications.

The City of Fremantle is a traditional local government organisation, employing an average of 750 people through the year, but requiring seasonal increases in staff. It operates in a small, defined geographical area south of Perth in a market that is suffering a severe skills shortage – even in unskilled labour. It employs a diverse workforce, including childcare workers, legal advisors, town planners, IT and other technical officers, engineers, aged care workers, lifeguards and arts centre tutors. Last year it hired 145 new employees through 74 advertised vacancies.

Despite their differences, both organisations have moved to electronic recruitment systems, with the same result. HR has emerged from beneath the administrative burden of manual systems and taken up a more strategic role.

The need

“Our very manual system was time consuming, expensive, laborious and very prone to human error. It was a nightmare,” says Denise Ford, HR advisor for The City of Fremantle. She says that there was one position for an administrative officer in 2003 that “took three of us almost a full week to send out information packages which we photocopied, stapled, stuffed into envelopes and addressed to all the applicants,” she recalls. This coincided with the internal promotion of an HR officer to HR manager, creating the drivers for change.

At Lion Nathan, Julie Masnick, HR manager in the people and culture team, says that the manual system they had endured until last year “didn’t provide a best practice hiring experience either internally or externally. The manual system was painful.”

Because the recruitment environment was becoming more challenging, they needed to make it as easy as possible for line managers (leaders). Masnick and her colleagues developed a vision to deliver a leading edge, trans-Tasman, online recruitment system that would deliver a better experience for everyone involved in the recruitment process.

The business case

At Lion Nathan, Masnick initiated discussions with others in the people and culture team, then formed a steering committee including resourcing, IT, line managers (hiring leaders) and the project sponsor – the organisation’s Australian HR division. They worked with an external consultant who helped them develop the business case, interviewing internal users to assess the cost and time aspects of the manual system.

“When we presented the business case to the executive team, there was some initial hesitation – possibly because they weren’t so involved in the process,” says Masnick. After in-depth discussion, they did get the buy-in they felt was necessary for the project’s success.

The process at the City of Fremantle was less complex. The HR team wrote a business case and presented it to the management group. Approval was obtained, providing that the system was reviewed in 12 months against the expectations presented in the business case.

Vendor selection and management

Both Lion Nathan and the City of Fremantlecreated a wishlist of recruitment technology requirements. The City of Fremantle found its vendor through the HR manager’s industry knowledge. “We felt very comfortable with the vendor straight away. They were honest about their capability and seemed to have a compatible culture to ours. We’re not very bureaucratic – especially for local government,” says Ford.

“Our vendor initiated the management of our relationship. During the first six months, their technical support people would call us each week to see if everything was going OK if they hadn’t heard from us,” says Ford.

Lion Nathan sent requests for proposals to six vendors they found through research and networking. It then asked three of them to present their products to the project team, using a range of hiring scenarios.

“The vendor we chose best met our current requirements and had comprehensive future plans about their direction. They explained how we could continue to work together to address our future needs, which include an integrated HR systems approach and such things as linking with online testing and selection solutions,” explains Masnick.

The role of IT

Although IT at Lion Nathan did not specify or select the solution, Masnick says they were very involved from the beginning. “I had an outstanding IT project manager who worked with me, reviewing system compatibility, vendor security and integration with other systems,” says Masnick.

In contrast, Ford says IT at the City of Fremantlehad very little input, needing just one short meeting with the vendor to sort out what they needed.

What does it do?

Each electronic recruitment technology vendor provides different functions in its products. Both featured organisations use an externally hosted web-based system that required an upfront capital expenditure and an annual license fee. Lion Nathan allows its 25-30 preferred recruitment suppliers to link into its system. System users can see if the candidate came through the corporate website, from an agency or seek.com, or is an internal applicant.

“The system removes the administration aspects of recruiting and now allows our resourcing team to add value to the recruitment process,” says Masnick. “Everything is now work-flowed through the system, providing a speedier response time and a greatly improved corporate image.”

Ford now has downloadable information packs, which significantly reduce mailing costs. “We are a green council, so anything we can do to remove paper from the process is positive,” she says. There are seven service centres not attached to the main administration block where the CVs used to be sent, so now those hiring managers can view all the applications from their remote locations.

Any downsides?

Apart from a few minor glitches, Masnick can think of no downsides to the recruitment system. Ford says that 30-40 per cent of candidates at the City of Fremantle are either not computer literate or don’t have easy access to a computer to make an online application. They scan any paper CVs into the system and send them directly to the hiring manager. “Also, if our system goes down here, we can’t see the online applications,” notes Ford.

Return on investment

“It paid for itself in the first six months,” asserts Masnick of Lion Nathan’s large investment. “Time to fill and cost per hire have decreased. We’re delivering more for less,” she says, pleased to have time to work on strategic recruitment issues now.

“Our time to fill has sped up by at least three days and our HR administration officer has two days a week back for every vacancy. HR has become a more advisory than reactive business unit,” says Ford. At the 12 month review, they were meeting or exceeding the expectations in the business case.

Tips

Both Ford and Masnick stress the importance of allocating plenty of time to educating the internal users of the new system. They also agree it is important to have a solid understanding of what your needs are and communicating them clearly to vendors.

Functions of e-recruitment technology

Define the role

Source applicants

Assess applicants

Report outcomes

Define the role

Create vacancy

Define questions to screen inappropriate candidates or capture additional information for filtering purposes

Attach documents to job vacancy

Create job vacancy advertisement

Source applicants

Search private talent pool for applicants