The last few years have seen unprecedented disruptions in when, where, how, and even why we work.

From talent shortages to a recession on the horizon, the recruitment trends and the market is more uncertain and competitive than it ever has been and it is increasingly more important for organisations to ensure processes and procedures are in line with the expectations of the market.

We are going to look the coming recruitment trends and what they will bring to the job market, how changing market conditions will impact recruitment, and what employers can do to evolve their strategy to attract— and retain—the best talent.

State of the market

Job vacancies in the Australian labour market have not just recovered from the Covid pandemic, they’ve doubled. According to the latest Australian Bureau of Statistics release, there are 470,900 job vacancies in Australia, an 85% increase since November 2020. As of September, 2022 unemployment sits at an incredibly low 3.5% as Australia approaches what is considered full employment, meaning almost everyone willing and able to work is in a job.

The market as it stands is very candidate-driven, but that could change significantly as recent signals point to a downturn in the economy. Australia is forecast to enter a recession in 2023 due to a further slowing of the economy and a spike in unemployment. The governments increase in the permanent migration program ceiling to 195,000 from 130,000 in 2022-23 is set to help ease widespread, critical workforce shortages and strengthen the pipeline of skilled labour.

With these looming changes in mind, we explore the challenges and trends facing employers in 2023.

A look at short-term hires and boomerang employees

Instead of relying only on full-time employee (FTE) hires, the latest hiring trends show companies are increasingly adopting contract employment by looking to interim executives and professionals to meet scaling workforce needs.

According to a Korn Ferry survey, the number of global interim workers is expected to grow in 2023: to roughly 78 Million, from about 43 million in 2018. The same report also stated that 80% of large organisations plan to increase their use of contract workers in the coming years.

There are numerous benefits to a short-term hiring approach, one of most important ones being the cost. The cost of hiring temp workers is generally more effective than the cost of hiring permanent employees. In addition to this, people who choose interim or contract work are often highly skilled, project-based individuals who can quickly adapt to new environments. They can bring unique skill sets and experiences needed for finite projects during uncertain times, while minimising risk to your business.

When it comes to boomerang employees, they are not a new concept, in fact 15% of professionals who quit their jobs return to their former company, but in 2023, that figure is set to increase. We spoke about the benefits of re-hiring corporate alumni earlier in the year (you can read that piece here). In a tight talent market, these ex-employees can hold incredible value. They come up to speed faster, hold institutional knowledge and understand the culture and values of the company. A widely cited study out of Cornell University found that, in one large healthcare organisation, boomerang employees outperformed new external hires overall, particularly in people-centred or administrative roles.

2023 will see organisations putting more effort and resources into the off-boarding process, maintaining their talent pool by staying in touch with employees who leave and sending them updates on the latest developments within the company, vacancies and other relevant information and ensuring they’re aware that the door is open should the ever wish to return.

The rise of internal mobility

Professionals are no longer thinking of career-growth in the traditional sense. They’ve stepped off the ladder and have begun exploring other parts of the organisation, signalling a stronger internal mobility trend.

Data shows that employees leave their employers for better development opportunities at similar rates as they leave for higher compensation. In 2023 employers will need to put more emphasis on developing their current workforce, offering regular trainings and certification programs to re-skill or up-skill internal candidates. Utilising predictive analytics to audit employees’ existing skillsets, shortlist promising internal candidates for difficult-to-fill roles, provide tailored career development content, and create personalised career pathways based on goals and interest areas will also be imperative.

Internal mobility is high-ROI: an average of 9X more effective than job boards in producing hires. It takes just 4 internal applications to result in 1 successful hire. These internal career pathways look different to each company: it could include lateral moves, upwards mobility, or cross-functional training and development.

 

Sustaining culture with a remote workforce

With a large majority of organisations successfully having adopted a hybrid work model, the issue that is now arising is how organisations can maintain, or even improve their culture, if so many people are working from home. Some organisations have turned to forcing everyone back in the office, despite what employees want or whether their roles require in-person interaction, but it is predicted that those organisations will likely see a dip in productivity – if not more employees handing in their resignations. 

A Korn Ferry survey showed that 79% of professionals said they will work fewer hours when they return to office than they currently do while working remotely. In another, 64% of respondents said going back to the office would impact their mental health negatively.

While hybrid workplaces have been predominantly great for employees, there is no doubt about the fact that they do affect culture. New hires make 17% fewer connections compared with pre-pandemic, according to a Vox report. In a hybrid workforce, people tend to communicate less with people outside of their departments and this can result in a decrease in collaboration, innovation and employees who feel isolated.

The good news is that a strong work culture in a hybrid workplace can exist, and there is a real opportunity for employers to evolve their approach to teamwork and collaboration in 2023.

Purpose and employee sentiment and wellbeing are they key to a strong company culture no matter the working arrangements. organisations need to look to instilling a strong sense of shared purpose across the board to unite people around a common goal. A shared purpose is a crucial unifier for employees and the very foundation from which the business builds and evolves its organisational culture. It is also inextricably linked with business performance. Research shows that having a strong purpose can contribute to the overall health and performance of a business, with purpose-oriented companies having 30% higher levels of innovation and 40% higher retention rates than companies that aren’t purpose-oriented (Deloitte).

Organisations need to review how they interact with employees and how they foster a culture in which people feel free to use their voices openly. As a starting point, companies need to have a solid understanding of how employees feel about their work lives. This can prove a challenging task when the workforce reaches far and wide, as is often the case in hybrid working models. But methods such as the Employee NPS Survey can play an important role in helping organisations gather and analyse data to understand employee sentiment.

Periodically surveying employees about their day-to-day workload and experiences, reactions to policy changes, new initiatives, or questions is a necessity to to help avert low employee morale and high attrition rates.

Work-life integration V Balance

Flexibility is a top priority for candidates in 2023, with 76% of professionals reporting they would prefer their workweeks to shift to non-traditional hours. Another reports that 88% of surveyed professionals said returning to the office will make home duties more difficult to handle.

Research indicates that 60% of jobseekers are looking for remote working options, while only 30% of advertised jobs are listed as remote roles. This provides an opportunity for hiring teams to bridge the gap, and realign their EVP with the current market.  In 2023, candidates will be foregoing the traditional 9-to-5 in favour of a more fluid schedule and looking for employers who offer work-life integration. Work-life integration involves blending both personal and professional responsibilities. Rather than viewing work and personal time as separate entities. Think working a few hours in the morning, taking an afternoon break for an appointment or to pick up the kids, then back to work in the evening.

Tailoring an employee’s work environment to their work style and personal circumstances can help create a productive, balanced work environment. It’s important to remember that there is no one-size-fits all approach as each individual works differently.

Doing more with less

We know we continue repeating ourselves here, but it’s not without need.  The need to do more, with less resources is one of the key challenges for hiring tea,ss.. Recruiter workloads increased 28% last year compared to pre-pandemic —with no signs of slowing down.

Business need to be leveraging technology to source better candidates, engage applicants, reduce time to fill, and improve candidate experience. Additionally, streamlining technology creates efficiencies and allows organisations to operate with leaner teams and do more with their budget. According to a LinkedIn survey, the average time to hire is 40 days, and according to SHRM 60% of candidates drop our do to a lengthy process. This is not only costly to you, but also results in a loss of productivity. It is important that your process is streamlined to offer the best candidate experience and to keep candidates engaged in your process. 

Pre-employee assessments are proven to cull out unqualified individuals early while providing your hiring manager with high-scoring candidates. Another helpful way to streamline processes is to automate scheduling. There’s no need for one round of phone interviews to schedule two more in-person interviews when everything can be done online in only a couple of minutes. By utilising assessments and video interviews, we were able to cut down Coles’ time to hire by 95%, saving them 20 business days. You can learn more about the case study here.

To navigate the 2023 talent market you need a strong and valid strategy. Every day, Testgrid works with various clients to help them optimise their recruitment and find the top talent. Get in touch to see how we can help, here!

View our recent Webinar: 2023-proof Your Recruitment Process or eBook : Future-proofing your Recruitment Process (or both), where we discuss what to prepare for in 2023.

The last few years have seen unprecedented disruptions in when, where, how, and even why we work.

From talent shortages to a recession on the horizon, the recruitment trends and the market is more uncertain and competitive than it ever has been and it is increasingly more important for organisations to ensure processes and procedures are in line with the expectations of the market.

We are going to look the coming recruitment trends and what they will bring to the job market, how changing market conditions will impact recruitment, and what employers can do to evolve their strategy to attract— and retain—the best talent.

State of the market

Job vacancies in the Australian labour market have not just recovered from the Covid pandemic, they’ve doubled. According to the latest Australian Bureau of Statistics release, there are 470,900 job vacancies in Australia, an 85% increase since November 2020. As of September, 2022 unemployment sits at an incredibly low 3.5% as Australia approaches what is considered full employment, meaning almost everyone willing and able to work is in a job.

The market as it stands is very candidate-driven, but that could change significantly as recent signals point to a downturn in the economy. Australia is forecast to enter a recession in 2023 due to a further slowing of the economy and a spike in unemployment. The governments increase in the permanent migration program ceiling to 195,000 from 130,000 in 2022-23 is set to help ease widespread, critical workforce shortages and strengthen the pipeline of skilled labour.

With these looming changes in mind, we explore the challenges and trends facing employers in 2023.

A look at short-term hires and boomerang employees

Instead of relying only on full-time employee (FTE) hires, the latest hiring trends show companies are increasingly adopting contract employment by looking to interim executives and professionals to meet scaling workforce needs.

According to a Korn Ferry survey, the number of global interim workers is expected to grow in 2023: to roughly 78 Million, from about 43 million in 2018. The same report also stated that 80% of large organisations plan to increase their use of contract workers in the coming years.

There are numerous benefits to a short-term hiring approach, one of most important ones being the cost. The cost of hiring temp workers is generally more effective than the cost of hiring permanent employees. In addition to this, people who choose interim or contract work are often highly skilled, project-based individuals who can quickly adapt to new environments. They can bring unique skill sets and experiences needed for finite projects during uncertain times, while minimising risk to your business.

When it comes to boomerang employees, they are not a new concept, in fact 15% of professionals who quit their jobs return to their former company, but in 2023, that figure is set to increase. We spoke about the benefits of re-hiring corporate alumni earlier in the year (you can read that piece here). In a tight talent market, these ex-employees can hold incredible value. They come up to speed faster, hold institutional knowledge and understand the culture and values of the company. A widely cited study out of Cornell University found that, in one large healthcare organisation, boomerang employees outperformed new external hires overall, particularly in people-centred or administrative roles.

2023 will see organisations putting more effort and resources into the off-boarding process, maintaining their talent pool by staying in touch with employees who leave and sending them updates on the latest developments within the company, vacancies and other relevant information and ensuring they’re aware that the door is open should the ever wish to return.

The rise of internal mobility

Professionals are no longer thinking of career-growth in the traditional sense. They’ve stepped off the ladder and have begun exploring other parts of the organisation, signalling a stronger internal mobility trend.

Data shows that employees leave their employers for better development opportunities at similar rates as they leave for higher compensation. In 2023 employers will need to put more emphasis on developing their current workforce, offering regular trainings and certification programs to re-skill or up-skill internal candidates. Utilising predictive analytics to audit employees’ existing skillsets, shortlist promising internal candidates for difficult-to-fill roles, provide tailored career development content, and create personalised career pathways based on goals and interest areas will also be imperative.

Internal mobility is high-ROI: an average of 9X more effective than job boards in producing hires. It takes just 4 internal applications to result in 1 successful hire. These internal career pathways look different to each company: it could include lateral moves, upwards mobility, or cross-functional training and development.

 

Sustaining culture with a remote workforce

With a large majority of organisations successfully having adopted a hybrid work model, the issue that is now arising is how organisations can maintain, or even improve their culture, if so many people are working from home. Some organisations have turned to forcing everyone back in the office, despite what employees want or whether their roles require in-person interaction, but it is predicted that those organisations will likely see a dip in productivity – if not more employees handing in their resignations. 

A Korn Ferry survey showed that 79% of professionals said they will work fewer hours when they return to office than they currently do while working remotely. In another, 64% of respondents said going back to the office would impact their mental health negatively.

While hybrid workplaces have been predominantly great for employees, there is no doubt about the fact that they do affect culture. New hires make 17% fewer connections compared with pre-pandemic, according to a Vox report. In a hybrid workforce, people tend to communicate less with people outside of their departments and this can result in a decrease in collaboration, innovation and employees who feel isolated.

The good news is that a strong work culture in a hybrid workplace can exist, and there is a real opportunity for employers to evolve their approach to teamwork and collaboration in 2023.

Purpose and employee sentiment and wellbeing are they key to a strong company culture no matter the working arrangements. organisations need to look to instilling a strong sense of shared purpose across the board to unite people around a common goal. A shared purpose is a crucial unifier for employees and the very foundation from which the business builds and evolves its organisational culture. It is also inextricably linked with business performance. Research shows that having a strong purpose can contribute to the overall health and performance of a business, with purpose-oriented companies having 30% higher levels of innovation and 40% higher retention rates than companies that aren’t purpose-oriented (Deloitte).

Organisations need to review how they interact with employees and how they foster a culture in which people feel free to use their voices openly. As a starting point, companies need to have a solid understanding of how employees feel about their work lives. This can prove a challenging task when the workforce reaches far and wide, as is often the case in hybrid working models. But methods such as the Employee NPS Survey can play an important role in helping organisations gather and analyse data to understand employee sentiment.

Periodically surveying employees about their day-to-day workload and experiences, reactions to policy changes, new initiatives, or questions is a necessity to to help avert low employee morale and high attrition rates.

Work-life integration V Balance

Flexibility is a top priority for candidates in 2023, with 76% of professionals reporting they would prefer their workweeks to shift to non-traditional hours. Another reports that 88% of surveyed professionals said returning to the office will make home duties more difficult to handle.

Research indicates that 60% of jobseekers are looking for remote working options, while only 30% of advertised jobs are listed as remote roles. This provides an opportunity for hiring teams to bridge the gap, and realign their EVP with the current market.  In 2023, candidates will be foregoing the traditional 9-to-5 in favour of a more fluid schedule and looking for employers who offer work-life integration. Work-life integration involves blending both personal and professional responsibilities. Rather than viewing work and personal time as separate entities. Think working a few hours in the morning, taking an afternoon break for an appointment or to pick up the kids, then back to work in the evening.

Tailoring an employee’s work environment to their work style and personal circumstances can help create a productive, balanced work environment. It’s important to remember that there is no one-size-fits all approach as each individual works differently.

Doing more with less

We know we continue repeating ourselves here, but it’s not without need.  The need to do more, with less resources is one of the key challenges for hiring tea,ss.. Recruiter workloads increased 28% last year compared to pre-pandemic —with no signs of slowing down.

Business need to be leveraging technology to source better candidates, engage applicants, reduce time to fill, and improve candidate experience. Additionally, streamlining technology creates efficiencies and allows organisations to operate with leaner teams and do more with their budget. According to a LinkedIn survey, the average time to hire is 40 days, and according to SHRM 60% of candidates drop our do to a lengthy process. This is not only costly to you, but also results in a loss of productivity. It is important that your process is streamlined to offer the best candidate experience and to keep candidates engaged in your process. 

Pre-employee assessments are proven to cull out unqualified individuals early while providing your hiring manager with high-scoring candidates. Another helpful way to streamline processes is to automate scheduling. There’s no need for one round of phone interviews to schedule two more in-person interviews when everything can be done online in only a couple of minutes. By utilising assessments and video interviews, we were able to cut down Coles’ time to hire by 95%, saving them 20 business days. You can learn more about the case study here.

To navigate the 2023 talent market you need a strong and valid strategy. Every day, Testgrid works with various clients to help them optimise their recruitment and find the top talent. Get in touch to see how we can help, here!

View our recent Webinar: 2023-proof Your Recruitment Process or eBook : Future-proofing your Recruitment Process (or both), where we discuss what to prepare for in 2023.

For the last few years, international students have not been able to enter the country as easily as they had before. Pre Covid-19, the international student population in Australia was 738,107. This year, the population is 422,095. In addition to this, graduate demands have never been higher and interest in graduate schemes has never been lower, making for the perfect storm in the graduate recruitment field.

With talent teams still feeling the burn from Covid-19 travel restrictions and more candidates going straight into entry level positions and skipping the graduate process all together, it is increasingly difficult to keep talent interested, even once they have been offered the job, but this doesn’t mean that it’s impossible. It simply means that graduate employers need to ensure their process is in line with market demands and that they’re in the best possible position from the beginning. 

Virtual recruiting isn’t going anywhere

We may be stating the obvious but virtual recruiting is here to stay. There’s a good chance that you’re reading this from the comfort of your home office, couch, or, even bed Research by the Institute of Student Employers (ISE) finds that 93% of employers have moved their recruitment process online. This may have been brought about by the pandemic, but virtual graduate recruitment is now business as usual with 48% of employers anticipating that their recruitment process will still be mainly virtual in five years’ time. Virtual recruitment can attract a higher number of candidates — potentially more than your current application and assessment process can handle. The process should be efficient for you and for candidates. You don’t need to read hundreds, or potentially thousands, of resumes. You don’t need to conduct dozens of interviews. There is a range of digital tools that can be a huge help for remote recruitment, from pre-employment assessments to video interview, when combined they can significantly reduce your time to hire.

Diversity really matters

ISE’s research into the biggest student recruitment trends looks at the commitment employers are making to diversity in hiring. Employers are broadening out their recruitment strategies to include targeted action on diversity strands including ethnicity, socio-economic background, disability, and gender. While 65% of employers have formal targets around diversity and have been actively developing their recruitment processes to make them more inclusive, almost all (99%) felt that they had more to do on diversity over the next five years.

According to Intel, diversity “will be a workplace deal-breaker for Gen Z.” Over a third of Gen-Zers say if given two similar offers, they would without a doubt choose the company they saw to be more diverse and inclusive.

What are you doing to stand out in this space? It is important to consider language used in graduate job descriptions as research suggests that the inclusion of certain words in a job description which are regarded as being more masculine could deter females from applying for the position, and vice versa. Do your job advertisements include a diversity and inclusion statement? Are you profiling current graduates? Student’s researching your program should be able to see profiles from a range of different candidates of different genders, backgrounds, disciplines etc. After all, you can’t be what you can’t see!

An efficient recruitment process is critical

22% of graduates  say that a long and complicated application process would deter them from applying. A poll carried out by Prospects supports this, discovering that university graduates are discouraged by long application forms that asked, (what they felt were) unnecessary questions or that require candidates to repeat information already supplied.

Some of the most common causes of prolonged time to hire are:

• Having a poorly structured and unoptimised hiring process 
• Lack of communication between the company and the hiring manager
• Multiple rounds of lengthy interviews
• Poor online presence

Pre-employee assessments are proven to cull out unqualified individuals early while providing your hiring manager with high-scoring candidates. Another helpful way to streamline processes is to automate scheduling. There’s no need for one round of phone interviews to schedule two more in-person interviews when everything can be done online in only a couple of minutes. By utilising assessments and video interviews, we were able to cut down Coles’ time to hire by 95%, saving them 20 business days. You can learn more about the case study here.

Make upskilling a priority

The Bright Network’s research shows that 95% of graduates want employers to be actively involved in their career upskilling. Upskilling refers to learning new skills to improve your performance – and possibilities – in your current career. Development should be a key part of employer branding in graduate recruitment strategies and employers should consider how they can bring in mentorship and training into their graduate development programmes.

Through upskilling, companies can save money by increasing the abilities of their current employees, instead of spending time and budget on hiring new workers. By providing employees with upskill training opportunities, organisations can make employees feel that they are valued and have a dedicated future within the company.

Wellbeing and the work-life balance

As we heard earlier, the job market has changed for good as a result of hybrid working. Graduates coming out of university have done the majority of their studies remotely and will expect their move into the professional world to be equally as flexible.

Work life balance, and people and company culture are more important to graduates than pay. When asked, 61% of graduates cited having a good work-life balance as most important, and 39% said having a good salary. Therefore, the ability to convey your organisation’s company culture, values and work-life is critical during the recruitment process. A realistic job preview, especially in a virtual setting, is the most effective way to bring your organisation to life.

Ensuring you have an effective recruitment strategy for graduate hires will ensure your businesses has the talent it needs to head into the future. Offering graduate talent a fair, engaging, digital assessment experience is where Testgrid can help. Contact us to learn more

5 Things You Didn’t Know About Psychometric Testing – But Probably Should

Psychometric tests are objective and standardised tests, based on a scientific method that is used to measure candidates’ mental ability and behavioural style. Typically designed to measure a job applicant’s suitability for a role, the tests are based on personality characteristics, aptitude (or cognitive ability), and can be custom-designed to ensure cultural add.

There are a lot of misconceptions about psychometric tests; here are 5 things to note that will provide clarity and focus to your recruitment process:

1. One size doesn’t fit all

When it comes to choosing a psychometric test for your organisation’s recruitment campaign it’s best not to take a cookie-cutter approach. Every organisation is different, not all tests are the same, and not all will work for your organisation. Any testing suite will also look different within your organisation, depending on the role and what is relevant to test. Some tests are better than others, not all will give you the desired outcome (trial and error is  always your friend!).

2. Psychometric testing is the best predictor of job performance

The statistics are in and the numbers don’t lie. Psychometric tests really are the best indicator of how a candidate will perform on the job. Cognitive ability and conscientiousness are the strongest predictors of future job performance. Also, amongst the various different elements measured, problem solving ability is most strongly linked to success on the job!

3. Psychometric testing can reduce staff turnover, improve engagement and retention

Research shows that psychometric tests can reduce staff turnover by 30-40%.

Psychometric testing helps to make informed recruitment decisions and select the best person for the job. It helps to also make the recruitment process more tailored to the individual. For example, personality tests are often used to inform a behavioural interview. This approach ensures that both candidate and company make the right choice – ultimately leading to a more successful match and long-lasting working relationship.

4. Psychometric testing is objective and legally defensible

Psychometric tests are objective – unlike interviews and ‘gut feel’. The candidate either does, or does not, have the required numerical/verbal/logical reasoning skills required to do the job. There is no vagueness or recruiter bias, it’s clear to everyone whether the candidate is the right person for the job. As an employer, it is important that you use objective methodologies in your recruitment process, to ensure fair and equal assessment of all candidates.

5. Psychometric testing goes beyond recruitment

Most organisations use psychometric testing only in the recruitment process and then file away the results once the selection decision has been made. But test results are valid for another 24 months, and can be utilised for the on-boarding and development of new hires. A new employee’s behavioural profile can help direct their development path within the organisation or assist with how they integrate into workplace culture. It can help them to understand their own preferred work behaviours and how to maximise their strengths and seize growth opportunities.

 

Want to know more? Contact us today to ask us about how psychometric testing can improve the success of your recruitment campaign.

The dedicated and compassionate individuals working in the aged care sector form the very essence of its existence. According to the findings of the aged care royal commission, these remarkable individuals hold a pivotal role in shaping the aged care journey for older Australians and their loved ones. As highlighted in the commission’s comprehensive report, the task of recruiting, retaining, and empowering a workforce capable of providing the expected level of care is undeniably intricate and multifaceted.

Aged Care: the fastest growing health segment in Australia.

As the largest demographic of our society ages, the demand for aged care services grows rapidly. In fact, so rapidly that aged care recruitment is experiencing significant and critical challenges in keeping up with demand.

Recruiting for aged care: How do we build a skilled, adaptive and diverse workforce of aged care employees with integrity?

As per Professor John G Kelly’s findings, the aged care industry needs to recruit 20,000 new employees per year, for the next six years, to be able to meet demand.

At face value, this level of recruitment is a massive challenge just in terms of the sheer volume of new employees needed. But the even bigger challenge is: how do we ensure that the aged care workforce we end up recruiting is of high integrity, with the right skills, highly adaptive and diverse in nature?

Challenges and Solutions:

Challenge 1: Recruiting for aged care – How do we improve the speed and efficiency of large-volume recruitment?

The costs of aged care recruitment are high, and in some parts of Australia, particularly rural and remote areas, there are already significant shortages of skilled candidates. Increased competition for staff in coming years will only heighten the challenges of recruitment.

Solution: Video Interviewing of candidates.

Video interviewing with a tool such as Vieple, helps you reach candidates near and far, interstate and overseas, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Video provides a robust process, reduces recruitment time, and vastly improves your ability to land the best candidates in a competitive market.  Read more about video interviewing here.

Challenge 2: Retention – How do we make them want to stay?

To improve employee retention and performance in aged care workers, several critical factors have been identified as contributing to long-term engagement and loyalty:

Training and development

Job status and recognition

Job satisfaction

Developing career prospects

Solution: High performer analysis, values and motivation assessments

It takes a special kind of person to want to work in the aged healthcare sector. Some would even say it’s almost a kind of ‘calling’ to look after the aged. To find the right candidates, it helps to have organisation-specific, tailored assessments and tests to gauge values and ascertain an individual’s motivations.

By the use of tools such as emotional intelligence, behavioural, values and motivation assessments, a recruiter can more readily identify, recruit and retain the right talent.

Challenge 3: Career pathways – How do we ensure adequate learning and career development?

Career pathways are integral to employee retention strategies and provide an excellent opportunity to work with training providers to develop skills and competencies needed now, and into the future.

The aged care sector needs to work closely with vocational education and training providers as well as higher education providers to ensure that this happens.

Solution: Workforce competencies and training needs analysis

Workforce Competency Assessments help identify your candidates’ abilities to do the job, while a Training Needs Analysis ascertains what additional training is necessary so you can plan training programs accordingly.

When your employees learn new skills and feel progress in their career path, they feel valued and invested in the long-term growth of your organisation. They’ll be more likely to stay and grow and become loyal and highly skilled aged care workers.

Want to know more about how we help solve the challenges of aged care recruitment?

Contact us today and ask about our solutions for the aged care sector.

Diversity in the workforce was once considered to be quite a controversial topic. But today, within recruitment circles the buzz around ensuring ‘diversity’ is growing like wildfire – especially within graduate recruitment – and for good reason.

It’s now widely recognised that organisations with a mix of people from different backgrounds and with varying life experiences, foster a richer workplace culture that functions more efficiently and boosts overall company performance. Diversity works because it widens the net, opens minds, and encourages innovation and creativity, which in a rapidly changing world is critical for organisational success.

But how do we ensure that the graduate candidates we are recruiting come from as diverse a pool as possible?

Three ways to build diversity into your graduate recruitment program:

The key to ensuring diversity in your organisation is to actually build it into the recruitment process from the very beginning: to recruit diverse talent at entry-level and from there build the pipeline.

Here are three very powerful ways to build diversity from the bottom of your graduate recruitment funnel:

1. Testing and Assessments

Psychometric tests and skills assessments that are objective, bias-free, fair and standardised across all candidates ensure that the recruitment process is based on a robust framework that virtually eliminates recruiter bias. This means that you increase your chances of getting the right person for the job – not just the one that the recruiter feels a cultural or gender-based affiliation for.

Well-designed tests and assessments manage any unconscious or conscious bias during the recruitment process to ensure a fair and objective result.

2. Diversity Norms

It is important to test your candidates against a population of people that best represents their characteristics. By assessing your candidates’ performance against specific norm groups, be they gender-specific norms, indigenous norms and/or ESL (English as a Second Language) norms, you can measure how your graduate candidates compare to relevant population segments.

3. Video Technology

You can significantly increase your chances of hiring diversity by ensuring that a wider (and therefore more diverse) pool of graduate candidates is given an opportunity to participate in the recruitment process by utilising cutting-edge technologies to make the process much more accessible. For example, video interviewing technology such as Vieple, helps you easily and affordably access a much wider pool of first round candidates from regional areas, interstate and internationally, as well as those with busy family and work schedules.

Want to know more about increasing the diversity through your graduate recruitment?

Testgrid uses a scientific approach by applying relevant data to support best-practice processes in recruitment, development, cultural and gender diversity, social outcomes, performance management and building inspiring workplace cultures.

Want to know more? Contact us today and ask about our solutions for graduate recruitment programs

The right apprentice may be right in front of you, but they might slip by without you noticing. How does this happen?

If you’re not asking the right questions, mining for the right skills, or identifying important behavioural indicators, opportunities to snap up top-tier apprentices may be missed.

Apprenticeships are an excellent opportunity for employers to attract, train and retain talented candidates who may not meet standard job-experience requirements.

Trainee roles offer motivated, focussed and proactive candidates the chance to break through the “experience barrier” and build their career from the ground up.

But how do you know which candidates have what it takes to make it and how do you find the right apprentice?

Take the guess work out of the equation.

Identifying the specific skills, aptitude and even personality traits your business requires from a trainee is important. Ensuring you know what you need before hiring your apprentice is vital.

An apprentice who seems a good fit on paper or in an interview may prove to be the wrong choice once in the role.

Don’t rely on guesswork to inform your hiring decisions, make your first choice the right choice.

How to find the right apprentice.

Ask yourself: what does my company need from an apprentice?

A natural communicator with keen business instincts?

Or a candidate with strong leadership potential?

A trainee with a natural understanding of safety issues?

At Testgrid, we specialise in helping organisations identify the right trainees for the right role. We’ll provide you with tailored talent assessment, management and development tools to ensure you find the best-fit for your business needs.

Our assessment products provide critical measurements of candidates’ competencies including:

Verbal reasoning skills

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We know the story all too well. The relationship ends, the respective parties move on and the chapter closes for good. But, does it really have to be that way? Let’s look at the benefits of staying friends with your ex and hiring corporate alumni.

So, is taking back an ex a good idea?

It is no secret that today, people change jobs more frequently than ever before. More specifically, Tony Audino, a Founder of Microsoft Alumni Network, stated back in 2018 that “More than 20 percent of workers change roles every year” while further predicting that the amount of disruption in the workforce will only increase in the upcoming years. It turns out that he was absolutely right. The market has never been tighter and more candidate-driven than it is today.

However, The Alumni Enterprise recently reported that an astonishing 72% of past employees would return to the company they used to work for! Additionally, the same source says that 24% of employees who turnover end up regretting their decision to leave.

With that being said, rekindling things with you ex and staying in touch with your former employees makes a lot of sense in today’s competitive job market. Not only does this group of talent know your company, but you also know them, their skills, talents, strengths and even weaknesses.

“There’s no recruitment method more cost- or time-efficient than rehiring reliable former employees,” wrote Issie Lapowsky of Inc. Magazine. “Some businesses call them corporate alumni. Some call them boomerangs, but almost all businesses will admit that rehiring top performers can drastically increase their return on investment.”

The benefits or recruiting corporate alumni

Where do you begin when it comes to rehiring?

We know that making the first move can be awkward, so we look at the things you can do to optimise your rehiring process and minimise drawbacks.

Maintain a talent pool

When employees leave your organisation, stay in touch by adding them to your talent pool. Doing so allows you to send them updates on the latest developments within the company, vacancies and other relevant information.  The candidates in your talent pool aren’t limited to just former employees with a permanent, full-time contract, by the way. A contingent worker – meaning a freelancer, independent contractor, consultant, etc. – who performed satisfactorily and who fit in the company culture should also be added to your talent pool.

Develop an Alumni Program

A Corporate Alumni program will help you build and maintain relationships with your former employees, but you have to ensure your program has a clear goal. What will the framework be and how will you promote it? Will you provide access to discounts or special perks? Will you host events or activities? How will you keep in touch?

An Alumni Program benefits the organisation by:

• Creating advocates for life and ensuring that an employee exit isn’t necessarily the end of a relationship
• Building on your talent pipeline for access to qualified boomerangs or potential re-hires.
• Strengthening your employer brand – it says a lot about your organisation’s values if ex-employees are willing to advocate for you
• Increasing loyalty amongst current employees when they see the value you add for alumni

Interview before you rehire

While it may be tempting to jump back into the familiar deep-end and skip this part of the hiring process altogether, we don’t recommend it. It is still important to have an interview process in place to:

• Understand why they left in the first place (if you didn’t have an exit interview) and if you did, you can compare the reasons and see if the same issues might still apply.
• Ask the former employee the same questions as any other candidate so you’ll be able to assess and score all candidates fairly.
• Set expectations on both sides

Re-board

Things have undoubtedly changed since your ex former employee left the company, even if they were gone for a relatively short period of time. New people may have joined, old colleagues may have moved on and new ways of working have perhaps replaced old ones. This is why you will need to have a re-boarding process in place for your boomerang employees. Elements you may want to cover include:

• New systems and technologies the employee will be using + relevant training
• Remote work and office policies
• Team collaboration practices and team building activities

You can use your existing employee onboarding process as a basis and adjust it where necessary to create your re-boarding program.

Rehiring a former employee can be highly beneficial for your organisation. Your alumni know the culture of your company and they can bring a fresh perspective to the business.

If you’d like to talk to us about ways to re-engage previous employees, get in touch!

Ghosting, the practice of disappearing without a word or a trace, has become a familiar and costly frustration of many human resource managers across industries. You’ve completed the interview process, decided on your top candidate, and sent out the offer letter—sounds like a win, right? Unfortunately for employers, the hiring process isn’t quite as predictable as it once was. The post-pandemic landscape means that the tables have turned and it is increasingly more common for candidates to cut off communications with employers.  In fact, candidates ghosting employers has increased by 10-20% over the past year alone. What’s more, according to a recent LinkedIn report, 95% of recruiters say they’ve experienced ghosting and a full 40% of candidates believe it’s reasonable to ghost an employer.

So, why are candidates ghosting employers?

In a candidate-driven job market, this new trend is leaving employers frustrated and confused. So what is behind this behavioral shift? Research by Robert Half found that 33% of candidates who cut off communications did because of a poor interview process – encompassing everything from unconducive interview scheduling to lack of transparency about the company, or even too many rounds of interviews. Another 23% ghosted because the job was not what they expected, and 16% disappeared without a word because the prospective employer implemented a mandatory return-to-office policy.

These findings underscore that even as employers evaluate candidates, the candidates are evaluating the company and the job in return – and they are expressing their opinions with their actions. They can afford to do so too, as the research shows that 29% of candidates who ghosted did so because they had received another job offer.

The underlying reason runs deeper than candidates simply having a choice. The Robert Half findings imply that employers are often not being sufficiently flexible about meeting candidates’ needs. Even the hiring managers surveyed recognise that, with 40% saying they lost out on a potential hire because the company could not or would not match the candidate’s desired schedule flexibility. A further 35% admitted the company had taken too long to make an offer – and the candidate moved on. And 24% said the company could not or would not meet the candidate’s salary expectations, whether these were reasonable or not.

What can employers do?

While this trend may be on the rise, there is a lot you can do to improve the talent journey at your company and ensure that you’re keeping candidates engaged—and communicative—throughout the process. Developing and implementing a proactive strategy to ensure a high-touch candidate experience can help you significantly minimise the risk of being ghosted. Here’s how to put one in place.

Develop a clear and concise talent acquisition strategy

Attracting the candidates you want starts with a recruitment strategy built on transparency and communication. The best way to do that is to work with your team to clarify your business needs for each hire and be sure that you’re keeping candidates in the loop from the beginning.  Have you made it clear from the outset what your processes and timelines are?  Do the candidates understand the stages and the gaps between each stage?  In addition to increasing the success of your recruitment efforts, this type of strategy can also help you tell your employer brand story in an authentic way. The best part? It could help to turn your candidates into your advocates or even clients. In fact, 64% of candidates who have a great talent journey say they intend to grow their relationship with the employer—even if they don’t get the job.

Communicate, communicate, communicate.

Far too many employers have ghosted candidates in the past, and it is a practice they’ve become used to, but when it comes to the interview process, the majority of candidates agree: there is nothing worse than being left in the dark. In fact,  48% of candidates feel frustrated by employers who don’t keep them updated on where they stand. The solution? You can manage each stage of the process with automated messaging so that candidates know where they are.  You know your process inside out, but candidates do not and often think the worst.  Those 48 hours that you are waiting for feedback from the hiring manager can feel like 48 days to the candidate, and you are allowing time for other organisations to poach your talent.

Above all, don’t hesitate to send a follow-up note if you don’t hear back right away. This is a great way to let candidates know that you’re not planning to ghost them and makes it significantly less likely that they’ll ghost you.

Speed up your decision-making process

According to an SHRM study, the average vacancy is taking 42 – 63 days to fill at the moment, but yet top talent is only on the market for 10 days.  So if we cannot go through our process more efficiently we are highly likely to lose the best talent to our competitors, are we then really surprised that candidates are ghosting? Employers should be aiming for a frictionless process that decreases time-to-hire without compromising the quality of hire.  During the early days of the pandemic, Testgrid worked closely with Coles when they had to suddenly hire 13,000 roles in 2 weeks, to keep the toilet paper on the shelves. We helped them streamline their hiring process, without compromising the quality of candidates that were being hired.  So within just a couple of days, the candidates were applying, being assessed for job fit using a 2-minute personality assessment, completing a recorded video interview that was screened within 24 hours by the store managers, and then an expedited onboarding process. You can read more about that here.  Streamlining the process is possible, so the question is what would that look like in your organisation? Are you utilising technology and assessments to expedite the process?

Although candidate ghosting is certainly a concerning trend, it doesn’t have to negatively impact your organisation. By being transparent, communicative, and putting your candidates first, you can establish a strong relationship and minimise the risk of being ghosted.

Ready to optimise your candidate experience? Learn how in our latest guide, where you will discover how to keep candidates happy and engaged. Want to talk to us about a personalised approach, get in touch!

When we talk about the obstacles to providing a positive Candidate Experience (CX), we could simplify down to 3 factors.

1. Cost – “it costs too much for X system to improve our CX”
2. Time – “it takes time to provide quality feedback to candidates”
3. Resources – “we don’t have the people to communicate to candidates”

Notice anything? The above applies to every aspect of your business. These excuses are no more valid for not achieving your CX goals than they are for missing hiring or sales targets.

So, what is getting in the way of providing a good CX? In this article we will look at some key components that make a good CX process, we will address the impact of poor CX and some examples of good candidate experience.

Some tactics to offer a great candidate experience from LiveHire:

• Make researching your company easy for candidates – be sure to fill your personalised careers page with company related videos or testimonials, and encourage past and present employees to review your organisation on websites such as Glassdoor.
• Rely on candidate referrals and employee ambassadors – implement a recruitment process that allows you to create a personalised talent community so candidates can express interest in your organisation. Having the ability to express interest in an organisation removes application barriers for diverse candidates.
• Let candidates know where they stand – empower candidates by giving them power to track their application.
• Give candidates a mobile apply option and ensure your career page is simple to navigate – giving candidates the option of applying from anywhere, combined with the option of easy apply makes the application more accessible and improves their overall experience.
• Help candidates prep for the interview – by using a technology platform that allows for recruiters to easily connect with candidates through on-platform messaging and SMS, they’ll feel like they can ask you anything.
• Provide next steps and follow up with candidates – keep your candidates up to date with any changes in their hiring status. As per the above, cost, time and resources don’t cut it as excuses.
• Invest in creating engagement with new hires before their start date – use a platform that allows you to interact with candidates via SMS or on platform messaging.
• Increase communication with candidates and provide feedback – this one is such a given that we aren’t even going to explain further. Just do it.
• Focus on the business impact of candidate experience – 60% of your candidates are dropping out of the recruitment funnel due to lengthy applications and 64% state they will take their business elsewhere due to bad CX.

In our upcoming webinar, we look at the above and other ways to improve your CX.

The Statistics

Examples of Good CX

Rachel O’Connell, VP, Human Resources at Great Wolf Resorts, was featured in a recent episode of the Recruiting Futures podcast, where she shared how the chain of indoor water parks view CX. She stated they view candidates the same as they do their guests, which is evident in the Jobs section of their website, from where candidates can search for their new role with the same system as if looking at one of their lodges, to texting “Greatwolf” to a phone number to schedule an interview.

Some other examples of great CX moves made by organisations are:

• Bond University when they implemented Testgrid along with our proctoring service and achieved a 99% completion rate.
• Coles, thanks to Testgrid, created a short assessment process integrated into their application process that reduced drop off, is WCAG compliant, and provides an option for candidates to give feedback.
• Curtin University when they changed their candidate interview video review time to 30 seconds using Vieple, allowing candidates to re-record and ease candidate anxiety.
• Deloitte surveying 3,000 candidates to understand their career goals as part of their continuous improvement plan for their career website.
• Spectrum Health System setting up and preparing candidates for interviews, where they meet with hiring managers and are promised a decision that same day.
• Capital One launched a comprehensive metrics campaign, benchmarked on asking every single person who applies a series of questions about their treatment, with a 50 to 80% response rate.

Upcoming webinar

We will be discussing the above and much more in our next webinar, we have teamed up with LiveHire to discuss the Obstacles Impacting your Candidate Experience.