New jobs market data reports good health. How the recruitment experience you offer will affect your clients’ retention rates. And just how many businesses are really GDPR-compliant?

2018 priorities: Recruitment experience and retention

When you list the priorities of your business, does it include improving the candidate experience? If not, you could be underperforming in key areas.

That is the finding of a new industry survey. It says that candidates’ experiences at the recruitment and onboarding stages will play a significant role in their retention. A high retention rate is perhaps the most prized performance metric of all top recruiters.

Korn Ferry, the industry consultants, polled 361 professionals across multiple industries. It found that the top reason for low retention was that roles or organisations failed to match the expectations of the candidate.

The findings suggest a failure among employers and recruiters to communicate the realities of work, says Korn Ferry VP of marketing Neil Griffiths. “It is important that organisations have a clear employer brand to share with candidates that is true to the company and reflects the day-to-day culture.”

The survey data would suggest this is more prevalent than one might think. 93 per cent of respondents stated that retention rates of new hires was concern. 82 per cent said that they would leave a role that did not match the expectations or experience presented in the recruitment process.

Onboarding and aftercare

Transparency and openness are invaluable assets for any recruiter. But forging strong ties with clients and employers is equally vital. Because smarter recruiting means identifying problems, and then solving them on all fronts.

This is the advice of Andrew Hyland, the head of recruitment at Macmillan Cancer Support. At Macmillan, he says, it is onboarding which plays the vital role in retention. And he says this is true of all organisations, across every industry. “Create a best-in-class programme, make it special, and then use it as a competitive advantage and a differentiator in our marketplace.”

66 per cent of recruits will remain at a company for more than three years, says Hyland, using data from Boston Consulting Group. The figures would certainly incentivise recruiters to work with clients who offer a better onboarding process. It may also encourage talent managers to work more closely with those who don’t -and help them address their shortcomings.

But recruitment experience does not stop with the successful applicant. Recruiters still have responsibilities to rejected candidates, too. Recruitment software tools like chatbots and communication integrations show positive impact on the candidacy experience of failed applicants. Have you considered how well your aftercare is performing?

April Jobs Data

With June fast approaching, we have received last month’s jobs data. Which means it is time to analyse the figures, and begin our plans for the third quarter of 2018.

Data from the Association of Professional Staffing Companies (APSCo) recorded a continued strengthening of the permanent placements market. Temporary and contract positions, meanwhile, extended their sluggish performance for another month.

Recruiters reported an average 9 per cent year-on-year increase in permanent placements in April. Standout industries included financial services (19 per cent increase) and Information Technology (10 per cent growth).

While this boom in long term placements saw the number of permanent vacancies fall, it did so by just 2 per cent. The disparity suggests an increased appetite among businesses to secure key skills into the future.

Meanwhile, the number of engaged contractors fell by 17 per cent year-on-year. Vacancies for short term workers also dropped by 9 per cent. The figures may show that contract workers are choosing to accept ongoing roles, as demand for contract work tails off. This is certainly the case within IT, which saw a dramatic 35 per cent decrease in the number of contract workers over twelve months.

Even in short-term recruiting, it was financial services that once again bucked the trend. While full time vacancies were up 10 per cent, year-on-year, the demand for financial contractors grew by 20 per cent.

Addressing the promising data, Ann Swain, the Chief Executive of APSCo, said: “The market for highly skilled talent continues to escalate.”

Last Friday was ‘GDPR Day’ – May 25th – the day new data protection laws came into affect. How ready was the world of business? Not ready at all, according to a poll by industry analysts SAS.

In a recent survey of affected enterprises, they found that only 7 per cent of organisations had fulfilled their new privacy and data protection obligations. And just 35 per cent had expected to finish their compliance duties prior to last week’s deadline.

Does that sound like you? Then don’t panic: Friday’s deadline was not the starting gun for costly litigations against businesses. In fact, GDPR is not expected to see much of an increase in legal actions at all.

The common misconception is that data breaches are now illegal. This is not true. The rules are written with the expectation that data breaches will remain a sadly inevitable part of the corporate world for the foreseeable future.

Instead, the GDPR is there to make sure companies react properly when a data breach does occur. The passing of last week’s deadline should be viewed as an opportunity to manage the way we collect, store, and use personal data a little more carefully in future.

This optimism appears to be the prevailing view – according to the SAS poll. More than 90% of respondents said that the GDPR would improve their data governance processes. Almost 70% of businesses believe that the GDPR will improve relationships with customers, and trust in their own brand. Perhaps every cloud really does have a silver lining?

If you are still getting to grips with the regulations, head over to our GDPR Hub. It contains information, news, and free resources to set you off on the right path towards compliance.