Candidate Experience From End-to-End:What’s Your Weakest Link?

How Would Job Seekers Rate Your Candidate Experience? Spoiler alert: Your candidate experience is probably worse than you think it is. What we have here — and in various other parts of the hiring process — is an experience gap between how employers perceive they’re faring versus how candidates rate their proficiency.

More than ever before, job seekers and employers are aligned in recognizing the critical importance of an end-to-end candidate experience. This recognition is a first step toward bridging the candidate experience gaps, but there is much work to be done to overcome the failures and frustrations that arise during different stages of the hiring process.

1

feel they do a good job setting expectations upfront and communicating throughout the process

78%0% 100%

THERE’S A DISCONNECT

of candidates

of employers

say employers do a good job of setting expectations in terms of communication at the beginning of a potential hiring interaction

47%0% 100%50%

50%

What’s Your Weakest Link?

Any business process is only as strong as the weakest link — and candidate experience is no different.

By understanding the complex perceptions, attitudes and behaviors of both candidates and hiring managers, you’ll be able to better identify and address where you fall short in your current process, which may be putting you a step behind your competitors.

Exclusive research and insights from CareerBuilder’s 2017 Candidate Experience Study1 will show you what your peers and competitors have identified as shortcomings in their process, illustrate the role of technology to help improve your process, and provide tips to make things easier for both you as well as prospective employees.

1 CareerBuilder partnered with an independent third-party (Inavero) to survey 5,016 candidates from the United States and Canada, as well as 1,500 hiring managers in the U.S.

2

say the employee experience is very or extremely important

82%

believe employers should treat candidates with the same respect as current employees

86%

say employers treat candidates with the same level of respect and accountability as current employees

49%

But there’s a disconnect here compared to what job seekers are saying

Candidate Experience Matters! As many as 4 out of 5 candidates ( 78 percent ) say the overall candidate experience they receive is an indicator of how a company values its people.

The lines between the candidate and employee experience are blending — at least in the eyes of candidates, as 75 percent say their candidate and onboarding experience with a company is the first part of their broader employee experience with that company.

That’s why it’s all the more important to partner with technology vendors who are experts in end-to-end human capital management : so you can better manage and understand how to improve your candidate experience as well as employee experience.

3

Hiring Managers Agree: BOTH THE CANDIDATE AND EMPLOYEE EXPERIENCE MATTER

say they view the candidate experience as very or extremely important

82% of hiring managers

of hiring managers

of job seekers

of job seekers

The Process Leaves Much to be Desired Only 1 in 3 employers have applied to one of their companies’ jobs to see what the process is like. Of those, nearly half ( 46 percent ) say the process was “very good.”

Compare that to the mere 32 percent of candidates who rate their most recent experience as “very good.”

Understanding which stages of the job search/hiring process are the most frustrating for candidates can help you address these weak links in your candidate experience going forward.

4

Even though these percentages may appear to show slight differences, they are very large in terms of volume when you look at the stages together. Nearly 6 in 10 (58 percent) candidates report that the action and engagement stages hurt their experience the most, while only 43 percent of employers see these stages as the most likely to contribute to a poor candidate experience.

5

OrientationEvaluating both yourself and the market to understand who is hiring and what job opportunities are available

Engagement Interacting with employers, interviewing and considering job offers based on company reputation, employment brand and application experience

ActionApplying for jobs, continuously researching companies, and prepping for potential interviews

ConsiderationBecoming more interactive and taking a deeper look at companies and what it would be like to work there

Post-acceptance/OnboardingThe time between accepting the job offer and when you begin your first day working, including employment screening and communication with your new manager, among other things

FROM A CANDIDATE’S PERSPECTIVE:

Here’s a side-by-side comparison of the stages candidates say hurt the candidate experience overall, based on recent experience, compared with what employers think is most likely to cause a poor candidate experience.

FROM AN EMPLOYER’S PERSPECTIVE:

Orientation16%

Consideraton14%

Action28%

Engagement30%

Post-acceptance / Onboarding

12%Orientation20%

Consideraton21%

Action24%

Engagement19%

Post-acceptance / Onboarding

17%

What Can You Do to Improve the Overall Candidate Experience? Start by setting expectations so candidates don’t feel like they’re left in the dark.

Most candidates (83 percent) say it would greatly improve the overall experience if employers could set expectations by providing a clear timeline of the hiring process.

Make sure to communicate regularly. After all, the No. 1 frustration during the overall job search is the lack of response from employers (cited by 52 percent of all job seekers).

say employers continuously communicating status updates to them would greatly improve the overall experience

81%

How to set communication expectations with job seekers

want them clearly explained in the job description

53%

want an automated email sent to them after applying

33%

6

of job seekers

of job seekers

of job seekers

WHAT DO JOB SEEKERS WANT?

A Career Site Can Help Deliver an Optimal Experience to Curious Candidates A considerable amount of frustration and negative experience is the result of a poor employer career site.

An employer’s career site is important for getting key information, according to 89 percent of job seekers. Does your career site offer up pertinent information to candidates?

Can candidates typically tell what it would be like to work for a company based on their career site?

7

11% of candidates agree strongly

WHY CANDIDATES THINK YOUR CAREER SITE IS SO IMPORTANT

45%of candidates agree Click here to put your career site to work for you and

portray your employment brand to potential candidates.

An Applicant Tracking System Can Improve Your Overall Candidate ExperienceIn today’s growing HR software market, any candidate management system you choose should add hours back to your day and help with ongoing communication to ensure a better overall candidate experience.

An applicant tracking system (ATS) plays a key role in candidate experience management and improvement efforts. It is central in the two stages of the hiring process with the most reported frustration and negative experiences among candidates: action and engagement.

Organizations currently utilizing an ATS reported placing more emphasis on the candidate, employee and hiring manager experiences.

utilizing an ATS said that recruitment and human capital management technology makes finding great talent easier than ever

78%

Still, more than

across all company sizes do not have an ATS; also, 68% of employers with fewer than 500 employees do not have an ATS

1/2

8

of employers

of employers

EMPLOYERS WEIGH IN ON ATS USE

Click here to learn how an ATS can help you with ongoing communication, among other benefits, which will ultimately deliver a better candidate experience.

As You Screen Candidates, They’re Judging You

Once the hiring process is in the finalization stage,

one would assume the process would be seamless with

minimal frustration, yet candidates are still reporting that

they’ve had bad experiences at this stage.

CANDIDATES ARE JUDGING YOU

say the employment screening experience has an impact on how favorably they view a potential employer

48%

Candidates say there’s room for improvement

would rate the employment screening experience as ‘easy’ when asked about the last time they had to complete one. This leaves significant opportunity for improvement.

59%

9

of candidates

of candidates

Click here to find out how to keep top talent from talking

to other companies while they wait to receive employment

screening results — and thereby provide a better candidate

experience throughout their journey.

How Does Technology Fit Into Your Onboarding and Human Capital Management Processes? Similar to employment screening, once the hiring process is in the post-acceptance and onboarding stage, the expectation is for your process to be seamless and frustration-free for new hires – yet a noticeable number of candidates say this stage has not been ideal.

Because of this, 2 in 5 candidates (40 percent) say they’ve experienced a lack of communication in the past between when they accepted the job and their first day of work.

Click here to take advantage of this big opportunity for a quick win by enabling technology to play a role in your onboarding process.

10

say the onboarding experience is the first part of the employee experience within an organization

YET ONLY

say they have a formal process in place for post-hire – but pre-start date – communication and interactions

47%

71%of employers

EMPLOYERS ARE CONTRADICTING THEMSELVES

of employers

Providing an Optimal Candidate Experience Should Be at the Core of What You Do One in 4 employers (25 percent) says the amount of time it took to fill their last opening was too long. We get it: The hiring process takes time and has its ups and downs. But don’t lose sight of the plight of candidates.

Job seekers on average say it takes them about two and a half months — or 10 to 11 weeks — to find a job, from when the search begins to when they accept an offer. During this time, they spend just over five hours a week on average on job search-related activities.

Your job is hard — but so is the candidate’s. That’s why it’s crucial to understand how to improve your candidate experience — and technology can help you get there.

11

say that the job search process is one of the most stressful things in life

73%

As much frustration as you face, KEEP IN MIND THAT IT’S A TRYING TIME FOR CANDIDATES AS WELL.

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About CareerBuilderCareerBuilder is a global, end-to-end human capital solutions company focused on helping employers find, hire and manage great talent. Combining advertising, software and services, CareerBuilder leads the industry in recruiting solutions, employment screening and human capital management. It also operates top job sites around the world. Owned by TEGNA Inc. (NYSE:TGNA), Tribune Media (NYSE:TRCO) and McClatchy (NYSE:MNI), CareerBuilder and its subsidiaries operate in the United States, Europe, Canada and Asia. For more information, visit www.careerbuilder.com