Taking a shot in the dark.
Teams are spending more, but what's working?
While 64% of companies have increased investment in sourcing, 63% admit they aren't measuring return on investment. Amidst forces like labor shortages and shifts to remote work (among many other things), sourcing strategies have become incredibly reactive. As resilience becomes a core capability for organizations, hiring teams must shift to thinking about how they build relationships and talent pipelines that will sustain them longer term through unexpected circumstances.
As companies rethink their sourcing efforts, defining goals and measuring success must be part of the equation.
Make it ridiculously easy to prove value.
Referrals bridge a critical gap between recruitment and retention, and raise awareness of employer brand significantly. Sourcing is both an art and a science, requiring practitioners to connect in a human way while still proving they deliver value to the organization. But without properly tracked benchmarks, it's hard to know which recruiting 'lever' is driving results.
When things are going poorly, companies tend to throw more money at job boards and advertising without examining what actually delivers value.
In a recent study by Aptitude Research, 84% of companies noted they believe employee referrals are the most cost-effective way to find and engage talent. While sourcing is one of the largest areas of investment in talent acquisition, it is also broad - only 26% of companies are satisfied with their sourcing efforts overall. A few things to think about before you embark on change:
Define the problem.
You can't solve what you can't 'see'. As we've seen panic lead to reactivity, HR and TA leaders are trying to move the needle any way possible - sometimes, this means throwing money at a number of solutions and services simultaneously hoping for a measurable change.
We suggest leaders press 'pause', and examine the data they have to determine what they truly need to solve for. Recent research revealed the biggest challenges with sourcing were finding diverse candidates (42%), difficulty searching for candidates in the ATS (32%) and limited in-house expertise (26%) - each of these challenges requires a different approach to solve.
Know what 'good' looks like.
With the problem defined, determine where increased investment can realistically take your talent acquisition strategy. If you're struggling to fill jobs in under 60 days, maybe your first step is getting to the national average of 41 days and improving from there. The right partner can help you determine what's achievable. If you're getting 3 referrals a month, don't expect 200 by next month. Examine the quality of hire, rate of conversion and hire rates for other sourcing channels and set realistic benchmarks for your referrals.
Think beyond hiring.
One of the really cool things about employee referral programs? They're one of the only people programs that can impact almost every critical HR metric - from improving speed-of-hire to retention and employee experience.
So, when you set out to define benchmarks and ROI for your referrals program avoid thinking too narrowly. Consider some of the metrics that other sourcing channels might not impact, and gather data more broadly than sourcing outcomes alone - think about things like year 1 retention, candidate experience, employee engagement and retention, time-to-productivity.
A strong employee referral program will enable companies to reduce turnover, improve quality and speed of hire, and reduce costs.
What's Next?
Convinced your referrals program could use a boost? Let's talk about how Aliro can help you implement or boost the role referrals play in your hiring strategy.
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