Why it’s important
A strong feedback culture give candidates support to present themselves in the best possible way. Everyone has the right to feedback, and ensuring candidates have an excellent recruitment experience is good PR for your company.
A good offer process has two benefits; firstly speed and quality of communication at this stage will reduce drop outs. Secondly it allows candidates the chance to feedback to you about how they found the process and you as a prospective employer. This will highlight any areas for improvement for next time as well as confirming what you do well.
Things to consider
- Candidates who want to work for you (or see an advert for a role with you), will come in search of more information. So think about who you are as a business, what accolades have you won, how many people work for you, what type of work do you do.
- How easy is it to navigate online, can a candidate access your website / careers pages from their mobile phone?
- Will they find the information they are looking for easily on your website? is your careers or ‘work for us’ page the first thing they see? We know that multiple clicks can put candidates off and they wont spend long searching, so your initial application process needs to be easy to find
- What are your values? You want to attract candidates who have similar values and are going to feel fulfilled / a part of your organisation when working for you
- Candidates like to find out more about what it’s like to work for you, things like ‘day-in-the-life’ stories are great to include – it helps people to relate if they see ‘people like me’ in your imagery, videos and stories, eg.
- Some companies even include situational judgement quizzes, so that candidates can self-assess whether the role is for them. Scroll down to see a free example from Skills for Care that you can use in your careers website. There are also care specific psychometric assessments available on the market, such as Care Character. These simple assessments support the candidate and hiring managers through the recruitment process.
What else?
- Include benefits and reward information – these are essential, candidates like to see what your pay rate and other associated benefits are.
- Include contact information – when looking for a new role, people often have questions, Include an email and phone number for an appropriate contact.
- Recruitment process. All companies have a unique process – it’s good to outline it so that applicants know what the steps are.
- Share links to your social media – candidates like to follow your updates on these platforms. (As an aside make sure there is content for them to read on these too!)
- Include a form or email address for candidates to register their interest in your company. If there’s no role available in the candidates location at the moment allow them to register their interest. This also helps you build a candidate pool to target when you are recruiting.
- Don’t forget to update your content regularly, it shouldn’t stand still! Schedule in time to review competitor websites to see how you compare.
- Utilise appropriate technology to deliver the best candidate experience – Some organisations are already looking at how new technology such as Artificial Intelligence and Virtual Platforms can help them in their recruitment activities.
Best practice examples and useful links
Skills for Care situational judgement quiz: https://www.everydayisdifferent.com/quiz-landing.aspx
Care Character, psychometric assessment and candidate engagement tool: carecharacter.com
Great stories / employee experience apply.careuk.com
Good accessibility to the recruitment team jobs.barchester.com
Good video content fote.career-portal.co.uk
Use of AI / chat bot bluebirdcarecareers.co.uk