5 questions for HR to improve talent experience

1. What is our full organizational cost of recruitment?

Cost per hire is the primary indicator used by organizations to assess the effectiveness of recruitment processes. This is calculated as the direct costs of recruitment divided by the number of hired individuals during a specific period. Direct costs typically include:

•    Recruitment team’s salary
•    Wages and benefits
•    Advertising
•    Marketing costs
•    Recruiting costs via job boards

Cost per hire is a useful metric for benchmarking whether your recruitment function is under-resourced or operating at peak performance. But solely calculating direct cost per hire ignores the full organizational cost of recruitment.

To provide a more complete picture, healthcare leaders can calculate both the direct and indirect costs of recruitment. Indirect costs account for recruitment costs spread across the rest of the organization, including:

•    Hiring manager investment in the recruitment process
•    Increases in overtime and agency staffing
•    Lost revenue due to vacant positions
•    Cost of turnover

Average organizational cost per hire, which includes both direct and indirect costs, is around $4,700 for U.S. employers. Cost transparency throughout your organization ensures HR investments are reflective of the goals of the entire company.

2. What are the qualitative and quantitative results of our TA strategy?

There are several metrics that your organization should be tracking to ensure performance is meeting strategic expectations beyond just financial needs. These include time to fill, candidate and hiring manager satisfaction, retention, source of hire, and requisition aging.

If you find that some areas are lacking, investigate further and optimize to improve results. Performance may be above average now, but “good” today can be inadequate a few months down the road – especially in a constantly changing landscape. By gaining insight into and staying up to date on real results, you can make more informed, strategic decisions that promote financial and operational health while improving the talent experience.

3. How do we measure hiring manager and candidate experience?

The communities you serve not only include your patients and their families but also prospective employees. A poor candidate experience will damage your brand and lead to patient dissatisfaction, which is directly tied to a disengaged workforce.

Measuring candidate satisfaction as well as hiring manager satisfaction is a helpful way to determine performance, measure changes over time, and optimize the experience to improve outcomes. Conducting satisfaction surveys, benchmarking against industry leaders, and discussing strategies to improve hiring manager and new-hire engagement will help make sure each department has access to top-quality candidates – and that prospective candidates and current employees are engaged throughout the talent lifecycle. Additionally, satisfaction surveys reveal whether hiring managers are receiving the necessary recruitment support, enabling them to focus on overall employee performance.

4. How do we know we’re hiring best-fit candidates?

An overflow of resumes could indicate an effective talent acquisition team, but quantity isn’t quality. Hiring the wrong person comes with significant costs. One metric that raises awareness into talent acquisition performance: retention.

The average employee turnover rate in U.S. hospitals is around 21%, but HR should focus on the first 90 days after hiring to determine whether the talent experience is working well. A good rule of thumb: if more than 10% of employees leave the organization within 90 days of being hired, there may be serious issues with the talent experience.

Other areas to consider include how you identify and attract candidates, evaluations during interviews, cultural fit assessments, and previous employment verification, among other pre-hire processes.

5. How are we finding best-fit candidates as quickly as possible?

Quality of hire is essential. With reimbursements hinging on patient satisfaction, integrating HCAHPS (Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems) criteria during the screening process can further highlight top-performing employees. But equally important is quickly onboarding talent, especially as hiring needs often arise without notice. Ensure your organization is investing in the right talent management and acquisition strategies – and accomplishing time to fill below the healthcare industry average of around 49 days – by evaluating source-of-hire data.

Many talent teams overlook the validity of source data once a candidate is employed. But you can accurately budget for sourcing when it’s clear which channels attract high-performing employees and which screening strategies lead to these individuals being hired. With this data, leaders can eliminate investments in underperforming sources and make decisions based on a better talent experience, productivity, retention, and patient satisfaction.

In an era where talent is at a premium, healthcare leaders are benefiting by digging deeper into their organizations’ talent acquisition functions. In doing so, they ensure their hospitals and health systems are operating at peak performance. Leverage the five questions above, so you can engage HR leadership and talent acquisition professionals in meaningful conversation that may spark necessary change.

Key takeaways

• Talent is in high demand in healthcare organizations, but the dynamics of the talent acquisition process are constantly changing and often poorly understood.
• Asking HR five key questions will improve the talent experience and boost the performance of your talent acquisition function.