Achieving a 38% Recruitment Cost Reduction for a Multinational Retailer
PeopleScout helped this retailer with their fluctuating high-volume hiring needs in a difficult market with high turnover and non-competitive salaries, resulting in a 38% cost reduction.
97%success retaining new hires
62hiring events hosted in a three-month period
38%reduction in cost per application
Situation
This multinational retailer required a high volume, flexible RPO solution to ramp hiring up and down based on their seasonal peaks. This included hiring for a variety of positions such as in-store hourly roles, supply chain, security, alterations and restaurant staff.
Solution
PeopleScout created a scalable solution that meets the retailer’s unique needs and seasonal requirements.
A full-cycle hiring program including sourcing, screening, interviewing, background checks and offer decisions
Seasoned recruiting experts across the U.S., UK, India and Poland to augment the client’s team
Introduced a streamlined high-tech application process with quick apply and screening via automated text using Affinix Digital Interview, Affinix CRM and Affinix Analytics
Comprehensive training for all new PeopleScout account team members, including classroom learning, shadowing and certifications to ensure full understanding of the client culture and values before officially starting client recruiting support
Talent Advisory solutions including creation and management of automated recruitment marketing campaigns leveraging Google Display Network, Indeed One-Click and AppCast, a tool that analyses highest performing channels and adjusts budget usage accordingly
In addition to the high-volume RPO efforts, PeopleScout created niche, specialised recruitment teams for various hard-to-fill job functions
Results
Achieved 97% success in retaining new hires to ensure those who accepted the offer showed up to the first day on the job, above the client’s goal of 95%
995,000 clicks and 202,600 applications to sponsored jobs on Indeed in a three-month period
Hosted 62 physical and virtual hiring events, receiving 12,000 RSVPs and making 1,800 offers at virtual events within a three-month period
41,000 clicks and 2,800 applications to jobs promoted on a variety of job boards in a three-month period
38% reduction in cost per application
Ramped internal team up and down based on fluctuations in requisitions, as illustrated in the hiring graph below
AT A GLANCE
COMPANY: Multinational Retailer
PEOPLESCOUT SOLUTIONS: Recruitment Process Outsourcing, Talent Advisory
The energy and utilities sector has a gender problem. The field is overwhelmingly male-dominated, and if providers are going to be able to meet the global demand in the future, talent leaders in the industry must bring in more women to tackle the gender gap in energy and utilities.
Women make up 39% of the global workforce, but only 16% of the traditional energy sector. This varies by location and job type. In the U.S., natural gas and nuclear energy have the highest percentage of female workers, at 35% and 34%, respectively. But in some countries, like Japan, women make up only 3% of the energy workforce.
According to Deloitte, over two-thirds of executives rate DE&I as an important issue. And for good reason. Diversity is strongly tied to innovation. Diverse teams—including women, neurodivergent individuals and professionals from underrepresented backgrounds—are more creative, make better decisions and solve problems more efficiently.
Additionally, the energy and utilities industry is facing a massive talent shortage. According to McKinsey, the global renewables industry will need 1.1 million blue collar workers to develop and construct wind and solar projects and another 1.7 million workers to operate them, including labourers, electricians and operating engineers. On top of that, an additional 1.3 million white collar workers will be needed to install, operate and maintain these facilities, including wind and solar project developers, project managers, finance experts, legal staff and many other roles.
If talent leaders in the sector stick to the same recruiting strategies aimed at the same talent pools, providers will be understaffed, customers could see more energy service disruptions and workers could experience more incidents and accidents.
In this article, we provide three strategies for increasing the number of female workers in energy and utilities to close the gender gap.
1. Address Barriers for Women
In order to effectively recruit women into the industry, talent leaders need to understand what is keeping them away and work to remove those barriers to entry.
One important issue is pay. Globally, women in the sector face a wage gap that is more than twice as large as it is in non-energy jobs. According to the World Economic Forum, women in energy make about 20% less than their male coworkers. Their research shows that the wage gap stays the same when accounting for ability, education and potential experience, indicating that the gap is not because of differences in skill levels.
This leads to women in the industry being more likely to leave their positions than men, creating a challenge for employers looking to retain their female workforce.
One step employers can take is to complete a pay equity audit. According to the Harvard Business Review, a pay equity audit involves comparing the pay of employees doing “like for like” work in an organisation. To complete this effectively, you will need each employee’s length of service, job classification and demographic information. From there, auditors can perform a regression analysis to account for pay differences based on factors like experience, education and training to identify differences based on gender, race or age.
With that data, experts recommend a two-pronged response. One is remediation, or adjusting the pay of any employees that may qualify. The next step is to identify what led to salary discrepancies in the first place. Were there incorrect job classifications? Or does the hiring process allow for wide differences in starting salaries? This will help create a fair and equitable process going forward.
Additionally, companies shouldn’t be shy or secretive about the work they are doing to build a better workplace environment for women. Workers value that transparency. In fact, several large organisations have made headlines for announcing when they’ve reached gender pay equity, like Adobe and Intel.
2. Invest in Diverse Sourcing Strategies
Once talent leaders confirm that their organisation provides a fair and equitable environment for female workers, the next step is finding them. The energy and utilities industry is not alone in this need. Across all science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) jobs, women only account for 28% of the workforce.
Energy employers should invest in sourcing strategies aimed at underrepresented workers. Consider adding an AI sourcing tool that can identify passive candidates with the skills needed to succeed at your organisation.
Some recruitment CRMs have automated talent matching capabilities that search candidate databases to find qualified candidates for any role. Candidates are then ranked by how closely they fit the role requirements, how likely they are to leave their current position, and their average tenure. Unlike a manual sourcing process, automated talent matching can help fill the top of your funnel in seconds.
Notably, in PeopleScout’s AffinixTM CRM, Talent Finder can find and filter qualified candidates. The Diversity Boost feature also amplifies diverse candidates to help you reach your DE&I goals. It even allows talent leaders to identify what diversity means at their organisation, including the goal of identifying qualified female candidates.
Also consider low-tech approaches to sourcing more female candidates. Attend “Women in STEM” hiring events, and partner with colleges and universities. The energy sector has become a hard sell for young workers, especially in fossil fuels. One study found that only 44% of millennials and Gen Z in STEM programs would be interested in working in the sector, but 77% were interested in tech. Identifying potential candidates and intervening early can help change minds and bring in more candidates.
3. Update your Employer Brand
Finally, talent leaders in the energy and utilities sector need to make sure that their employer brands appeal to female workers. Are DE&I efforts advertised? Do women appear in careers site imagery? What about company leadership? Are women represented?
Your employer brand is your most powerful tool in attracting top talent. The energy industry lags behind in employer branding and digital recruitment marketing, two factors that appeal to millennial and Gen Z workers and can attract more women. Showcase and celebrate female workers and leaders in places like your careers site and social media. Share the progress you’re making toward diversity and inclusion goals. Advertise benefits like mentorship programs and leadership training.
Also consider your job postings. Do they include gendered language? Words like “competitive, dominant or leader” may discourage women from applying. One survey found that male-dominated fields tend to use more masculine words in job descriptions, at 97%.
These changes can make a real impact. For example, a manufacturing client that operates in an industry that has historically been male-dominated partnered with PeopleScout with the goal of increasing the number of female applicants and hires. PeopleScout worked with the client to develop the Women in Manufacturing campaign. PeopleScout interviewed nearly 20 women who work in roles across the company and who love their jobs. Using this information, PeopleScout built candidate personas to target women interested in the industry, and created a campaign featuring real women who work for the client.
Using our proprietary talent technology Affinix™, we built a dedicated landing page and talent community for female candidates. The four-week Women in Manufacturing campaign launched on International Women’s Day and showcased the company’s woman-friendly, inclusive culture. The campaign featured employee spotlights, videos and stories to showcase how women are integrated into the corporate culture and are integral to the company’s success. This increased the number of women who visited to the employer’s careers site and is moving the needle on the company’s DE&I goals.
Think Long Term to Close the Gender Gap in Energy and Utilities
As with many male-dominated industries, progress won’t happen overnight, but employers should set reasonable and achievable goals to close the gender gap in energy and utilities. With the staffing challenges facing the industry, building a more diverse workforce for the future isn’t an option—it’s a necessity. An RPO partner brings industry expertise, recruitment technology and talent advisory solutions to the table, providing employers the tools they need to find and hire more diverse talent.
Amongst travel and hospitality recruitment challenges is a clear and persistent issue: staffing shortages. Talent leaders are struggling to fill empty roles amid low unemployment rates.
According to a 2023 survey by Deloitte, more than half of hotel executives (53%) say their properties have between 25–74% of the workforce they had in 2019. The situation at airports is even tighter with 62% of executives saying their workforce is half its prepandemic size or smaller.
On top of this, the unemployment rate sits at 3.8% in the U.S., 4.3% in the UK and 3.7% in Australia. The travel industry also saw a massive exodus of workers. In 2022, there were record quit rates during the Great Resignation, with the quit rate in leisure and hospitality jumping by a percentage point to 6.4%. So, how can talent leaders hire hospitality and travel workers when the available pool is smaller?
Luckily, the right technology solutions deployed at the right times during the recruitment process can help talent leaders source, attract and screen candidates to find the best talent more efficiently and effectively. In this article, we’ll cover three technology interventions that talent acquisition teams can put into place to tackle hospitality recruitment challenges.
Hospitality Recruitment Challenge No. 1: Our open positions receive few applicants, and many of those who do apply do not have the background or experience needed to succeed in the role.
Solution No. 1: Invest in artificial intelligence sourcing technology to fill the top of your funnel.
Amongst common hospitality recruitment challenges that we see is finding talent with a wide variety of specialised skills across diverse and distant geographies. There is no one-size-fits all approach to hiring travel and hospitality talent. Finding a chef for a luxury property in Lake Como, Italy will look very different from a search for housekeeping staff at a family resort in Orlando, Florida. Finding a flight attendant looks very different from filling a baggage handler role.
With such a tight talent market, employers must target passive talent. During the Great Rehire talent leaders focused on filling roles as quickly as possible, but now they need to focus on finding and hiring more experienced workers.
An AI-enabled candidate sourcing tool can identify passive candidates with the right experience for specific roles and can even identify which candidates would be most likely to leave their current employers. Within seconds, recruiters can build a list of these candidates and share the opportunity. PeopleScout’s talent acquisition suite, AffinixTM, includes the AI sourcing feature, Talent Finder, which can connect employers with millions of passive candidates.
Consider the following best practices for using an AI sourcing tool:
Before searching for candidates, make sure you have a thorough understanding of the technical and soft skills needed to be successful in the role.
Use features, like PeopleScout’s Diversity Boost, that can identify candidates from underrepresented backgrounds to help meet your DE&I goals.
Blend AI with the human touch. By having a recruiter reach out to a sourced candidate with a personalised message, employers can create a positive experience.
Make sure a human makes all final hiring decisions. AI can make the process more efficient, but hiring managers should make the final call.
Hospitality Recruitment Challenge No. 2: Candidates drop out of our process before reaching the offer stage, either by abandoning the application or ghosting the interview.
Solution No. 2: Improve the candidate experience by making the process quick and easy by embracing tools like SMS or virtual interviews.
Hospitality employers must ensure that their candidate experience sets them apart from other employers at every stage of the candidate journey. For candidates, how they’re treated during the hiring process is a preview of what their experience will be as an employee.
PeopleScout research shows that the hospitality industry has a lot of room for improvement in this area. In our analysis of the candidate experience of more than 215 different organisations, the hospitality sector came in last overall with the lowest average scores in every stage except Follow-Up (in which it was second to last). While hospitality organisations effectively showcased their diversity and inclusion efforts on their career sites, only half gave candidates the opportunity to register their interest.
Your candidate experience should be unique to your brand and help you distinguish yourself from other employers hiring for similar roles or skills. Many talent acquisition teams don’t appreciate that candidates don’t perceive the recruitment process as a funnel. They’re the main character in their own story, and they expect to be treated that way. Candidates want to engage in their job search on their own terms. So, anytime they encounter a roadblock to getting the information they want, especially if they don’t know what to expect in the next stage, they’re more likely to drop out of your process.
There are several ways to leverage technology to make the process easier for candidates. First, start with a shortened application. According to PeopleScout research, nearly 40% of organisations asked candidates to duplicate information that was already contained in their resume or CV. Make sure your application only collects the information that is most critical for determining who moves along to the next step of the process.
From there, other technology solutions can be used to gather the additional information necessary to make a hiring decision. SMS can be used for an initial text screening, and virtual interviews, like those available in Affinix, allow candidates to answer additional questions at their own pace while feeling as though they’re driving the process.
Finally, automated communication can keep a candidate engaged in the process. The right technology platform can help by sending automated messages to candidates, via email or chatbot technology, updating them on their application status. You can even craft messages letting a candidate know if they did not get the job, so they aren’t left wondering if you ghosted them.
Consider the following best practices for using technology to improve your candidate experience:
Make sure your application is mobile-friendly and can be filled out in 10 minutes or less. Test your current application to see how long it takes to apply.
Provide candidates with the opportunity to opt-in to receive text messages or emails from your organisation to remain in compliance with local spam laws.
Tailor the type of virtual interview to the type of role. While video interviews may be appropriate for customer-facing roles, others may prefer the opportunity to answer questions with recorded audio.
Make it simple for candidates to understand where they are in your process; this can be something as simple as a progress bar.
Hospitality Recruitment Challenge No. 3: Our assessment process isn’t effective at identifying the candidates most likely to succeed in the role, leading to increased turnover, reduced productivity and disengaged employees.
Solution No. 3: Assess candidates for passion, purpose and mindset.
The travel and hospitality industry is all about guest experience, and hotels, airlines, restaurants and theme parks differentiate themselves with the unique experience that they provide. So, talent leaders need to find candidates who not only have the right skills and experience but also a deep understanding of the brand and how it is reflected in the service provided.
For example, in a major city, you may find three hotels on the same street, one catering to a high-end luxury experience in a historic building, another geared toward young travellers with bold art and hit music playing in the lobby, and a third designed with business travellers in mind—with a large business centre, meeting rooms and plenty of quiet spaces for someone to plug in their laptop. Many hotel brands even have this variety of styles within their own portfolios. The service provided in each hotel looks different, and a person who excels at a luxury property may not thrive in a trendy hotel.
By selecting the right assessment tool, employers can go beyond looking at just capability, behaviour and results but also determine whether candidates align with their organisation’s purpose, have passion for the work they would do and whether they have the mindset to adapt to new environments.
By building an assessment during pre-screening that accounts for passion, purpose and mindset in addition to the standard skills and experience, employers can use technology to shortlist candidates based on several different attributes at the same time. This way, employers can get a clear picture of the different strengths and weaknesses of candidates in order to make informed decisions about which candidates are best to bring forward to the interview stage.
By identifying candidates who match well with an employer’s brand of guest experience, talent leaders can reduce turnover and build a happier, more engaged team. In turn, that leads to better customer experience and a better bottom line.
Consider the following best practices for building an effective assessment for hospitality talent:
Identify the essential behaviours for the role to separate those who will actually be successful from those who simply present well during an interview.
Build assessment tools around your organisation’s vision and values so applicants have a chance to form a connection to them from the start.
Self-evaluation tools can also be used to help applicants consider their own strengths and whether the role will offer sufficient opportunity to use and demonstrate them.
Distinguish between good candidates who meet the criteria and great candidates who will take an organisation further.
Finding the Right Talent Technology for Hospitality
The travel and hospitality industry still faces an uphill climb in returning to or even exceeding their prepandemic staffing levels, but talent leaders have additional and improved tools available to help identify, attract and screen candidates. However, in a full marketplace, finding the right tools can be a challenge. Consider partnering with an RPO with expertise in technology that can help identify the most impactful ways new tools can solve your most pressing hospitality recruitment challenges.
In the ever-evolving landscape of talent acquisition, Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO) has emerged as a go-to solution to help organisations redefine their recruitment strategies. However, many employers shy away from engaging an RPO provider because of common misperceptions. If you’re a talent acquisition leader stepping into the world of RPO for the first time, get ready to separate fact from fiction as we dismantle RPO myths.
Myth 1: Outsourcing Means Losing Control Over the Hiring Process.
Let’s set the record straight from the get-go: RPO doesn’t mean relinquishing control. You’re not sending your recruitment program into a mysterious void.
In fact, reputable RPO providers thrive on collaboration. You maintain oversight, make strategic decisions and keep your finger on the pulse of the recruitment process. Your RPO partner should provide you with regular reports so you can track metrics and SLAs against your hiring goals.
It’s like having a co-pilot who respects your position in the driver’s seat.
Myth 2: RPO is Expensive.
There’s a notion that RPO will drain your coffers faster than you can say “ROI.”
With an ever-widening skills gap and climbing hiring costs, organisations are looking for recruitment solutions to reduce overhead and improve outcomes while reducing risk. By streamlining your hiring process, reducing time-to-fill and minimising administrative burdens, RPO creates substantial value, particularly for high-volume or hard-to-fill specialist roles. While RPO may not be the cheapest option, a good RPO, and the technology they bring to the table, improves efficiency and delivers results.
Think of it as an investment that not only bolsters your team but also your bottom line.
Myth 3: RPO Only Works for Large Companies.
You might be thinking, “RPO? That’s only for the large enterprises with deep pockets.”
Not so fast! RPO isn’t an exclusive club for corporate giants. It’s an adaptable strategy for businesses of all sizes. Whether you’re a startup looking to scale or a mid-sized enterprise seeking an edge, RPO can be tailored to fit your unique needs.
In fact, according to Everest Group, smaller organisations made up 43% of RPO of news deals in 2022, up from 23% in 2017, as they increasingly turn to RPO to help scale and reduce risk in an uncertain labour market. RPO helps these mid-sized and small organisations scale up their hiring efforts without the costly commitment of building talent acquisition teams in-house.
Myth 4: RPO Takes a Long Time to Implement.
With the economy see-sawing post-pandemic, we’ve seen our clients shift their focus to agility and speed with an increase in urgent hiring projects. Organisations often think that RPO is not a viable option in these situations due to the misperception that it takes 12 to 16 weeks to ramp up.
While an RPO engagement can certainly be a long-term strategic partnership, there are also solutions for short-term recruitment projects where speed is the priority. For example, we developed PeopleScout Accelerate, a tech-powered, ready-to-go recruitment process outsourcing (RPO) solution that combines PeopleScout’s deep recruitment expertise and a pre-configured Affinix™ talent acquisition technology suite—implemented in just two weeks.
Myth 5: RPO is Only for Filling Volume-Based Positions.
Your talent needs are unique to your organization and the right RPO partner will know that a one-size-fits-approach isn’t effective. Don’t let the myth of “volume hiring only” keep you from experiencing the benefits of RPO.
While RPO is an ideal solution for high-volume hiring in which many hires for similar job families are made annually, it’s also perfect for hard-to-fill specialist professional roles. With their networks, resources and expertise, RPOs have the ability to attract candidates from all corners of your industry.
One huge bonus of the long-term relationship you build with an RPO partner is their ability to create talent pools. Having a pool of active and passive candidates speeds up time-to-hire by giving you fast access to qualified candidates when a new vacancy opens. Plus, RPO providers have access to leading technology featuring AI matching tools that can identify and source strong passive and active candidates within seconds of an open job requisition.
Myth 6: RPO is Exclusively Cost-Cutting, Not Quality-Improving.
Quality over quantity, right? Absolutely. And guess what? RPO providers are on the same page.
Unlike working with a staffing agency, which is often a transactional relationship, an RPO partner won’t flood your inbox with CVs that miss the mark. Instead, they use targeted strategies to find the ideal candidate who aligns with your values and vision.
RPO providers can help you develop and implement effective selection and assessment processes to identify high-performing candidates with the right skills and experience for the role. Plus, with their tech know-how, RPOs can help you leverage predictive analytics to gain a better understanding of the behaviors of top talent and predict factors such as cultural fit, willingness to change companies and future tenure potential.
With RPO, quality isn’t compromised—it’s elevated.
Myth 7: RPO is a One-Size-Fits-All Solution.
While some providers have gained reputations for making their clients follow a rigid process, it doesn’t have to be this way.
Good RPO partners are chameleons, adjusting their approach to your shifting hiring needs. Whether you’re gearing up for a hiring spree or scaling down temporarily, your RPO provider should deliver custom solutions based on your industry, job types, hiring budget and goals.
And remember, you don’t have to outsource your entire full-cycle, end-to-end recruitment process. Look for an RPO partner that offers partial-cycle, project-based and even modular RPO solutions to help you scale your recruitment function to meet your needs—from talent mapping and sourcing to designing assessments and onboarding. In the fast-paced world of talent acquisition, flexibility is your secret weapon.
Our RPO Amplifiers provide employers with the agility they need to weather the ups and downs of the labour market. These modular RPO solutions augment your team where you need it in your recruitment lifecycle. You get focused support for peak hiring, hard-to-fill positions, compressed time frames and more—whether as a boost to your internal recruitment team or to an existing outsourced recruitment provider.
Myth 8: RPO Providers Only Cover Recruitment.
While RPO is focused on improving recruitment processes, it can also include other HR functions such as employer branding, talent management and workforce planning. RPO providers can offer a range of services that can be customized to meet the specific needs of the organization.
RPO partners are increasingly offering a range of value-added services to meet the demand for proactive, innovative candidate experiences. When you partner with a leading RPO provider, you also access:
Talent acquisition consulting and best practices
Technology consulting and implementation
Passive candidate engagement
Market insights, talent mapping and analytics
Recruitment marketing and candidate attraction strategies
Employer branding and employer value proposition (EVP) development
Assessment design and execution
Diversity and inclusion consulting
When considering potential RPO providers, make sure they can provide you with value-added services that will optimise and streamline each phase of the recruiting process.
Myth 9: RPO Replaces Your Internal HR Expertise.
Your internal talent acquisition expertise is invaluable—and it’s here to stay. RPO isn’t about replacing your team; it’s about augmenting their strengths.
Organisations often struggle to invest in growing the number of talent acquisition and HR resources required to keep up with the rate of change. RPO providers take on time-consuming, but necessary, recruiting activities such as sourcing and candidate engagement. This frees up internal HR staff to focus on higher value activities.
Plus, through working across many clients and industries, RPOs have their finger on the pulse of what’s going on the labour market and can share best practices and insights to help you make informed workforce decisions.
Consider your RPO team your ally, enhancing your internal capabilities and helping you and your team shine even brighter.
Myth 10: RPOs Don’t Care About Your Company Culture.
Your company culture is your crown jewel, and you’re not about to let it fade away in the name of outsourcing. Fear not! Reputable RPO providers understand the value of cultural fit.
Your RPO team integrates your values, purpose and employer brand into every candidate touchpoint. An RPO provider can help you amplify your employer brand by leveraging your established candidate attraction assets in targeted recruitment marketing campaigns. Utilizing job postings, social media posts, your career site and email campaigns, your RPO provider will carry your carefully crafted employer brand to candidates, providing them with compelling reason apply to your open positions.
It’s like having a partner who not only respects your company culture but actively works to preserve and enhance it.
If your organisation is looking to develop an employer brand from scratch or update your current one, a leading RPO partner can provide you with employer branding services to complement your recruitment strategy ranging from creative support to full-scale employer value propositions (EVP) development.
From debunking misconceptions to revealing the true essence of RPO, you’ve now navigated through the labyrinth of misperceptions to arrive at the threshold of transformation. With RPO, you’re not just recruiting—you’re building a workforce that will grow your business for years to come. So, it’s time to shatter RPO myths and embrace the potential of of this powerhouse solution.
Amidst a tumultuous economy, employers continue to face challenges in talent acquisition and are seeking nimble solutions that allow them to address hiring needs quickly. Despite layoffs in some sectors, job openings surpass pre-pandemic levels in nearly every industry—averaging 31% more vacancies than in 2019. This is compounded by three million people having dropped out of the labour force.
Many organisations lack the in-house recruitment resources—in terms of personnel or technology—to respond to fluctuations in a volatile talent market. Plus, with skills gaps growing, internal talent acquisition teams are too stretched to effectively manage the candidate lifecycle. Consequently, employers experience dwindling talent pipelines and an increase in drop-offs and ghosting between offer acceptance and onboarding.
No wonder 91% of hiring managers say they’re experiencing hiring challenges and 45% say they’re struggling to find qualified workers for open roles at their companies. Many organisations are seeking recruitment support in the form of modular RPO (recruitment process outsourcing) as a cost-effective way to augment their recruitment capabilities where they need it most.
That’s why we’re thrilled to announce our new suite of modular solutions, RPO Amplifiers. RPO Amplifiers has a solution that can help augment your team to meet your short-term talent needs—while providing lasting business value.
What is Modular RPO?
Modular RPO, or variable RPO, is a strategic approach to managing the recruitment process in an ultra-focused manner. It involves outsourcing specific components of the recruitment process to an RPO provider, or as a supplement to an existing outsourced recruitment engagement, providing quick access to targeted and customised recruitment support. With a modular or à la carte approach, you choose from a range of services based on your requirements.
Our RPO Amplifiers include:
Talent Mapping
Talent Sourcing
Talent Campaign: Surge Support
Assessment Transformation
Modular RPO vs Full End-to-End RPO
Modular RPO differs from traditional enterprise RPO in that it allows businesses to select and customise the specific recruitment services they need, rather than outsourcing the entire process.
The main differences include:
Scope: Modular RPO focuses on specific parts of the recruitment process or short-term initiatives, while end-to-end RPO can cover the entire recruitment function.
Duration: Modular RPO engagements are typically short-term, while end-to-end RPO is a long-term strategic partnership. However, many of our RPO partnerships at PeopleScout have started as short-term engagements.
Technology Integration: End-to-end RPO often involves more extensive use of technology, including integration with other HR systems as well as customisation.
The decision between modular RPO and a full RPO engagement depends on various factors, including organisation size, hiring volume, budget and strategic workforce planning. It’s essential to assess your specific needs and evaluate the benefits and trade-offs associated with each approach before making a decision.
6 Benefits of Modular RPO
Here are six key benefits of a modular approach to RPO.
1. Cost Optimisation
Modular RPO gives you greater control over your recruitment costs. You select specific recruitment services based on your challenges, enabling you to allocate your budget more efficiently by avoiding unnecessary expenses for unused services. In uncertain economic times, this is a more cost-effective approach that still lets you benefit from the expertise of an RPO partner.
2. Scalability and Agility
The business landscape is unpredictable, which can cause your hiring needs to fluctuate rapidly. Modular RPO provides the agility to scale your recruitment capabilities up or down based on demand. You can quickly adapt your recruitment efforts in response to market conditions, ensuring you have the adequate resources during high-demand periods and avoiding unnecessary expenses during slower periods. Plus, some of our clients have added RPO Amplifiers onto their full RPO engagement—whether they’re partnered with PeopleScout or another RPO—when an extra boost is needed.
3. Customisation and Control
Some organisations prefer to maintain a certain level of control over their recruitment process, particularly during uncertain economic times. With modular RPO, you can customise your recruitment process according to your specific requirements. Select the services you need, such as candidate sourcing, screening or onboarding support, while retaining oversight of other aspects of the recruitment process. This level of control allows companies to align the outsourced services with their internal hiring strategies and maintain greater mastery of their talent acquisition function.
4. Strategic Focus
By outsourcing specific recruitment functions to an RPO partner, you can free up your internal HR teams and hiring managers to focus on core business activities, such as talent development, workforce planning and organisational restructuring. By opting for a modular approach, organisations can collaborate with their RPO partner to design a solution that addresses their specific challenges and aligns with their strategic goals.
5. Access to Technology
RPO providers have access to advanced recruitment technologies and tools. Even with modular RPO, you can leverage these technologies for specific recruitment functions without investing in them for internal use. This is particularly beneficial in challenging economic environments where capital expenditures are carefully managed.
6. Risk Mitigation
In uncertain economic climates, modular recruitment solutions are a great option for organisations who are new to RPO. By opting for a more targeted and flexible approach, you can evaluate the effectiveness and value of the outsourced recruitment partner before expanding the engagement further.
PeopleScout’s RPO Amplifiers offer you the ability to optimise costs, maintain agility, streamline recruitment processes and focus on strategic priorities—while still benefiting from our 30 years of expertise as an RPO partner. The benefits of modular RPO align your organisational needs with our current economic realities.
While navigating through high-volume recruitment processes, organisations often find themselves overwhelmed by the number of applications for a multitude of positions, ranging from entry-level roles to specialist positions. This can be a costly and time-consuming process that can damage the candidate experience and doesn’t guarantee candidate quality. This is where predictive analytics steps in, transforming the recruitment landscape.
Driven by advanced data analysis techniques and machine learning, predictive analytics offers a strategic advantage in managing high volumes of roles as well as ensuring the right fit.
How Does Predictive Analytics in Recruitment Work?
Predictive analytics involves the use of historical data, such as applicant resumes or CVs, interview feedback, performance data, and employee tenure to create models that predict future candidate success. Predictive analytics finds patterns and correlations within this data to identify characteristics that lead to successful hires. These indicators could include specific skills, educational background, work experience, and even personality traits that align with the company culture. This data-driven approach ensures a higher standard of candidate quality, as recruiters are guided towards individuals whose attributes align seamlessly with the organisation’s culture and role requirements.
Furthermore, this strategic deployment of predictive analytics doesn’t merely benefit the organisation; it elevates the candidate experience by matching applicants with roles that resonate with their skills and aspirations. As a result, candidates feel more engaged and valued throughout the recruitment journey, culminating in enhanced hiring outcomes and a positive brand reputation.
Predictive analytics presents itself not as a solution, but rather as a dynamic framework for continuous improvement. Organisations can leverage powerful analytics to determine fundamental employee attributes for specific roles, effectively managing the hurdles of volume hiring and retention. This involves harnessing predictive analytics insights to craft bespoke pathways that foster workforce growth.
Predictive Analytics in Action
In late 2021, one of our hospitality clients, Merivale, faced the challenge of recruiting 800 roles within six weeks. Partnering with PeopleScout, they turned to Affinix™, our proprietary talent acquisition suite with includes Affinix Analytics. PeopleScout’s strategy involved deploying Affinix to swiftly source and categorise applicants based on role streams. To ensure quick turnarounds, a tech-powered approach was implemented, utilising video and phone interviews. Leveraging Affinix’s real-time analytics dashboards, candidate responses were screened using built-in AI-powered tools to dynamically filter them into qualified roles. Referrals from current staff were also encouraged through Affinix CRM tool. Despite the challenging talent market, PeopleScout achieved remarkable results a time-to-offer of just 3.36 days and a time-to-fill of 5.5 days. The collaboration’s success continues as they meet the client’s ongoing talent needs, emphasising the transformative role of Affinix’s analytics in the current market.
Several tools are employed for predictive analysis in recruitment, leveraging data-driven insights to enhance hiring decisions. Affinix seamlessly integrates AI, machine learning, digital interviewing and more. It’s a comprehensive solution for streamlining recruitment and enhancing candidate experience. Affinix encompasses various features, including AI Sourcing, which identifies passive candidates for each job posting. CRM optimisation and requisition management enable enhanced communication and talent pool creation based on skills and other factors. Moreover, Affinix Analytics provides job seeker analytics and operational metrics to understand the end-to-end recruitment process. The platform’s integration with HR technologies solidifies its holistic approach to talent management.
Making Informed Decisions about Predictive Analytics
Although promising, predictive analytics, and AI in general, can be perceived as being risky. The key concern is the potential of creating biased algorithms, which can limit diversity in the hiring process and create inequalities. Bias might be present in the historical data fed into the model, from which the algorithm learns. Additionally, the accuracy of predictive models could be compromised due to the constant changes in the recruitment industry as well as evolving organisational needs.
Moreover, the complexity of machine learning algorithms can decrease transparency in decision-making, which would make it challenging for candidates to understand the reasoning behind rejections. Furthermore, quantifying skills and abilities could be difficult for certain roles.
In 2018, a leading retailer released the results of hiring software that was developed internally. The AI scored female candidates lower than male candidates due to bias in the data used to train the model. The model was trained using the company’s historical hiring data, which mostly consisted of men. As a result, AI saw male candidates as preferable to female candidates.
Organisations considering using predictive analytics in recruitment should keep these issues in mind, particularly as they gather data that the models will use. If any bias is discovered by the predictive model, it’s an opportunity for you to introduce (or update) unconscious bias and diversity training to your hiring managers.
Changing the Recruitment Landscape with Predictive Analytics
Predictive analytics in recruitment is a powerful force in changing the landscape, particularly in the context of high-volume hiring. The integration of historical data with cutting-edge HR technology optimises the recruitment process, enriches the caliber of selected candidates and ensures that talent acquisition supports the strategic objectives of the organisation. However, balancing the benefits and limitations of this approach is crucial for a responsible and effective application of predictive analytics in high-volume recruitment.
The future of work is green. According to the United Nations, the global economy is undergoing a “greening,” as industries like energy, transportation and construction adopt more sustainable practices. That process could create 24 million more jobs globally by 2030, putting workers with green skills in high demand.
However, supply has not kept up, even as the need for green skills spills into other industries like economics and finance, security, market and geopolitical analysis, communications, social sciences, and legal.
In this article, we’ll explore the drivers for green jobs and the need for green skills, which green skills are in the highest demand and how employers can find and hire top green talent.
What are Green Jobs?
So, what qualifies as a “green job?” According to the International Labour Organisation, “Green jobs reduce the consumption of energy and raw materials, limit greenhouse gas emissions, minimise waste and pollution, protect and restore ecosystems, and enable enterprises and communities to adapt to climate change.”
Demand for green skills is outpacing the supply. According to LinkedIn’s Global Green Skills Report, between 2022 and 2023, job postings requiring at least one green skill rose 22.4% while the share of green talent in the workforce only grew 12.3%.
What’s causing the shift? According to the World Economic Forum, many countries are working to achieve net zero by 2050. This means that both governments and businesses are driving the green transition.
So far, the majority of green job growth has come in some of the highest polluting industries, such as energy and transportation, and in some of the countries that produce the most greenhouse gases.
The U.S., Germany and India, countries that emit some of the highest amounts of greenhouse gasses, are leading the way in green jobs. According to the World Economic Forum, Germany is adopting more green skills in the manufacturing industry, and the U.S. and India are outpacing other countries in both oil and gas and mining.
But the need for green jobs goes beyond installing solar panels and building electric vehicles. According to LinkedIn, one of the most important sectors in sustainability is finance, and it is lagging behind. In the fight against climate change, huge investments will need to be made in things like wind farms and electric vehicle charging stations, and financial professionals will be in the spotlight. Despite that, only 6.8% of finance workers globally have green skills. However, there are signs of change. Between 2021 and 2022, the percentage of green jobs in finance grew 17%.
With increasing competition for green talent, employers need to have an in-depth understanding of the most in-demand green skills and how to attract, hire and train top talent.
What are Green Skills?
It is easy to mistakenly associate certain green skills to specific industries. Unlike the ability to set a broken bone, which will qualify a worker for a job in healthcare but isn’t relevant if they’re applying for a role with a law firm, green skills are different. Think of green skills more like tech skills in their ability to be applied across a wide range of industries. For example, carbon accounting, or estimating the carbon footprint of different organisations, can play an important role in a variety of industries, from consulting to waste management. While there might be a concentration of workers with green skills in green industries, those skills are in demand across the global economy.
According to LinkedIn, the fastest growing green skill in the EU is climate action planning. A climate action plan is “a framework document for measuring, tracking and reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and adopting climate adaptation measures.”
Climate action plans exist for a variety of organisations. For example, they exist at the government level, for international organisations like the World Bank, Fortune 500 companies and more. This means employers are competing for candidates across industries.
There are many green skills that are required for jobs in industries not considered green. For example, according to LinkedIn, a knowledge of energy efficiency could be necessary for roles like a plumbing engineer, utilities manager, vice president of facilities or HVAC specialist.
So, what are the most in demand green skills? It depends on where you are. In the U.S., carbon accounting, drinking water quality and energy engineering are seeing some of the fastest growth. While in the EU, sustainability education and carbon emissions round out the top three after climate action planning.
How to Hire for Green Skills
To meet their own hiring and sustainability goals, employers need to understand where to find candidates with in-demand green skills, how to attract them and how to train green-adjacent workers to help fill skills gaps. Here, we cover three options for employers struggling to fill green roles.
1. Skills-Based Hiring
Skills based hiring sounds simple—hiring people based on skills rather than previous job titles. However, according to SHRM, it requires a commitment to change. Traditionally, many jobs list requirements like specific degrees or years of experience that are used to determine if candidates are ready to take on a role.
According to one survey, more than 80% of employers believe they should prioritise skills over degrees. Yet, 52% are still hiring from degree programs because it’s considered a less risky choice. This means that especially in entry- and mid-level roles, candidates with the right skills could be overlooked for failing to meet these specific requirements.
Research shows that adopting a skills-based hiring strategy can yield significant improvements to an organisation’s talent acquisition program—increasing quality of hire, expanding the talent pool, increasing diversity and improving employee retention.
Transitioning to a skills-based hiring process requires a culture change, a transformation in thinking from the top down—from senior leadership to hiring managers—and updates to many aspects of the recruitment process.
One of the most important steps is updating the screening or assessment process. Rather than eliminating candidates who lack certain degrees or years of experience, develop criteria and assessments that objectively measure the skills necessary for the job. Then, screen candidates in rather than screening them out. An RPO provider with talent advisory capabilities can assist organisations moving to a skills-based screening and assessment strategy.
2. Green Adjacent Skills and Gateway Jobs
Additionally, employers can build gateway jobs and look for candidates with green adjacent skills.
Gateway jobs are roles that can serve as steppingstones and give workers the opportunity to gain the green skills they’ll need for a green career. According to the LinkedIn report, one example of a gateway job is in supply chain management. As the industry looks to reduce its carbon emissions, workers are developing the green skills to do the job, even though they may not have had them when they were hired. In fact, 41% of workers who move into gateway jobs have no prior green experience.
An effective strategy for hiring candidates for these gateway roles is looking for green adjacent skills. These are skills that don’t necessarily fall under the green umbrella but would give the candidate the ability to do many functions related to the role. For example, candidates with STEM and digital skills can go a long way toward helping an organisation reach its sustainability goals. Also, experience in industries currently undergoing a green transformation, like utilities, mining, transportation and agriculture can be applied to green jobs.
To find these candidates, employers need a robust souring strategy to identify those with adjacent skills. The right technology solution can identify both active and passive candidates with specific skills, expanding the talent pipeline and predicting factors such as cultural fit, willingness to change companies and future tenure potential.
3. Reskilling and Upskilling
When hiring candidates with adjacent skills, employers must implement reskilling and upskilling programs to fill the skills gap.
According to the World Economic Forum, nearly half of young workers believe they don’t have the right skillset to guarantee them an adequate job over the next decade. On top of that, sustainability transformations happen quickly, and without ongoing training, older workers could be left behind. The good news is that according to PwC, 77% of employees are ready to learn new skills or completely retrain in response to new technologies in the workplace.
Reskilling and upskilling can happen at a few different levels, from government programs to higher education and private employers. However, organisations shouldn’t just rely on external programs. By building effective reskilling programs, businesses invest in services tailored to developing their own workforce while also assisting the global need for more sustainable work.
A Renewable Future
Setting up a green, sustainable future is everyone’s responsibility. As the demand for green skills increases, employers need effective solutions for finding, hiring and training top green talent. RPO providers, especially those with talent advisory services, can be a valuable resource for talent leaders looking to revamp their recruiting programs for a renewable future.
The energy and utilities industry is in the process of a massive transition as providers move to green and renewable energy sources and adjust to changing energy use patterns across the globe. In the U.S., the Inflation Reduction Act passed in 2022, which increased the incentives for energy-transition-related investments and core renewables. In EMEA, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 has spurred a faster transition to renewables, according to the UK Climate Envoy.
This growth has left a massive talent gap, especially in an industry with an aging workforce. Talent acquisition leaders in the energy and utilities sector need to understand the forces shaping the recruitment landscape to remain competitive.
CHECK OUT THIS INFOGRAPHIC FOR INSIGHTS TO HELP YOU NAVIGATE THIS GREENING INDUSTRY.
Over 20 years ago, the U.S. Congress passed the Minority Health and Health Disparities Research and Education Act, or the Healthcare Fairness Act, to address national issues such as the increasing need for a diverse workforce. With focus on the life sciences, it stated, “There is a national need for minority scientists in the fields of biomedical, clinical, behavioural, and health services research.” Yet, underrepresented populations are still the largest “untapped STEM talent pools in the United States.”
Black and Hispanic individuals remain underrepresented in the science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) workforce. Plus, women remain underrepresented in fields like physical sciences, computing and engineering. Moreover, organisations in Europe are struggling to find and retain women in STEM. According to Eurostat, female scientists and engineers remain a minority in STEM roles, and despite increases over the past decade, women still make up only 16.5% of engineers in the UK.
For life science organisations, the lack of minorities and women in STEM fields and the sector overall will present long-term challenges in cultivating a workforce that will help them remain competitive in our increasingly diverse and interconnected world.
However, it seems there hasn’t been much progress made in the 20+ years since the Healthcare Fairness Act. So, how can life science organisations make a difference in creating more diversity in life science careers? Keep reading to learn more about the DE&I challenges and opportunities for life science employers.
Life Science’s Lack of a Diverse Workforce
Diversity is lacking across the entire life science industry, from research to clinical work. According to the U.S. National Science Foundation, the representation of minority ethnic groups in the science fields must more than double to match the groups’ overall share of the U.S. population. In fact, 65% of the U.S. workforce in life science are white, 19% are Asian, 8% are Hispanic and only 6% are Black.
Being a future-focused employer requires investment in building diverse and inclusive teams. Bringing underrepresented groups into your organisation provides a full range of benefits and skills to drive innovation. The issue is particularly pressing as the industry undergoes a wave of transformation due to the disruption of tech—further widening the current skills gap.
Additionally, diversity in leadership will help you boost retention and attract talent. With 85% of life science employees who identify as a minority saying they are ‘hugely underrepresented’ in senior roles, the lack of diverse leadership representation could be detrimental to your organisation. It could affect your bottom line and further hinder your ability to attain those highly competitive, in-demand skills (like data analytics and computer programming) needed within the industry.
Furthermore, Informa Connect conducted one of the largest industry employee research reports to date, which surveyed life science professionals around the world about their opinions on diversity and inclusion in the industry. When asked what the industry’s biggest problem is pertaining to having an inclusive and diverse workforce, over a third of respondents named the lack of representation of minorities in leadership roles.
Due to the lack of women in STEM careers, life science employers struggle to attract women to R&D roles. According to the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), 70% of global researchers are men. This creates problems for life science employers as both female life science professionals (65%) and male professionals (59%) believe women are under-represented overall. It doesn’t help that, although women make up almost half (48%) of life science workers, men still out-earn women by 13%.
Why is Diversity in Life Science so Important?
Although there are clear disparities around representation of minorities and women in life science, only 23% of organisations are giving significant focus to DE&I and only 13% are financially investing in diverse groups. Organisations that aren’t prioritising DE&I will struggle to cope with the industry’s current talent shortage. The lack of diversity puts organisations at a competitive disadvantage when it comes to attracting and retaining top talent.
In our recent research report, candidates say that a diverse workforce is an important factor when evaluating companies and job offers. This is even more important for candidates from underrepresented groups. In Biospace’s latest report, 93% of women of color responded that they believe diversity is important when considering a job. Investing in DE&I-focused talent acquisition strategies, programs and training creates a huge opportunity for life science organisations to grow a diverse and productive workforce.
A diverse and inclusive work environment builds trust, increases engagement and improves business outcomes.
Organisations with strong “diversity climates” have increased employee job satisfaction and employee retention as well as financial returns above national industry medians. Companies with above-average diversity scores report nearly 20% higher revenue due to innovation.
Moreover, diversity provides many benefits for improved organisational performance and productivity such as:
Broader range of skills and experience
Multilingualism to support global growth
Increased cultural competence and awareness
Diverse workforces, including cognitively diverse teams, leverage a greater variety of perspectives to solve problems faster with improved accuracy. According to the International Labor Organisation, when companies establish inclusive business cultures and policies, they experience a nearly 60% increase in creativity, innovation and openness.
For example, the majority of the western world’s research uses tissue and blood from white individuals to screen drugs and therapies that are developed for a more diverse population. However, different ethnic groups experience different outcomes from various treatments, methods and diseases. A diverse workforce, especially in biomedical science and pharmaceuticals, would more likely push for inclusion in research and testing and provide different perspectives that could lead to new insights and discoveries.
Strategies for Attracting, Recruiting and Retaining a Diverse Workforce in Life Science
Creating a diverse and inclusive work environment can be challenging, but here are some proven steps for attracting top diverse talent and establishing equitable recruitment practices.
1. Focus on Employer Branding
Show diversity as part of your organisation’s DNA by articulating a compelling EVP and employer brand that clearly defines and establishes your organisational commitment to DE&I. Building your internal and external employer brand messaging gives you greater influence over what you are known for, how you are perceived by candidates and the value that you offer to your employees. Make sure your recruitment marketing materials are relevant to a variety of audiences with imagery and content that highlights diversity in race, gender and more. Plus, showcasing real employees adds a layer of authenticity to your employer brand.
2. Update Your Career Site
After viewing a job post, a candidate’s first point of contact is usually your career site. It’s crucial that your career site shows your DE&I efforts. Sharing diversity goals publicly and transparently is an important way for candidates to experience your organisational values and mission.
3. Keep Job Listings Simple
Plain language is especially important if you want to reach diverse populations. Use verbiage that your candidate would use rather than your internal terminology and assess your job ads for biased language. Avoid verbiage like “expert,” “rockstar” or “like a family” that are often masculine and project a homogeneous work culture that prioritises like-minded thinking over diversity. Additionally, remove any experience or skills that are “nice-to-have” in your job descriptions, and keep in mind that men and women value different things. For example, while men usually prioritise compensation, most women see work-life balance as their number one priority.
4. Go Beyond Your Careers Site
Elevate your sourcing strategy by:
Optimising your reach by posting on relevant job boards and platforms. Don’t forget that professional networking groups, like the Black Healthcare and Medical Association, are great resources to get your job ads in front of the right people.
Establish relationships with STEM-based programs at universities, alumni associations and other networking groups that cater to diverse populations.
Get your internal teams involved by asking for referrals. Diverse employees are often connected with diverse candidates.
In doing so, you cast a wider net to reach a larger pool of diverse candidates, maximising your chances of growing your workforce.
5. Representation Matters
During the interview stage, make sure candidates see how much you value diversity by having a diverse panel of interviewers. When a candidate sees someone who looks like themselves or another minority when being interviewed, it creates a sense of belonging and reaffirms your company’s mission to establish a diverse culture. Additionally, make sure your hiring panel has received diversity training and can successfully communicate with those that think differently and have unique backgrounds or working styles.
“Companies need to acknowledge the unique needs and contributions of employees with multiple historically excluded identities.”
Yaro Fong-Olivare, Executive director of Bentley University’s Center for Women and Business (CWB)
Diversity training programs are not a one-size-fits-all solution and come in various training types, which can be customised to help achieve your organisation’s goals. Diversity training helps employees feel a sense of belonging, so they are more likely to stay with an organisation, which can improve your retention rates.
7. Enable Talent Acquisition Technology and Track Your Efforts
To build a diverse candidate pipeline, it’s critical that you engage cutting-edge technology and analytics tools to know where your diverse candidates are coming from, how they’re progressing through the recruitment process, and which of your sourcing channels or campaigns brought them to you. Although these insights are often stored in different systems and platforms, a comprehensive reporting tool can help synthesise your data and visualise trends.
For example, PeopleScout’s Affinix™ brings together applicant tracking systems (ATS), candidate relationship management (CRM) systems, artificial intelligence, machine learning, digital marketing, predictive analytics and digital interviewing to provide award winning innovation to support your organisation’s diverse hiring goals. Affinix Analytics’ diversity dashboards show how diverse candidates are entering your pipeline in real time. By tracking how candidates progress through your funnel, you can determine which resources and campaigns bring in top candidates from underrepresented groups. From there, you can analyse the results, identify hiring trends, adjust sourcing spend and strategy to make data-driven decisions.
Conclusion
Building an inclusive and diverse workforce doesn’t start and end with just hiring underrepresented groups, it requires an entire organisational shift. In order for the life sciences industry to maintain leadership and competitiveness in science and medical advancement, it’s crucial that organisations invest in building a strong and diverse talent pipeline. Everyone from the C-Suite to hiring managers has an important part to play in achieving DE&I goals and shrinking the industry’s growing workforce gaps.
The Recruitment Handbook for Hiring Tech & Digital Talent
5 Strategies for Recruiting the Best Tech Talent Now and into the Future
Today, every company is a tech company as organisations across sectors create digital customer experiences, embrace automation and AI, and analyse the data created through these platforms. In fact, 6 out of 10 of the most in–demand skills are tech-related.
However, according to Gartner, a third (36%) of HR leaders say their sourcing strategies are insufficient for finding the skills they need. So, how can talent acquisition leaders keep up with the demand for tech and digital talent?
In this handbook, you’ll learn:
Global trends driving the need for tech talent
Strategies for overcoming challenges in your tech hiring programs
How partnering with an RPO provider can help
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