A few years ago I remember speaking with the head of talent acquisition at a midsized company about benchmarking their candidate experience. I had pitched our CandE Benchmark Research Program (we were still The Talent Board at the time, and now we’re part of Survale, which has been the talent experience backbone of the CandEs for over nine years).
They told me they were covered because they used their ATS’s candidate survey tool by simply turning it on, customizing the questions, and setting the survey trigger timing after rejection, application, interview, offer, etc.
But when I dug further and asked, “Are you benchmarking? Can you compare your data against other employers’ candidate experience feedback?”
They answered, “I don’t think so, no. They don’t give us that access.”
That was telling. Then I asked, “Do you review the feedback data internally with your team? Do you identify strengths and weaknesses, key takeaways, and future recommendations on how to improve your recruiting, hiring, and candidate experience?”
There was a pause, and then they said, “We do review the ratings data periodically, but again, we have nothing to compare it to.”
Then I asked, “Do you measure candidate willingness to refer?”
They said, “Yes, we do. And the last time I checked, our NPS was over 60.”
I said, “Wow, that’s really high. Did that include rejected candidates?”
There was another pause, and then they said, “No, that’s from our hired candidates.”
Of course it is, and that’s where it should be. But in our CandE Research, rejected candidates, those who make up the great majority of candidates, only have a high of 14 referral NPS (as of our data this year so far). That’s a difference of over 124%. And within that difference, there are consistent and timely candidate journey activities that drive a more positive candidate response and a willingness to refer within multiple industries and company sizes. We see that every year in the CandE Award winners, employers with above average candidate experience ratings. And benchmarking provides these baselines.
When we first started the CandE Benchmark Research Program way back in 2011-12, most of the employers we worked with were not doing continuous candidate experience surveying. Just one-time batch surveys in our benchmark. Today many more are, and that’s a good thing.
Back in 2015, I remember being told that employers just needed to receive their raw candidate experience feedback data because they had people on the TA team who could analyze and interpret the data. That turned out to be incorrect with rare exception, and while I’ve spoken with more teams over the years that do dig into their own data, most still don’t have the team members or resources to do that.
Unless you can get actionable takeaways from your candidate experience feedback data, it’s a wasted opportunity to make improvements that could impact retention, the employer brand, and the business bottom line.
From siloed ATS surveys to Glassdoor to niche single-industry benchmarking to vendor candidate experience reports (and sprinkle a little AI on top) – there are opportunities to cobble together comparisons that may glean some actionable insights for you. But do you even have the team and resources to do this yourself? And wouldn’t you want to readily compare your candidate feedback across the candidate journey using data points like:
- Job type (hourly, professional, etc.)
- Relationship with employer (previous employee, customer, etc.)
- Gender, generation, and more
- Employer industry
- Employer size
- Recruiting team structure
- And so much more
The benefits to benchmarking with our CandE Benchmark Research Program are many including:
Identify Gaps
Discover the difference between how you think candidates perceive your processes and how they really feel.
Reliable Feedback
Get feedback from all candidates, not just new hires. This provides the kind of data that uncover hidden problems with your hiring process – from pre-application to onboarding.
Understand Candidate Sentiment
Learn how likely candidates are to apply again and refer others and why they are.
Data Driven Improvement
Get concrete data to justify improvement strategies based on candidate feedback.
Track Progress
Repeat participants can compare year-over-year changes in candidate experience and the return on investment from their team’s initiatives.
Expert Advice
Each benchmark participant gets a consultation with our candidate experience experts with actionable insights and recommendations.
Listen, if your organization is surveying your candidates for recruiting process feedback, from new hires and rejected candidates, and you’re using the data insights to improve your recruiting processes, that’s a win in our playbook.
But if you’re not, it’s time to declare independence from not knowing what your candidate experience feedback data means and how it compares to other employers big and small across industries.
Benchmarking your candidate experience feedback will ultimately provide you with recruiting competitive advantages and clear business impacts.
