Candidate experience:

Get it right and reap

the rewards

Candidate experience is something which needs active consideration from

beginning to end of the hiring process. Any single touchpoint a candidate
has with your company can affect their overall experience, and for most
companies, there are a lot of touchpoints.

Actively work on your candidate experience to enjoy higher amounts of

qualified applicants, a reputation of being a desirable employer, and being
able to attract the best talent. Neglect your candidate experience and you
will find that the implications stretch much further than just a disgruntled,
unsuccessful applicant.

In this chapter, we’ll look at what has changed, how it has affected the
candidates’ expectations, and share some tips and tricks to help you offer a
candidate experience which will mean both candidate and employer leave
every interaction positively.
Why does candidate experience matter?
Whether client, employee, or candidate, the ideal goal is that everyone who
interacts with your company has a positive experience. With employees, this
will lead to happier staff. With clients, this will lead to repeat business. But
with candidates? While it can be easy to dismiss an unsuccessful candidate
as “out of sight, out of mind”, if they leave with a bad experience, it’s likely to
impact you negatively.

Lasting bad press and damaged reputation

Let’s look at the data.

68% of candidates believe that the way they are treated in the hiring
process is reflective of how the company treats its employees.

94% of candidates feel the recruitment experience affects their decision

to accept or reject an offer.

Nearly 78% of candidates will tell family and friends about a bad
interview experience and 19% will post about it on social media.

This is potentially a lot of people loudly dissatisfied with not only your
hiring process, but also your company. Regardless of the role, it’s almost a
guarantee that for every successful candidate you have, you will have
more unsuccessful ones – meaning it’s important to manage and improve
these people’s experience with you. Your employer brand is at stake – a bad
candidate experience could result in a bad reputation, a future inability to
attract talent and loss of customers.

Disconnect between understanding and execution

Most employers are aware of this. Indeed, 82% say that the candidate
experience is extremely important to them. That said, only 46% of candidates
say that employers treat them with the same respect and accountability
as the employees already working for them. There’s a disconnect between
perceived importance and execution.
What has changed?

1. Candidate expectations
While previously a good candidate experience stood out, now it is what is
expected. Tolerance of a poor candidate experience no longer exists. No longer
will the good candidate experience shine for its rarity, rather it’s the company
which doesn’t consider the candidate experience that will stand out for all the
wrong reasons.

This is fair. As a society we’ve moved into a hyper personalised world where
algorithms can predict what you’ll need, websites can proactively help you to
make the correct purchase for your own specific needs and you can track a
pizza from order to being delivered to your door. Today’s world has shown how
easy it is to be timely, helpful and communicate. Your hiring process should be
no different.

2. Volume of applicants
With a sudden global swing to high employment, you’d be forgiven for
thinning what was once the candidates market now is the employers. This is
not the case. Candidates are much more informed about not only what a good
candidate experience looks like, but also of what they can expect from you as a
company. Will you confirm their expectations or dash them?

Simply having more applicants for jobs does not suddenly put the power into
the hands of employers, as to start to, or continue to, offer a lesser candidate
experience will not serve you well in the long run.

3. More remote applicants

With remote work more prevalent than ever, geographical considerations
matter less to candidates. This will, paired with higher levels of unemployment,
lead to higher numbers of applicants for positions. Your candidate screening
will need to be a well oiled machine to effectively process these large volumes
of applications. You can expect that not all these applications will be a good
fit. Similarly to the previous point, it’s important therefore to consider the
unsuccessful applicants experience.
 4. Demonstration of values
As explored in chapter two, your company values contribute significantly to
your employer brand. This is important for attracting candidates, but also for
keeping them engaged throughout the hiring process and ultimately for their
decision to work for you.

More than ever, candidates want to work for companies that live by their
values. Why not make this obvious to them throughout the hiring process?
How you treat candidates is a great way to demonstrate your company values.
For example, if you claim to be dedicated to diversity and inclusion, make it
obvious in the hiring process. If a candidate sees no evidence of this in the
hiring process – it appears disingenuous because it is disingenuous.

The long term implications of how you treat unsuccessful

candidates
This hasn’t changed as a result of any external factor. However, the
implications of your candidate experience, for better or worse, are getting
louder and increasingly powerful.

Your reputation
Your unsuccessful applicants will talk of their experience to friends,
family or maybe even share it online – whether on social media, job
boards or other public forums. This will impact how many other people
interact with you, not just the candidate themselves.

Impacting custom
The candidate experience may change purchasing habits – if people
have had a negative experience, they are less likely to continue to be, or
become, a customer. And vice versa – people are more inclined to buy
from brands and companies they like and admire.

Future hires
You don’t know if you will encounter or need this person again in the
future. Why not make it easy to pick up that relationship again by
ensuring a positive experience?
6 steps to improve your candidate
experience

1 Bottlenecks: Find them and get rid of them

55% of candidates will give up on a position if they don’t hear back from
the company after two weeks of applying. Your time wasting will make the
company look disorganised, show a disregard for the candidate and also look
downright rude.

Figure out the bottlenecks in your process and address them. Perhaps it’s
the candidate screening which is taking too long, or maybe it’s the hiring
managers – once you figure out where days are turning into weeks, you can
fix it. Bear in mind that it’s estimated that the best talent on the market is
gone after just 10 days, and you’ll have a strong case for pushing for less time
wasting.

Be clear about the process and manage expectations

2
Ever applied for a job and then wondered what’s next? Ideally the answer
should be no, but chances are, we all have experienced this. It’s a confusing,
unclear and altogether bad impression to give an applicant if they don’t know
what’s going to happen next. When will they be contacted? When can they
expect a phone interview? Will you ever hear from them again?!

This is unfortunately another area where the data shows us that how
employers think they are performing differs from reality. Only 47% of
candidates feel that employers set clear expectations at the beginning of the
hiring process, while 78% of employers think they are managing expectations
well. Oh dear!

Know your process and communicate it clearly.

Communication, communication, communication

3
Nobody likes radio silence. Moving on from point 2, it’s no surprise that
poor communication is cited as one of the top reasons for a bad candidate
experience. Even if it’s automated to let them know they’ve been unsuccessful,
make sure to update your candidates at each stage of the process.
 If you’ve already outlined expectations at the start of the process but things
are taking longer than expected – let your candidate know. They are much
more likely to stick around in the process if a delay is explained, rather than
if they are left in the dark.

Write clear job descriptions

4
It’s easy to get carried away with trying to make a job description stand
out. However all too often, this is done at the expense of the job seeker
actually understanding the role. Our survey of over 2000 job-seekers
showed that 64% said that they were put off applying for a job because of
a confusing job title.

The trend to fill your job descriptions with quirky terms has been around
for a while – terms such as guru, rockstar and similar. When you really
think about it – do these terms add anything? Not really. If every touch
point is an opportunity to make an impression, do you want your job
descriptions to be vague and gimmicky, or detailed and accurate?

Keep your job descriptions clear and detailed. Avoid jargon and get to
the point. This way you’re much more likely to attract the right kind of
candidate, and avoid wasting time – both yours and the candidate.

Ask for feedback and give feedback

5
We’ve already seen several examples in this chapter of the disconnect
between how companies think they are doing and what the candidate’s
experience really is. You simply can’t know what the true candidate
experience is if you don’t ask candidates for feedback!

Understanding what your candidates want, expect, and ultimately received

is essential. Get feedback from candidates who have gone through
different parts of the process. We’d recommend a poll or survey rather than
asking them directly, as it will encourage more honest feedback. You can
also get this unbiased feedback from online sources such as Glassdoor.
However chances are that by simply asking about their experience, you
will be improving it. You will be demonstrating that you care about the
candidate, so we recommend doing both.
 Equally, it is crucial that you are also giving your candidates proper
feedback as well. The further a candidate gets in the process, the more
they will expect some personalised feedback, even if they’ve been
unsuccessful. Take the time to give this, even if it’s just a few pointers
– this small input will make them feel it has, at the very least, been a
worthwhile learning experience.

Fix up your online presence and get mobile-ready

6
People look for jobs in more places than just job boards and will often
check you out before applying. Make sure your social media is current and
matches your company brand and culture. Similarly with your website – is it
up to date? If someone checked it out, would they want to work for you?

Also, don’t forget that over 60% of job seekers search for jobs from their
mobiles. It’s important that your hiring process and any tools involved are
mobile-friendly.

An easy win to use today

A lot of what constitutes a great candidate experience is common sense.
Indeed, this could be why so many businesses think they offer a great one,
while their candidates disagree.

The failing comes at the point of execution. Many of these tips involve small
tasks – small tasks which are easy to overlook and mentally put into the
“I’ll do that later” pile.

The problem with this mindset is these small tasks are also timely. Start to
reconsider these tasks and frame them in the context of contributing to
an amazing candidate experience. It isn’t just an email to a candidate, it’s
contributing to your company’s employer brand. This will help you to stop
overlooking the smaller, but crucially important pieces of the puzzle.
 Our next chapter covers hiring tech talent. How has this group evolved, and
how will your recruiting need to adapt?

What are the best ways to engage with this sector? We’ll cover this and
provide you with useful and applicable tips you can start using today.

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