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24-Q1-GL-SCH-P0004 - Recruiting Brainfood

Recruiting Brainfood

Hung Lee

Psychology perspective on the candidate experience for recruiters.

Cronofy

Adam Bird

Techarenan

Malin Freiman Moezzi

Currys

Curry's

Vicki Saunders

Pearson

Helen James

Candidate Psychology in the Hiring Process

Hung Lee 00:00
Welcome, everybody, to this, I think, very interesting angle on candidate experience. We wanted to get together today to talk about the psychology that's involved in the job search, particularly for people that have already achieved seniority in their career path. I don't know whether you're aware of it, but anybody who's got any friends or contacts or anybody, sort of on the market right now, it's not a particularly good market for a lot of people. And I think it's particularly challenging for people who have actually achieved a degree of seniority. Reason why there's simply less jobs, obviously, most organisations are pyramidical structure. So you know, the more senior you get, there's going to be less opportunities in the general sense, but also is difficult in another way. Because actually, a job seeker that has had a great deal of experience might in fact, be an inexperienced job seeker, because they haven't actually done it in the same frequency as someone who's just, let's say, a recent graduate who's, you know, been applying all the time and being in there. So we want it today to explore what is the psychological angles of the candidate experience for senior people who are on the job market? And how does that then serve? How does that information help us as recruiters and employers, you know, rethink and redesign recruitment processes appropriate for this demographic. So hopefully, you're happy with this conversation, this will be recorded, of course. So if you aren't able to make it, you get access to this on replay. But this is live right now. So if you're here and you and you want to join us, make sure you join us in the chat. And we'll interact with you there. I'm your host Hung Lee. Let's just go through to see who else is joining us in this conversation, Adam, let's go with you first, can you introduce yourself real quick? Who are you what it is you do? And tell us a little bit about Cronofy, actually.

Adam Bird 02:08
Thanks. So yes, Adam Bird, CEO and co-founder of Cronofy really what we do, certainly in this sector is we help kind of make interview scheduling more efficient. So we power the interview scheduling of about 75 different recruiting systems right now. Plus, we have our own tooling on top to augment their tools like Greenhouse, SmartRecruiters, etc, that need far more, especially at these kind of more senior hires where the recruiting gets horribly complicated, and the kind of flexibility required to work around multiple calendars. And as part of this work and trying to understand the kind of the problems that people are facing, we do an annual survey of candidates. And so for the last three years, we've done 6500 candidates, we've just got the data of the 2024 report. It's 12,500 candidates across the USA and Europe. And some really interesting insights to not the kind of the demands, the requests, the kind of wishes are for candidates, but actually the increasing levels of stress that we're seeing across the entire candidate spectrum. So really keen to talk to talk about this today. Yeah.

Hung Lee 03:10
Fantastic stuff Adam. And by the way, market, obviously we have the cost of living crisis, we have all of those externalities. I think that obviously elevates the stress level, because it actually means it is more significant for people who find themselves on the job market, it's a lot more stressful. So no surprise, by the way, candidate experience ratings have generally been going trending down over the last two years. I think it was Ken Grossman's words, something similar where they just tracked all the time sort of how people were rating their experience in the job search and it was trending down and I think it matches with where we're at on the economic economic side. Let's go round as we see it, Vicki, good to see you. Can you quickly introduce yourself? Who are you what it is? You do?

Vicki Saunders 03:57
Yep. Hi, everybody. I'm Vicki Saunders. I'm the founder of The EVP Consultancy, after spending 10 years leading EVP and employer brand at Boots, BA Systems and Currys. And yeah, my role now is about helping organisations to develop and activate their EVPs and employer brands.

Hung Lee 04:19
Fantastic stuff. Let's move on to you, Helen. Helen James, quickly introduce yourself. Who are you, what it is you do?

Helen James 04:26
Yeah, so I am Helen. I'm a global talent acquisition leader. My superpower is change and transformation. And yeah, that's me.

Hung Lee 04:39
Yeah, great to see you Helen. And we have Malin as well. Marlon. Can you quickly introduce yourself, who you are, what it is you do?

Malin Moezzi 04:45
Yes. Hi, everyone. My name is Malin Moezzi. I'm a licenced psychologist. And I've been working with organisational development and specialising in recruitment for the past eight years. And right now I'm working as a consultant. So yeah, running my own business for once.

Hung Lee 05:01
Fantastic stuff. Okay, folks, listen, we have a wonderful panel here today, if you have any questions or any contributions you want to make, make sure you communicate with us in chat. In fact, if you can hear us, okay, let me know in the chat, whether the audio and visuals, okay, from all of our guests here and make use of the q&a feature as well, if there's any particular questions you want us to get to, because we'll get to them towards the end of the conversation. Okay, let's talk about the job market as we see it. And I think, Helen and Vicki, I think both of you have seen sort of direct experience in this in recent times. Tell us a little bit about that. Helen, if we can go to you, what has been your experience of just investigating the job market to date? What have you kind of encountered externally before we think about the psychology part of it?

Helen James 05:53
It's tough. And there are some really great people at the moment looking for jobs, which I've never really known before. There's this whole piece about being ghosted, and you don't hear back from organisations as well as agencies. It's also I don't think people are sharing as much. I know, there's this whole supportive network, don't get me wrong. But you mentioned earlier, that, you know, it's a hard environment, there a budget cuts, teams are being cut. So for me, and what I really enjoy, and what really gets me out of bed is this change and transformation piece. And I'm not seeing any of it. I'm not seeing -- I'm not saying it's not happening, but whether people just aren't going out to the market to sort of say, right, Helen, 6 months, 3 months, 12 months, whatever, or they're keeping it inside, to obviously make sure that all their teams can work on things. So yeah, it's brutal, but it's an interesting dynamic as well, that I that I haven't seen before. And I was contracting for an awful lot of years. And you know, now, obviously, permanent it's, yeah, it's a bit odd, actually.

Hung Lee 07:10
Yeah, so maybe that's the first thing we need to think about, it's actually surprising to a lot of people to encounter a market like this. Because it has, I mean, again, I was at LinkedIn Talent Connect yesterday, there was 600 people in the room, there was lots of people out there looking for work in that group, senior people, very highly credible. Individuals that you would say, in a better market would generally never even enter the market, because they'd be head hunted away. And, you know, they wouldn't actually ever be thinking about creating CVs and applying for jobs. But there they were, and they were talking about, yeah, doing a lot of applications. A lot of ghosting is going on. And a lot of long processes that don't seem to go anywhere. And it's just a very, very tough market. So surprise is maybe the first thing we need to recognise, that this is not something people might be used to. And the external conditions, I think, do need to be recognised. Because sometimes when you're in a job search, if you are doing it completely by yourself without interaction with others, you might you might kind of turn that inward and start questioning yourself and saying, you know, is it me that's just getting rejected? Or is it me that's getting ghosted? Whereas in fact, it's a it's a market wide phenomenon? I had a conversation yesterday with a lady who exactly told me this, she was like, turning the external environment internally and thinking, look, what's my problem? And we have to say, you know, what, part of the reason why you need to go and connect with others is to hear the experience of other people and say, You know what, it's not that unusual that you are encountering this very, very tough market out there. So yes, Steve, thank you for your comment. There are lots of lots of reorganisations, and people in our space, the function, talent acquisition, of course, that's been one of the primary areas that's been cut, it was highlighted, actually, by very famous CEOs. Mark Zuckerberg highlighted it in one of his big announcements that actually the TA function is going to be cut down so that this is market wide, and it's affecting our industry, particularly. Vicki, have you got anything to add on that? Any thoughts on sort of the job search? How we encounter it so far?

Vicki Saunders 09:23
Yeah, so yeah, I've heard many times that TA is a bit like the canary in the mine. It's a good indicator of where the market's gonna go. If companies start pulling back on hiring people into TA, then they're tightening their belts and maybe doing some reorg, redundancies, etc. So I do feel like we're feeling in the TA sector more. We feel it more acutely, probably. But yes, it is tough. And I would echo what Helen said, you know, I know a lot of people People who are fantastic employer brand leaders, you know, six figure salary employer brand leaders who are out of work right now. And they are the kind of people with like you say, the credibility but the track record, but normally are just headhunted and move into the next role straightaway. So you know, it's really hard.

Hung Lee 10:22
Malin, let's go to you on this. And what would you say, are the kind of the things that people need to think about when they're unused to this experience, particularly, again, individuals that are senior into the markets marketplace, who have experience of themselves of their professional work, but maybe it's like a very new and different sort of market that they've encountered.

Malin Moezzi 10:50
So I think the biggest challenge is, as you say, to once again, enter market that you know, nothing about, we are all of us are, no matter if you were born in the 90s, or if you were born in 50s, all of us have been schooled, that we are, we are our experience. So we tend to identify ourselves and our competency with experience and knowledge and skills that we have practised on. And so senior executives and people who have been working with management have identified as leaders as experts, and they tend to identify and describe themselves with their experience and what they have done so far. And right now, and the current and also the future of recruiting doesn't focus as much on experience and knowledge and skills as it has been, we are focusing much more on potential and people working competency based know to put personality and personal traits first, and your problem solving skills. And I think this, this switch is the biggest chalk that you will meet, because you will sort of prepare yourself, you will write your resume, and you will prepare how to describe yourself and your experience and that heavy weight that you might have in your backpack. And then comes a question that focuses more on who you are as a person. And you are asked to describe yourself in terms of behaviours. And this is nothing, that this is something that no one is really trained in. And all of a sudden, someone tells you that your experience your skills, your knowledge isn't worth as much as it has been previously. And I think this will be a big challenge for many people entering the market right now.

Hung Lee 12:29
That's a really interesting observation. Because this leans into this skills based hiring kind of consensus that we seem to be racing toward. And actually, skills based hiring explicitly says experience is less important. It's actually directly part of the thing, so maybe that I didn't even connect those two things. But maybe it is a case that a lot of the people who've got experience in their professional careers have leant on the fact that they've got experience as a way to get through the door, but perhaps is the kind of this you know, tectonic shift on the on the underneath it, which is saying, You know what, we're going to consider this less important. And, you know, bulk up assessments, let's say, to identify, you know, the traits, characteristics or skills that might be more important. So I didn't even consider that skills based hiring may actually be a component of the candidate experience for experienced job seekers out there. Did anyone else, quick one in the audience - did anyone else even think about that? Or am I just like, slow to the chase here? Adam, you want to say something?

Adam Bird 13:41
Yeah, I think it's interesting, just picking up on that point of moving to more sort of skills based assessment, we see this a lot, we see more stress in sort of creative roles and in our research, rather than kind of other roles. And I think they've been kind of closer to be able to provide assessments that allow people to be kind of judged on their skills as like a task and people are trying to create these... They're trying not to make wrong hiring decisions. So what they're trying to do is learn how to make those assessments, which is creating more complicated hiring processes. And especially if you're not used to doing a task as part of an interview process, that's a new thing, if you haven't been kind of looking for jobs more recently. But of course, that in turn requires a tighter feedback loop. Because that person is laying themselves bare. How did I do? I've got no idea. I never do these things. And so more more demand on that kind of the communication piece, which if you end up ghosting, if you don't end up communicating, I wonder whether that's why we're seeing more stress in the kind of more creative industries that we are seeing it perhaps in other industries, we're still seeing stress, but it seems to be from the data, that's where it's especially present.

Hung Lee 14:57
That's a really interesting observation again. You know, the idea, let's say, again, we've kind of segwayed into the skills based hiring kind of angle, but let's explore it a little bit more. Skills based hiring ultimately means there's a, there's an additional focus on assessment. So we're going to degrade the CV and experience as something that we consider, not ignore it, but we're going to degrade it in terms of the waiting, and we're going to assess this person, assessing this person requires you to do put some energy into that you're going to do an assessment, create a task, do something. But then if you fail to -- if the company then fails to feed back to the person that's produced that assessment, then obviously, that's going to be very, very damaging to the candidate's perception of that organisation, because you've actually invested a lot more time in into the process, consider, you apply for a job...

Adam Bird 15:51
But also the perception of themselves as well. And I think that's really, really important because the company do 10, 20 assessment, so 10, 20 people, so for them, it's normal for the candidate, this might be the first time they've ever had to do this as part of an interview process.

Malin Moezzi 16:06
Probably, even if they've done it before, right now a trend that we're seeing here in Sweden, because we've been working a lot with assessments early on in, in recruitment for many, many years, we've been working with logic reasoning tests, but also personality assessments for many years. And it's getting so so common that there are more and more vendors out there, more and more companies are using assessment. So even if you have sort of understood why you should take these assessments, you still shouldn't be forced into... If you're applying for five jobs, you shouldn't be you shouldn't have to take these tests five times. Because when you apply for a job, traditionally, you write one CV, and you write maybe one cover letter, and you have one conversation. And now you have to also take the assessments five different times if you're applying for five jobs. And I think this is also a big obstacle of not having a candidate centric perspective when we are using new methods. And I think we have completely failed when it comes to the communication of the purpose of using assessments early on, and what skill based hiring actually means. Because no one is saying that your experience is worthless. No one is saying that not knowledge is useless, I think all of us can sort of relate to we are not the same person as we were when we started a new profession. It doesn't matter if you're 19, or if you're 50, 52, when you start a new profession, but you are never as good as you are when you have some experience. But experience is extremely hard to measure and to evaluate early on in the process, which is why you need more assessments to fairly assess who this person is and how they will behave at the job and how to use their experience how to use their knowledge. Because today, we know that inter-human factors, and interrelational factors are more evidence into work performance than previously when it was more task based. And which is also why we see personality, having an upswing and intelligence and problem solving scale actually has a lesser factor when it comes to predicting work performance now.

Hung Lee 18:11
You know, very interesting chat, as well keep the conversation going in the chat stream, by the way, we're gonna we're gonna go into the cultural differences. I think you're right, we need to explore different regions, where this sits is different. But Helen, let's go to you, since you wanted to make an observation with all of that sort of use of assessments and so on.

Helen James 18:32
Just going back to the interview process, really, or the whole recruitment process, if the organisation is looking at skills based hiring, then you could make that a feature on the website, or just say, has everybody heard about this. So all candidates understand this is the expectation of so you will then probably look at your CV in a different way think, right? This needs to be a skills based CV, which, you know, could take a little while to get the versions correct. But at least if you know, it's like anything, isn't it, if you know what's expected, or what the what the organisation are looking for, you can at least give yourself a bit more of a fighting chance, actually, and there's so much around, and about skills based hiring that we've all heard about it, organisations are doing it. But I just think from from the candidate point of view, as you rightly said, In the beginning, a few of us haven't been in the market for a long time. And because you've got your experience, you just think the CV is fine. Well, it's not you, might need to redo it in a different way. It's just these little, it's these hints and tips that organisations probably need to give that will make their job better because you as a candidate will be better prepared. And I absolutely agree with that feedback piece. Because if you don't get... feedback is a gift. All right, however it's served. And if you don't get it, you're gonna be thinking, well, what why did I do that? What's wrong with that? What's wrong with that? So it all helps. It's like a big loop.

Hung Lee 19:59
Yeah, I think it's a simple rule, isn't it, I think of the feedback thing is very much like as a metaphysical exchange is energy in energy out, you know, if you've asked like for more energy from the candidate, you've got to reciprocate that energy back. Now, that's not to say you should give white glove treatment to every single applicant that comes through, you can't do that, there's 1000s of people applying, we have an overload of applicants, actually, in this case, and that's just simply going to accelerate with the tools that applicants currently have. So you can't give white glove treatment to every single person. However, if you've asked that individual if take them through deeper into the process, and then ask them to do assessment or a test or your interview, second interview, third, if you whatever it is, you need to reciprocate the energy and commitment that that candidate has provided, and that you need to then white glove that treatment, you need to then put some concierge there. So you've got to moderate your sort of effort based on how deep you've pulled that candidate in and how much energy you've asked that candidate to do. So I think that's table stakes for recruiters. But maybe we've we've forgotten it, as we as we go through. By the way, Helen, you mentioned a really important point as a tip for companies that could improve candidate experience very simply. And that's simply being transparent on the process of how you do intend to assess those candidates, you can publish that on the website, you know, there's no reason why that should not be in a job, in every job description, or even on the default. Folks, our philosophy and our assessment is this, this is how we do it. And then everybody who goes through that process is going to basically have already agreed that is the process. And you'll find that that's got to have an effect on their opinion on the candidate experience, you know, so yeah.

Helen James 20:13
Can I just say one more thing, I caught up this week, actually, you would never go into a restaurant and wait at the door, with nobody coming to speak to you to seat you. Nobody asking you what you wanted from the menu. And then nobody talking to you when they delivered your food. It's the same, like we give our energy and our applications to roles. And then we don't hear anything back. That employer brand piece is, is really poor. So just, you know, I know, we're not going to dive into the recruitment process, but there's lots of really small wins that some of these teams can make. And one of them is telling you on the website, what those what those steps are, doesn't matter how basic 101 it is, but they manage expectations.

Vicki Saunders 22:37
Yeah, I would add to that, Helen as well that I agree the transparency would be great. But I think some reassurance probably too, because I think if you if you're used to the old version of of an interview process where you're asked about your CV and everything else, and then at the end, you get your chance to ask your questions about the organisation. It might be a perception that people think, Oh, am I still going to get my chance as well, if we're going to this whole skill based methodology? Does that mean that that interaction that I get what I need out of that conversation still happens? So I think there needs to be some reassurance there that isn't all just about you being assessed in the company's eyes for the skills that they want. It's a two way street, isn't it? It's about whether the company is the right fit for the candidate, etc.

Adam Bird 23:29
I think just on this, I saw something in the chat people talking about sorry, TA teams, because they're the first like the canary in the coal mine. They've been kind of gutted for want of a better word. And so they are and maybe the more senior people who are more expensive. And oh, yeah, this is an opportunity for you, Junior TA person, to act up and develop your career in a kind of perhaps potentially more cynical view on saving some, some salary. They are desperate. I don't think it's any lack of intent to provide a great experience, but it's just they don't have the tools. They don't have the time they don't have the experience to do this. So I think we it's very easy to kind of beat up on the recruitment teams by providing a poor experience. And I think it's a great analogy, the restaurant analogy, but it's it's kind of you're expecting sixth formers to run a restaurant. It's possibly the situation that some teams are in.

Hung Lee 24:28
But someone actually mentioned it in I think it was Steve, actually who's dominating the chat. By the way, please make sure Steve doesn't dominate the chat. But he did mention something to the effect of we kind of denuded the TA teams because we've chopped them down. And then obviously that means there's lots of TA folks that are on the job market that are then applying for these jobs to these companies that actually now have denuded TA teams. So actually we've got under capacity under resourced functions that are kind of trying to obviously optimise the new technology and trying to do more with less. But that's the transition. We haven't gotten to that point at this stage. And therefore, the experience for recruiters that are now applying is shockingly bad. Because we kind of understand how candidate experience works. But we're going into a kind of a skeleton staff sort of say we're kind of applied to a company that has, you know, radically rejigged its organisation, and in fact, probably targeted, the more expensive, more experienced resources. So they're actually less experienced than they were before in the past. So again, there's not a justification or maybe go some way towards the explanation as to why you're this experience has been as mean, so tough. Go ahead, Malin.

Malin Moezzi 25:48
Yeah, I would like to, to sort of add, connect to what we've been talking about, but also in the chat, and two things. So that transparency and communication is key. I think we're all agreed on that. But I love what Adam is saying. And like, I think candidates also have to sort of accept that right now, we are going to work with a lot of automated feedback. And I also think that recruiters need to be brave enough to offer automated feedback, as long as you have a clear communication that this is to be expected. Because we know right now that we have a lot of applicants there is there's no, there's no way for us to keep in touch with 50, 200, or sometimes 500 applicants, and we don't have the time, and we don't have the staff to do it. However, if we're hoping to have a manual feedback, or have an interaction, and that this will keep us from talking about the automated feedback, and then we end up ghosting them instead. Because we are always postponing and hoping to connect with them. And we end up not talking to them at all. So instead, I think we need this balance of candidates accepting automated feedback. And for us, recruiters and TA to actually work better with our communication. And so always have this automated feedback and try to have as much communication as possible early on, in the middle, and in the end. And keep giving feedback, if you know that you're going to run a long course of recruitment process than just keep the feedback going. Like we're still not, we're still not where we are, we're having a few weeks more, we're still talking to applicants. Keep up, you know, just to keep up the company communication, and it might be automated, maybe you can send a video message that is generated equally to everybody just to show your face and have somewhat more live interaction. But also candidates need to accept that you won't get a phone call. And you won't get asked back to the office to go through your assessment results. You won't have that type of feedback because there is no time. And I think this is an important balance from the candidate perspective, but also from the TA perspective.

Hung Lee 27:47
Yeah, so there's some tough love there from Malin. I mean, basically, we need to have a reset of expectations. I think that's fair comment to a degree. Because let's imagine the last time you were on the job market was pre 2021. Let's see. And that was boom times. You know, if you recall, only what three years or so ago, everyone's phone was ringing off the hook. We're getting 3, 4, 5 messages per week, everybody, you're getting headhunted who's in the recruiting space, that was only like 18 months, two years or so ago. So maybe our expectations were super ubiquitous at that point, and now suddenly, you know, we find ourselves in a different marketplace, we've got to reset our expectations. Say look, this is just a totally different market now. It's a small market, that's a fact. And we've got to figure out okay, what what is an acceptable level of interaction with a with an organisation? Now I agree automation can help but at the same time, I think the black hole is still a persistent issue, right. So clearly the the implementation of technology even basic stuff is very uneven throughout throughout the marketplace. So fortunately, this black hole experience is quite persistent. And I don't have too many answers there.

Adam Bird 29:01
I'm just going to say I think the most important answer you can get in a recruitment process is no. And as soon as possible. No, because then that's it. Fine, I don't have to think about it. But it's the not knowing that's the killer.

Hung Lee 29:20
The ambiguity, actually let's talk about ambiguity. Ambiguity, my kind of amateur psychologist perspective Malin you correct me if I'm wrong here, but I think ambiguity is the source of stress. Like if you know a disaster's coming, that's disastrous, but it's like okay, the stress doesn't seem to be the same because you know, this disaster's there is going to happen. Whereas if you kind of like literally have a grey fog, you're just waiting for something that's like mega mega stressful, and it just builds up until you have a resolution. But what is that phenomenon? Do you know anything about why why we have that sort of thing in our heads?

Malin Moezzi 29:59
Because I mean, it just in general, not knowing is the worst thing ever, because it keeps our cognitive load always thinking about the next step, when will I find out, I will be looking at my cell phone, I will be resetting my email, I will always be looking for information. And I can't really move on and think about the next step until I know. So this is quite like, this is just common sense. It's not even psychology, like we want to know. And we always talk about this big myth that, oh, you should never give a negative negative answer on a Friday before a weekend. And it's like, yes, you should, because it's better to give an answer on Friday. So you can let go, and you can let loose you can be mad all Saturday and Sunday if you want to, but at least you will know. So the worst part isn't having a negative feedback. It's having no feedback at all. And then we need to sort of move past this myth that we should wait until the perfect timing for us to give a good negative feedback in the best possible way. Because, honestly, there is no good way to really communicate that you didn't get the job, you just need to communicate the fact, like that's the most important step.

Hung Lee 31:01
Yeah, I think we should be really getting towards 100% communication on not success. I think candidates are mature enough to understand, I would say most candidates, not everybody, but I think most candidates are mature enough to understand they're not going to convert every single application to a job. I mean, that's just normal, right? But you've got to be able to, to close off those super loose ends. Imagine if you're applying like 50 jobs a week or something, they're just 50 loose ends, you've got to try and close away. And that as you say, the cognitive effort to have those things in your mind must be super high. We actually had a complaint in the online community earlier today about unprepared candidates, totally unprepared candidates who showed up to interviews, they were actually successful to be selected interviews, and they didn't even know about the company. Now I thought that was weird. But then I kind of thought, You know what, maybe that's a symptom of them being super used to not getting any feedback whatsoever. So that they just applied and forgot about it. And then oh, we've got an interview. And then they showed up and it kind of leads to kind of bad behaviours, or almost like as a mutually reinforcing thing. So yeah, I think we can definitely start being more disciplined with a no, although I would put a caveat and say, you can be too early with a no. Because oftentimes, an instant rejection is perceived to be a rejection where you've not been fully considered for the role. And people can get very annoyed by that. And in fact, there's been a case sort of a, there's been a lawsuit. In fact, in the US where a candidate is suing Workday. They're suing Workday for ageism, because they thought that they've been filtered out. Because, and the reason why they felt that is because they got an instant rejection. Now that's because they just felt look, I applied, what else could the veto me on must be date of birth, boom, I'm out. Now whether that's true or not, I don't know. But I think Workday's in trouble, because they had some sort of filter, which could describe the date of birth of the person. So there is some sort of caveat, I think the best time to reject, you just time delay it, basically timeshift, the, the rejection? Adam doesn't like this. But I have a problem with instant rejection, I've got to say, unless the job's done.

Adam Bird 33:33
It's about transparency, it's like you need to be absolutely clear. And we have a principle in our company of truth. And that has to apply to the recruiting process, our kind of head of talent describes that, if we know it, the candidate should know it. So actually, if Workday shared their criteria, their filtering criteria, then there'll be no issue. And I think there's kind of two, I think what you're -- that is a sticking plaster this like, oh, delay it to make it look like we considered it. But that doesn't change the facts. And I think just just pulling back on this kind of this distress point, the lack of communication is, is the biggest cause of stress for candidates, about 40% of candidates that we see in our research across the board, say this, but it's especially acute for neurodiverse candidates, you get sort of levels of sort of 56-58% of those candidates, find that time really stressful, not hearing anything. And so this is another important aspect of this. So I don't think we should be trying to find sticking plaster plaster solutions to try and pretend that we're assessing. Truth, transparency is the most important tool we have.

Hung Lee 34:49
All right. I think that's a powerful comment. Do you agree with Adam Bird there? Let me know in the comments. What do you think it was? Should we just be straight up and say right away, that's the case and just take sort of, the handling? Or should we do a time shift? Let me know in the comments, folks, happy to be heckled on this. Let's see what what the verdict is. By the way, I was about to say, which actually replay which added to this a little bit. Why would there be that -- part of the problem may be the existence or failure to kind of kind of take a job down. Like we post a job. Typically, I think time duration is still the most common way in which job is published. In other words, we default to 30 days, or however much we paid for. And actually, we don't have a very convenient way to pull that job down. Despite the fact we might have a shortlisted bunch of candidates, it's actually a really good argument for the use of programmatic advertising. And again, I don't want to shill on a particular type of technology. But we need to be better at shutting down a job where we no longer require those candidates. And we need to make that an automated process. That isn't a case where individual recruiters have to make that decision or hiring managers need to make that decision. Because you're never going to make that decision. It's similar, it's similar to on the reverse side of that is, you know, when you're a candidate and you're registered in a database, how many times you actually take your details off? Once you found a job? You know, you don't you just say okay, fine, I found a job and you move on with your life. And then it's only when you get a bunch of calls coming in to say, Oh crap, my CV still a monster or something, that you might then go and deactivate it. So it's quite normal, I think not to do it, we just need an automated solution. So programmatic advertising, I think that's going to be a way forward, particularly for high volume, we need a solution to smaller volume, because right now, programmatic only seems to work for you know, mega scale hiring or closing a job. There we go. How do we do that? I don't know. I mean, are there tools in the ATS's that do this right now? I'm not sure they should be? Adam, got any thoughts on this? I mean, you've got an insight on where the product development is in terms of shutting these jobs down once they've hit a threshold?

Adam Bird 37:05
The whole notion of doing it when you hit a threshold, I'm not quite sure I like that as a hiring process either. This idea that you kind of define a cohort and have to choose the one from the cohort doesn't fit with my kind of view on hiring anyway. And I'm not really close to that job process. But I think if you're stuck and the jobs up, and you've hired for it, you just have to, that's your auto response. Really sorry, I know the job's up, we've hired it, good luck in your search. To Malin's point earlier on that's, that's a great use of automation.

Malin Moezzi 37:34
And I think like, I want to add something also and connect back to when we were talking about skill based hiring, I think, when it comes to communication and being transparent, you can't just use the headline, we're working with skills based recruitment, because this means 10 different things to 10 different recruiters and it means 20 different things to 20 different organisations, skills based hiring does not mean that you are objective, it does not mean that you are working with a structured scoring and assessment, it just means that you're looking for skills first. And you can do this using traditional methods, and actually use pretty poor assessments to define what skills are. And this is also where the transparency in the communication is so so important, you need to explain what does this mean in this particular process. And this is where you can actually give instant feedback, because if, as Adam said, if you are super clear on your criterias, how you will measure them. And if there are any cut offs, then you can just add to that. Like, for this instance, we have some level of experience that is a high criteria. And if you don't meet that criteria, then you can actually have an instant feedback. And or if we're looking for instance, feedback after five people have applied, and you have your top four that the all scored really high and matched your profile, then you can say that we have right now we are we already have three people who have a highest score match, we are going to talk to them. And if things change, we will get back to you. But as of now you are not in the top five of our candidates that we are going to meet in a structured interview.

Hung Lee 39:07
That's well and good. But the reality is that needs to be a system, right? There's no way an under-resourced recruiting team is going to do that, I think that's the problem. One of the problems of advertising a job generally is that we can't predict the amount of effort the recruiters are required to deal with it. Because is it going to be 10 applicants? Or is it going to be 10,000 applicants? We actually don't know until we publish the job. So we can't adequately organise resources to deal with the applicant flow unless we have an automated system, which does cap the number of applicants that come in. But Adam, I totally get what you're saying is like, look, listen, we want to cast a wide net and give everyone a fair chance. But the reality of it is I think you can kind of shut jobs down more effectively if you connect it with ATS progress. So for instance, let's say I've got three candidates through the second interview for a three stage interview process. In other words, you know, we're going to move these people into quite close to final stage, it would be great if I had a way to shut that job down or pause it so that I'm not accepting more people at the beginning of the funnel, who I'm not going to talk to, because they're two weeks out from that process. So I think the technology is going to be there, I'm hoping ATS are producing this technology, it's not that hard to do. Again, I lean on a little bit of programmatic because that's connected to where the job has gone externally, this is where ATS's need to talk to advertising sort of distributors sort of see. And they need to work together to make sure that these jobs as candidates see them actually live. So we're not applying to what isn't effectively a job. You know what I mean? Anyway, Vicki, go ahead.

Vicki Saunders 40:44
Yeah, I was just gonna make a point about what we're describing in terms of the candidate experience, the ambiguity, the keeping people hanging, the ghosting, and the impact that has not just on those who are regretted, but on the people who join the organisation. Because we know that there's, there's massive variance isn't there between candidates when they join the organisation and their time to productivity as a metric, or their engagement as a metric. And we know that the higher their engagement, the faster their time to productivity. So I just think that this whole angle on the business case for an improved candidate experience, which isn't just about, we know that poor candidate experience can affect reputation, okay, so there's a business risk, and that you can assign a cost or risk cost to that as a business. But actually, I think there's also a cost that can be brought into the business case about how you've treated somebody, you've made them feel respected, you've made them feel like they belong, you've made them feel things which are in line with your company values as part of the candidate experience. And then when they join, they're, you know, they're moving forward into productivity and engagement. And hopefully, then also, less early attrition, I think the candidate experience is it's like, somebody doesn't just take off their head and their heart, when they when they sign the contract and go, Yes, I accept the offer. They carry all that stuff with them when they walk into the organisation, too.

Hung Lee 42:27
That's a really good observation. Yeah, well, I wonder whether anybody listening here, I mean, have you had a bad candidate experience? And then taking the job? Let me know what you were like, what how did you feel about this? Like, did you come in? I'm interested in your psychology, that you've had a terrible experience. But you know, what, somehow the job has actually been offered to you? Did you take it? If so, you know, how did it go? It's an interesting kind of experiment. Think about let me know in the chat. Okay.

Vicki Saunders 42:56
Well, in the in the current climate, I think people will take jobs, even if they've had a poor candidate experience, but there's still a flight risk. Yeah. When they join, the motivation, impacts on team morale, etc, etc, etc.

Helen James 43:15
People will move on, won't they, when they win the market picks up. Yeah.

Hung Lee 43:18
And actually, that's actually a perception that's worth talking about really briefly, because I wonder whether part of the problem that as experienced candidates have in the current job market is this sense of flight risk, perceived flight risk from the employer side, where they might be thinking, you know, what, this job isn't quite big enough for, you know, this person's level of experience. They've got the skills, they've got this, this and this, but I don't think they're going to be there for six months, you know, they're going to keep on the market and keep looking. Is that a legitimate concern? How do candidates alleviate that? Like, what's the what's the story or thoughts on that? So I think that's one of the concerns as you get older as an individual, it's a quite a common bit of feedback I'm getting from a veteran job seekers. So to say that I'm fully prepared to take a different level of job or take a you know, a different role. But they're perceived to be you know, what, this guy is going to be gunning for the Head Of type of position, or they're not going to be fully satisfied, with what we've got on offer. Any thoughts on this? Like, is it a fair comment? Is it a fair position from employers? Or is there anything that a candidate can do to alleviate those issues? Any ideas that now open it to anybody with thoughts on this?

Helen James 44:32
I'll just, I think if that thought is in somebody's head when they're interviewing you, it's going to be really hard to shift that thought, okay, no matter what you say, you know, and you can say, No, I, you know, do you want me to commit for however long you don't say that in an interview, but it's really hard if somebody's going into an interview from the candidate side. And, you know, you might have been out of work for an awfully long time. Financial issues are front front of mind for some people. And it's like, I'll take any job, I just want to have my self worth back and be able to demonstrate to an organisation that I am excellent at what I do, because it's. So it's a tough one, actually. Because if the person who is interviewing you thinks he's going to move on in six months time, no matter what you say, but you know, it? I don't know, I don't know what the answer to that is actually bring somebody in, that has got experience that has got energy that is passionate, that wants to do a fantastic job. See where it goes.

Hung Lee 45:37
Quick one, Helen, would it be better for that to be an explicit conversation? So rather than the employer suspecting or?

Helen James 45:49
I think so it's, it's all about, it's all about the honesty, isn't it? And as we talked about and the feedback and if you can build up an honest relationship with whoever's interviewing you and it probably will be your boss. Even better, I think, because organisations talk about the amazing experiences they give to their customers, give an amazing experience for somebody that you're interviewing with, and if that conversation is whoever Helen, thank you, but actually, at least you've had that conversation and you as an individual think, Alright, gave it my best shot, maybe slightly tunnel visioned, you know, not really the growth mindset that I wanted in a new organisation.

Malin Moezzi 46:32
I think it's hard, because as soon as you as soon as you deviate from a structured process, where you're not asking all the candidates the same questions or having the same conversations, you will be biased, and you don't know who will appreciate your honesty, and appreciate this transparency from a candidate perspective. And who will sort of give you a no on the spot. So I think like in, in theory, super. But in real life, I don't think it works. Because we're not that good at being objective and actually assessing these kinds of situations and these discussions, because it's also like I always asked when people say motivation is so interesting to to look for in the beginning of the recruitment process. And I asked why. And they said, because it's so important to understand why you want to be at this organisation or in this job. But how do you assess what a good motivation is? Is it that you love this organisation? And you've been looking for them for 20 years? Or is it that, Oh, I haven't had a job for two years, and I need money.

Hung Lee 47:39
I think Malin's got a point, like part of our problem of our attempt to debias interviewing is that are we then kind of literally reading a script, in which case, why don't we just use a robot to do the interview? You know, if we're saying we have to be completely asked the same questions all the time, boom, boom, boom, literally, why am I why is a human being there? A human being hopefully is there to provide a judgement and maybe have an EQ to judge whether the person is able to accept an honest conversation. And that's not always the case, some candidates are not able to do it, we can understand it's a, it's a risky move, for a hiring manager to take or recruited to take. However, I would hope that we were able to do that. Adam, you definitely want to say something, I want to get your insight on this.

Adam Bird 48:25
So I think no recruitment processes objective, you're always even if you're asking the same questions, you're making a quantitative assessment of the answers, and their fit for your organisation. And I think that's the other really important point, that fit for your, for your organisation. So for us, truth is foundational, you know, it's like everything we do, and we're kind of we are, for many people brutally truthful, in the in the way we deal with each other. And through the interview process. So, personally, I obviously I'm hiring more senior people. I look to qualify people out, and I make this explicit in the interview process as early as possible, get the difficult questions out the way. And so we can have these really candid conversations with people, because then unless we can do that, in many ways, that's part of our filtering process. It's just you're not going to be successful at our organisation. If you're not comfortable having these candid conversations. So I think staying true to your organisational principles and the way you operate as an organisation. So we talk about transparency, that that's useful, but it depends how transparent you are as an organisation, or whether for example, delaying a response by 24 hours is a way of pretending that you're you're doing something else. That just wouldn't fly in our organisation so I think...

Malin Moezzi 49:50
But then it should be here. Yes, well, then then this has to be in the job ad. So like, in theory, these things are great, but you can't add stuff in the end, like all of the things you're discussing, it has to be in the job at it has to be measurable criteria. And you have to be straightforward from the beginning. And that's where we deviate. Because I think in theory, we would love to assess these things. But honestly, us as human beings, we're not that good at being objective. We're not that good at making these quantitative measures. That's the problem. And especially today, because I've seen a lot of comments in the chat right now that we have a lot of young and, and junior TA teams, they do not have the skills to make these assessments of candidates fairly and objective. This is why we have such a high level of discrimination when it comes to age, especially ethnicity. We're not that good. I wish we were, I wish we needed human interaction and in interviews and in recruitment process, because it should be a positive thing. But it's also the biggest obstacle in us being fair and hiring the top talent.

Hung Lee 50:56
Yeah, quick interlude guys, sorry, quick interlude, we've got about seven minutes left, everybody. So if you've got any questions for this amazing panel, please use the q&a feature at the bottom. We're going to get to them in about three minutes. Okay. So use the q&a feature if you've got any questions on any of these particular topics. Okay, Vicki, I think you were saying something?

Vicki Saunders 51:16
Yeah, sorry, I was just gonna come back to what Adam and Malin have been talking about. You know, if we don't ask some of the questions in our heads as recruiters, if, because we want to ask people all the same questions. If we don't ask any case specific ones, then we keep our own assumptions, we haven't given an opportunity for our brain to be challenged by what the real responses do you know what I mean. So would it just increase bias, if we don't ask some of those conversations that, you know, trying to assess whether somebody's a flight risk, because they're too senior in the role. It's a bit like, it's a bit like the old, you know, not giving any people feedback. You know, like Helen said earlier, feedback is a gift. And it's a gift because it allows someone to see themselves in a different way. And if you, if you don't give people feedback, then it's you're not being fair to them, you're not setting them up for success. And I also think this is the similar case here that if you don't actually face into some of those questions, you'll just walk away with your own assumptions in your head.

Malin Moezzi 52:21
And I sort of agree, and only the facts... I mean, the truth is in the pudding, we discriminate. And if we were good at doing these kinds of assessments and asking the right kind of questions and making a fair judgement based on that, then we wouldn't see this problem with discrimination. Because we also have, all information we gather, we also have to sort of give feedback to the hiring managers. And they might interpret things differently than we do. Because we have the expertise, we knew why we asked a question and we know how to assess it. But giving the feedback to other people who are joined in the decision might not interpret in the same way. And as I'm not saying it's not good, I just it's not relevant, it's just we need to be super careful. Because every time we deviate from the structure, we risk bias coming in to our decision. And it's crucial, both for the individual but also for the organisations. And I think we need to sort of accept that, accept that we have faults as human beings when it comes to decision making. And most people also have a tendency to have a bigger belief in their experience and their judgments. And then most people, we're more confident in our own judgement making than we should be.

Hung Lee 53:37
Sorry, I'm gonna interrupt here. But I think on this the the philosophical conflict is like, do we trust the human judgement? Or can we externalise that judgement into some structure that anybody can pick up and use? And I think that's something that we're wrestling with it in a way that we haven't come to an overly satisfactory conclusion. Go ahead Adam, I don't want to interrupt.

Adam Bird 54:02
I think just because something's difficult doesn't mean we shouldn't do it. And also, the kind of sticking to the same set of questions presupposes that we've got the right set of questions at the start of the process. And to Vicky's point, pulling those threads with people, understanding the story behind them, helps us better understand the types of candidates that we're assessing for this role, and helps us improve that process. But this is why you have two, three people on a panel as you get those different perspectives and different people can then assess each other. So yes, it's there's someone who's more expert on the kind of make, it's not objective, it's tending towards objectivity, then that's really powerful, because then they can kind of pull in other assumptions, but those people who are perhaps biased are going to start pulling on things which might expose other things that we want to we want to learn so I think it's far more powerful to learn as much as possible about someone and learn how to ask the questions and evolve that question set.

Malin Moezzi 55:11
I agree, let's just keep it to the maybe two final candidates and not do it as 50. And in the beginning, because we move the subjectivity to the end, and I think if we do that, we might be able to use them correctly. However, right now, the traditional way is the most average way. And we tend to ask these kind of questions to the 15 first candidates, and then we won't succeed. And I think that's great to understand. And I would just like to say, I don't think this is a philosophical question. I think this should be an evidence based situation. I think we shouldn't see this as a philosophical questions, but as a research question, like we have statistics, we have research that said, some better some methods are better than others. They're not perfect, but they are way better than most traditional way ones.

Hung Lee 55:54
Okay, let's, by the way, Steve, you're mixing your parables. So that's all good. I think there was only three blind men in the elephant story. But yeah, go with 12. Why not have more? I don't have a problem with that. Guys. We're going to we're going to sort of come to the questions now. And then I want to finish off with a return to the candidate psychology, I think it's been a fascinating conversation on sort of the interaction with how employers can do a better job and can they experience and the assessment side, but let's go back to our candidates psychology, I want everyone to think a little bit about what type of tips can you give to a candidate who was on the job market today and encountering some of these issues? Like what psychological things should they be bearing in mind to help kind of empower them to be more successful in market conditions that we have? So let's go to the first question here. We've got Ben Walsh, Ben is saying okay, with the way cost of living is dramatically increasing. Do you think candidates salary expectations are too high compared to what companies can offer at the moment? I personally think candidates have been flexible. I don't know whether what the panel thinks but everyone I've spoke to is generally said, You know what, we recognise that's the situation? Maybe it's down to who's on the who's on the market and isn't. If you're on the job market involuntarily, I think you've been hyper flexible. If you're currently in situ, you're probably not moving without I would say significant uplift. That's my assessment of this market is bifurcated. What are your thoughts anyone? And anybody got a comment to make on Ben's question there?

Helen James 57:32
I agree with what you said Hung. And some of those roles that are being advertised at the moment, their salaries are lower, a lot lower than people are expecting. And there's a I think there's four of us that actually applied for one role. And we all said the same thing. We would have maybe 18 months ago, it would have been a lot higher. And it goes back to what we were saying before about taking a job. If there's a financial pressure, absolutely. However, when the market changes, then would that person then move on?

Hung Lee 58:04
Yeah, I think that's the answer, Ben. So okay, we're running out of time. So I'm really sorry, everyone, but let's try and find three real quick, in 20 seconds or less. What tip would you give to an experienced job seeker today, Adam Bird, your thoughts?

Adam Bird 58:21
I, I don't have any tips. I'm sorry. Yeah, it's yeah, it's a -- I would hate to be in the market right now.

Hung Lee 58:28
No, I think just recognising the reality of it is one of the things that we need to bear in mind. It's not a personal thing. It is just the market-wide phenomenon. And Vicki, your thoughts?

Vicki Saunders 58:40
I would just say, try not to take it personally.

Hung Lee 58:45
Yep, I think that's basics in it. Very good. Helen.

Helen James 58:49
Look, after your health, both mental and physical. And get out there exercise, make sure you're eating properly, sleeping properly, and rightly so. It's not probably your fault. You just got to have a wellbeing about you.

Hung Lee 59:02
Very, very good. It's a holistic wellbeing folks. You can sit in front of the computer and think that's all you do. That's not what you should do. Make sure you take a walk every single day. Malin, final word to you, bit of advice to a job seeker right now?

Malin Moezzi 59:16
My words my words of advice would be prepare, prepare, prepare, seek information about what skills based hiring means, what common tools and assessments you should be prepared for, and demand information and transparency from the recruiter ask why they're using different assessments and what to expect.

Hung Lee 59:34
Yep, that's a very, very good tip. Once you're applying, if you have interaction with a recruiter, ask what is the assessment process that's going to eliminate some of that ambiguity that's causing you stress down the road? Okay, folks, we're over time. So we're gonna get kicked off this platform anytime. Right now to thank you, everyone. Thank you, Adam Bird. Thank you, Vicki Saunders. Thank you, Helen James, thank you Malin. I can't pronounce your second name yet, but we'll just say Malin for now. And thank you everyone in the crowd for your wonderful contribution. It's been a great conversation, take care of yourself make sure you connected to everyone make sure you're learning all the time from your peer group and good luck and job search folks.

Malin Moezzi 1:00:10
Happy Easter to everyone, yes.

Psychology perspective on the candidate experience for recruiters

Recruiting Brainfood - Candidate psychology in the hiring process

In this webinar, we discussed the current job market trends and their impact on candidates through the hiring process. We explore:

What recruiters can do to help improve the candidate experience

How recruiters can engage their hiring teams to have empathy for candidates when managing interviews

What candidates should expect or demand from hiring teams this season