How the Candidate Experience Award Winners Rate On Glassdoor

Ahh, it is October! What an amazing month - the leaves are starting to change, everyone (and it does seem like everyone) is selling pumpkin flavored something, and most importantly - it is the month of the HR Technology Conference! It has been going on for 16 years, and the best way I can describe it is it is like shopping at Mall of America, going to a Ted Conference, and a family reunion. But why discuss this in a recruiting blog? Aside from wanting to make sure you go next year - there are two primary reasons - and I will cover each one in a separate blog.

1. The Candidate Experience Award (CandEs)
2. Hot new Recruiting Technology to make your life easier!

How the Awards Came to Be Over some beverages Chris Forman, Elaine Orler, Gerry Crispin and Ed Newman (all of which are recruiting celebrities) came up with the idea that there should be some award that recognizes companies that truly make sure they offer the best interview experience to candidates. Being the thought leaders that they are - they didn’t want the awards to become some commercial exercise - so they formed the Talent Board as its own 501c3 company to run the award process. Finding the Top Companies The award process uses three steps, and many companies drop out along the way:

1. The company fills out a very comprehensive survey as to their applicant process
2. The Talent Board then will survey the company’s applicants (regardless of whether they were hired)!
3. The company will then be judged by a panel to make sure what is written is actually in practice.

Pause for a minute - how many would like to hear the survey results of candidates who were told no? Pretty brave, transparent and innovative stuff! Learning from the Candidate Experience Award Winners The amazing thing is that report is free (you can get the 2011 and 2012 report here). You can also register to get the 2013 report which will be ready in Jan/Feb of 2014. So you can learn what some of these amazing firms are doing. Here are some examples:

1. They survey candidates to find out about their experience. 6.1 percent of the winners survey to find out why people abandon the process.
2. Some actually predict for the applicant how long the process will take.

The 2013 Winners: Just for fun, let’s compare some of the 2013 winners to their Glassdoor overall company rating! As recruiting professionals, take a minute to think about your process. What does it look like for a candidate? How many questions do you ask them on the application - does it feel like an IRS audit? How much feedback do they get - does their application go into a black hole? If you thought that this was the way it is supposed to be - there is a better way!