An Overwhelming Process
Head of Talent Acquisition, Joel Broughton, was tasked with improving the recruitment process to uncover the best people to staff residential care facilities. Reviewing the existing process, he found that many of their business leaders were overwhelmed by existing hiring requirements.
“Some of our leaders were spending up to 50% of their week on recruitment based activities. And it’s not fair. It’s not fair for people to be doing a role essentially that they’re not qualified to do and expect them to do a great job at it.”
“Finding that there were operational leaders who were focused on doing recruitment activity when they should have been focused on doing other things, care-based work, running their own business, having their own staff, hundreds of staff reporting through to them with their own issues.”
“These people were completely overworked and sometimes completely overwhelmed with the volume of recruitment that was coming through.”
As a result, there was a high dependence on recruitment agencies. Combined with the cost of having leaders spend a large amount of time on hiring and other costs from inefficiencies, Joel developed a powerful business case for technology to support their small talent team of two to better support residential care facilities.
Joel made the decision to implement Vervoe at the top of their hiring process. The BlueCross talent team consulted directly with facility leaders to develop a skills assessment that would not only scale to handle the hundreds of applicants they received from every role, but make it faster for them to recommend the most qualified candidates to their facility leaders.
Creating the Business Case
The unique combination of their workforce schedules and the advent of the COVID-19 health crisis meant that there were some vital criteria for Vervoe to meet.
First, it had to be a contactless process. Where traditionally BlueCross were able to organise onsite assessment centres, the crisis meant they were unable to do this. Designing their Vervoe assessments to capture complete candidate details meant that they could achieve this in just weeks.
“We are stepping candidates through the entire recruitment process inside Vervoe. We’re making offers to people without ever meeting them. It is in the truest sense of the word contactless recruitment.”Joel Broughton
The second important factor was availability outside standard business hours. The shift-work nature of residential aged care means staff are rarely able to schedule interviews in ordinary times. Before implementing assessments, one third of candidates booked into assessment centres for interview would never show up.
With Vervoe, BlueCross can now allow applicants to interview for the role at a time that is most convenient for them, and when they are likely to perform at their best.
Finally, it was imperative that the talent team could prove the value of implementing new technology in the business.
Direct Cost Savings
With a new process in place, the BlueCross team were able to screen a high volume of applicants for personal care and hospitality/food service positions.
- Implementation of Vervoe took less than 48 hours, including custom assessment creation. Previous suppliers had taken up to three months to implement.
- The team screened 900 applicants in less than six weeks. In the traditional process, this would have taken 40 weeks to achieve
- Candidate NPS remains above +71, demonstrating a seamless experience for all candidates.
A Competitive Advantage
Joel also encourages others in the talent community to use a time of disruption to develop competitive advantages that will ensure businesses are able to scale back up quickly, and into the future.
“Now is not the time to batten down the hatches. Get ahead of those challenges that you’re going to be asked to deliver as a talent leader. Understand the numbers in your business.
Make those changes now so you’re actually bringing them to the business rather than the business asking you to react. Being really proactive… there’s a great opportunity right now to make change.”Joel Broughton
Discover how easily you can increase efficiency in your recruitment process. Contact our team today to learn more.
About BlueCross
BlueCross is a leading private aged care provider in Victoria. Since 1993, they have offered services such as residential aged care, in-home and respite care. BlueCross operates 34 aged care residences in Victoria, Australia, supporting more than 2600 residents and over 1000 clients living in their own homes. BlueCross is proudly supported by over 4000 dedicated employees and hundreds of volunteers.
To maintain the high level of care, dignity and kindness to their clients, BlueCross relies on staff, student placements and volunteers who align to their mission of providing quality, holistic care.
