The Bank of Queensland (BOQ), an ASX listed Australian retail bank, headquartered in Sydney is one of the oldest financial institutions in the country. With 111 owner-managed branches throughout Australia, thirty-six corporate branches and third-party intermediaries and over 2,300 ATMs; they pride themselves on their mission to become Australia’s most loved bank.
They are making it a reality by creating real long lasting relationships with their customers. In 2021, customer satisfaction with BOQ was rated at 82.9% by Roy Morgan. They truly pride themselves on exceptional customer service and satisfaction.
High Standards For Quality
Their contact centre is the heartbeat of customer sentiment and where they need to ensure every customer leaves satisfied and employees need to be the best of the best. While they couldn’t compromise on quality, the traditional recruitment process for their contact centre was previously not efficient and lacked the agility needed to meet the demands of a competitive hiring landscape.
Their previous hiring process was CV screening, phone screening then an assessment centre. BOQ wanted to optimize these stages without compromising candidate experience. Their main goals were to improve time to fill for their contact centre, reduce attrition at the probation period and impart a day-in-the-life experience and expectation to an applicant to reduce any job shock as attrition was at 27.5% in the first 12 months. Manual CV screening, phone screening and organising assessment centres consume valuable time, while lengthy assessment centre sessions add to the burden, often resulting in suboptimal candidate experiences and resource drain.
The Vervoe Solution
Vervoe partnered with Krish Paulpillai, BOQ Senior Talent Partner’s team for their contact centre recruitment to revolutionise their process. By leveraging Vervoe’s innovative features, and working with Vervoe’s Behavioural Science team, they worked together to create an assessment that assessed skills like communication, resilience, multitasking and others. The assessment contains a range of questions taking them through real life tasks they would come across in the role as a customer service consultant at BOQ.
Results & Impact
By leveraging Vervoe’s innovative features, the BOQ team saw game-changing results that streamlined their hiring operations while enhancing candidate quality in just 60 days.
Efficiency Gains: Krish attested that Vervoe swiftly proved its worth, primarily through significant time savings and process optimizations. Key highlights of the efficiency gains include:
Time Savings: Vervoe slashed the time spent on traditional CV screening and phone screening, eliminating the need for manual sorting and initial candidate evaluations. This resulted in a staggering 150 hours saved over a span of two months.
Reduced Assessment Centre Time: By transitioning to Vervoe’s platform, the BOQ team witnessed a remarkable reduction in Assessment Centre (AC) time, from a total of 9 hours per week to a mere 3 hours. This translated to a total weekly time saving of 6 hours for three recruiters and two Hiring Managers (HMs).
Process Streamlining: Vervoe facilitated the removal of CV and phone screens from the recruitment process, allowing the BOQ team to focus on more meaningful interactions with candidates. Additionally, the revamped assessment centre structure, termed ‘Showcase,’ offered a comprehensive overview of the company, its values, and included a personalized HM interview, enhancing candidate engagement and understanding.
Annualized Impact: The cumulative effect of these efficiency gains resulted in an impressive annual saving of 2340 hours, empowering the BOQ team to allocate their time and resources more strategically towards other critical HR initiatives.
Quality Enhancement: Beyond efficiency, Vervoe’s impact extended to the quality of candidates entering the recruitment pipeline. Noteworthy outcomes in this domain include:
Conversion Rate: Pre-Vervoe, the conversion rate in assessment centre interviews hovered around 40-50%. With the integration of Vervoe, this figure surged to an impressive 60% at the introduction of Vervoe and now sits at a staggering 95% conversion, showcasing the platform’s ability to attract better-suited candidates.
Confidence in Candidate Selection: The BOQ team expressed unwavering confidence in Vervoe’s ability to identify and attract the right talent. This newfound trust was evidenced by the team’s assertion that candidates passing through Vervoe’s assessment centre were virtually guaranteed employment, reflecting a remarkable shift in recruitment dynamics.
Diversity Hiring: The contact centre recruiters are no longer looking at CV’s or other details outside of work eligibility/remuneration expectations until interview stage. As soon as a candidate applies for the role, they are invited to a Vervoe assessment. Implementing Vervoe has given every BOQ candidate the opportunity to be considered, in a process that is free of bias and ensures every candidate is assessed equally.
Candidate Feedback: BOQ candidates have given an average rating of 4.59/5 for the Vervoe assessment process and platform. The consistent positive feedback they have received is largely around being given the opportunity to show their skills and not just send a resume out into the ether.
The Best Is Yet To Come
“The team is loving it. We’ve just surpassed 1000 contact centre candidates that have gone through Vervoe. I sat with Amber last week and she gave me a demo of the tool, how she uses it and how the candidates are finding it. Not only are the Talent team loving it, but we are seeing the benefits at the management level too. And candidates are reporting high engagement through the hiring process in our surveys,” Danny Timchur, Senior Manager, Workforce Optimisation of BOQ said.
Another highlight, “I’m hearing stories about really strong collaboration between the Talent team and the Vervoe team also. Can’t be happier!” he mentioned.
Bank of Queensland’s collaboration with Vervoe stands as a testament to the transformative potential of modern assessment platforms in revolutionizing recruitment practices.
By combining efficiency gains with enhanced candidate quality, BOQ team have been empowered to elevate their recruitment strategy, ultimately driving organizational success and growth in only 2 months
“Conversion in assessment centre interview pre Vervoe was 40-50%, during initial roll out of Vervoe 60% and now they’re converting roughly 100% to offer,” Krish says.
“There’s 100% trust that Vervoe is bringing in the right candidates which means they feel confident that anyone coming to the assessment centre will be hired,” Krish continued.
“The leaders in the contact centre have noticed a sharp rise in speed to competency during the training phase for our newest employees. They have also seen a decrease in drop outs during this critical phase, which had been an ongoing issue for the training groups. Again, this is being drawn back to the assessment and showcase which has led to increased quality hiring and overall better candidate experience. Although it’s too early to measure, I have no doubt we’ll see this impact our attrition in a positive way in the coming months.” Krish says.
The best is definitely yet to come! BOQ and Vervoe are looking forward to innovating together and achieving remarkable milestones. Here’s to a wonderful partnership ahead.