Welcome to the 2024 CandE Winner Case Study series.
Each year, the CandE Benchmark Research Program collects case studies from CandE Winners – the employers with above-average candidate experience ratings in our research. These CandE Winners answer the following questions:
- What recruiting and candidate experience improvements have you made?
- How did you build support and commitment to make these improvements?
- Which improvements were the most innovative?
- How will you use your CandE Award in your employer branding?
- Do you use any of your CandE data to quantify business impact?
These are the employers from our 2024 CandE Program that invested in improving their recruiting, hiring, and candidate experience, reaping the ultimate benefits of a positive business impact – candidates more likely to apply again, to refer others, to be a brand advocate, and to be a customer for consumer-based businesses.
This case study was from US Pharmacopeia. USP is an independent, scientific nonprofit organization focused on building trust in the supply of safe, quality medicines. We are working to strengthen the global supply chain so that the medicines people rely on for health are available when needed and work as expected.
If you’re interested in participating in the 2025 CandE Benchmark Research Program, you can learn more about it here.
- What recruiting processes and candidate experience key improvements have you identified and completed in the past 6-12 months? What data or evidence prompted you to make these changes? (Be as specific as possible with examples for each.)
Job Posting & Role Definition Improvements:
- Crafting more accurate, transparent, inclusive, and engaging job descriptions.
- Implemented Textio – DEIB inclusive language tool to support validation that hiring leaders are utilizing content to attract diverse candidates.
- Tailoring job description phrasing to emphasize formal education and practical experience are valued, allowing flexibility for candidates with diverse backgrounds.
Data Improvement:
- Time-to-Fill: Measured the process against outcomes to develop and define new global metrics to improve the candidate experience with a consistent and measured hiring process and evaluate talent acquisition based on the data.
- If certain positions take longer, sourcing strategies are optimized for efficiency. Proactively identifying the hard-to-fill roles and elevating the strategy accordingly from the strategy session.
- Application and Departmental Demographics: Identifying underrepresented demographics by department/divisional openings to create inclusive targeted recruitment marketing campaigns.
Sourcing Candidates:
- Through access to approved marketing images and content, we’ve created targeted marketing approaches to leverage social media, online job boards, and employee referrals for a broader candidate pool. Ultimately, teaching ourselves to “fish for ourselves” when internal resources are not available to support.
- Utilizing AI tools (HireEZ) for efficiency and increased productivity where it makes sense.
- Targeting passive candidates through employer branding strategies and utilization of LinkedIn Insights to create intentionality in our searches.
- Source performance metrics to track the number of hires by source, which helps us to be more intentional with the advertising budget.
Interview Process:
- Reassessing and implementing a structured interview process by subsets of identified positions and then intentionally aligning the interview process to match the position appropriately.
- Screening success rate at various stages of the interview process is being addressed to mitigate unconscious bias.
- Training interviewers on unconscious bias and inclusive hiring practices.
- After interviews, offer real-time structured feedback from interviewers to the hiring manager to mitigate discrimination and unconscious bias and highlight quality to help select the most qualified candidate.
- Candidate and Hiring Manager Feedback: Post-interview surveys (via Survale) to all candidates and hiring managers to reveal whether the process and talent advisor is perceived as fair, efficient, and professional.
Candidate Experience
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- Candidate surveys throughout the full cycle of hiring experience to measure what is working and where there is room for improvement and opportunities.
- Offering clear communication throughout the hiring process with intention of setting expectations.
- Personalizing outreach and follow-ups – removing canned system generated text.
- Providing feedback even to unsuccessful candidates to enhance the employer brand.
- Candidate NPS monitored, allowing us to course-correct in real-time as needed.
- Retooling our Hiring Manager Toolkit with updates and revisions to provide a resource that supports the hiring manager’s ability to positively impact the candidate experience.
Onboarding Process
- We continue to listen to our new hires and streamline our onboarding program to deliver a structured and supportive experience.
- Effective October 2024, our New Employee Orientation will be held in person at our corporate headquarters.
- Assigning mentors or buddies to new hires.
- Utilizing digital platforms for seamless onboarding, documentation, learning and performance.
Post-Hire Analytics
- Continuously monitoring employee performance to assess the effectiveness of the hiring process through weekly surveys.
- Exploring 30/60/90
- Using predictive analytics to refine future recruitment strategies.
- How did you build support and commitment within your team and the broader organization to make these improvements? How did you demonstrate and report on the importance of a quality candidate experience with your leadership team? (Be as specific as possible with examples.)
Shared Vision, Alignment, and Collaborative Goals:
- TA defined what a good candidate experience looks like and established our end goals.
- Fostered an environment so everyone could see the value and benefits backed by data showing how a positive candidate experience impacts the organization (e.g., employer branding, retention, and overall reputation).
- Aligned our outcomes to the organization’s goals, vision, and mission.
- Infused our processes to reflect our commitment to DEIB and quality, highlighting our capability to operate in a real-time agile environment.
- Established clear and measurable goals to improve the candidate experience.
- Involved all stakeholders (HR, recruiters, hiring managers, and HR departments) to establish a sense of ownership and accountability throughout the team and the organization.
Cross-Departmental Collaboration
- The candidate experience touches many areas of an organization, from initial outreach to onboarding. We focused on building bridges between teams to help ensure everyone works collaboratively to deliver a smooth and consistent process for candidates.
Training and Development
- Equip team members with the necessary skills and tools to contribute positively to the candidate experience.
- DEIB Unconscious Bias training
- Interview Hiring Matrix
- Interview Evaluation Form
Feedback Loops
- Encourage open feedback from both internal teams and candidates.
- Candidate Interviewing Surveys
- Hiring Manager Post Interview Survey
- Regularly review candidate feedback to identify areas for improvement and celebrate successes.
- Complete transparency with the team regarding data helps maintain our commitment.
- Providing access to TA to see their performance survey results.
- Addressing the good areas and those areas that need improvement based on trends.
- We adopt the policy that no candidate should be disappointed with our performance or process. We address complaints and concerns.
Recognition and Accountability
- Celebrate successes when improvements are made and ensure accountability for those involved. We recognize team efforts to improve the candidate experience and cement our commitment further.
- Tracking our feedback through our Survale Dashboard.
- Monthly/quarterly TA updates to leadership.
- Weekly TA team meetings
Iterative Process Improvement
- As a team, we constantly work to emphasize that candidate experience is an ongoing and ever-evolving process. As the organization grows and changes, so should the strategies and practices surrounding candidate engagement.
- CandE Award participation to track our progress and to help us identify areas of opportunity and growth.
- Which of these improvements do you think are the most unique and innovative and why? How do you know that your changes are making a difference? What data or evidence validates the innovative improvements you made? (Be as specific as possible with examples for each based on your people, your processes, and your technologies, and include any candidate quotes that validate the improvements made.)
USP found that it is not one unique approach but the collective synergistic improvements that have been more impactful because they generate a compounding effect. Because we take a collective approach, there is an interconnectedness in improving multiple components at once. This means the system/process becomes more efficient as each improved area supports and amplifies the other. These iterative collective steps are sustainably built while infusing the culture of doing so the team quickly adopts and adapts.
Multiple improvements have proven to create a stronger foundation of resilience and flexibility. If one element fails or weakens, we can compensate, which leads to more sustainable performance. Everyone on our team has at least one backup where appropriate, so we keep our finger on the pulse of candidates and feedback.
- Whether you’ve won your first CandE Award or multiple CandE Awards, how will you publicly use the CandE Award, and what it represents, in your employer branding and recruitment marketing? (Be as specific as possible with examples.)
Social Shares
- Excited to be a 2024 #CandidateExperience Award winner! [LINK] @ERE @TheCandEs #TheCandEs
- Pleased to announce that we’ve been named to @ERE @TheCandEs Candidate Benchmark Class of 2024 [LINK] #TheCandEs
- Congrats @[Company Name] – an @ERE @TheCandEs Winner for having above average positive #CandidateExperience ratings for 2024! #TheCandEs [LINK]
- #CandidateExperience is super important to us! Thrilled to be recognized by @TheCandEs as a 2024 #TheCandEs Award winner [LINK]
Signature Tags
- [Company Name] – A proud CandE Winner of the Global ERE Candidate Experience Benchmark Research and Awards Benchmark Class of 2024
- Proud to be CandE Winner in the Global ERE Candidate Experience Benchmark Research and Awards Class of 2024
- Recognized as a 2024 CandE Winner in the Global ERE Candidate Experience Benchmark Research and Awards Program for meeting the high standards of candidate experience excellence
USP Careers Site
- Post the CandE logo to the site.
- Do you use any of your candidate experience benchmark data to quantify and demonstrate financial, referral, and/or employer branding business impact to your leadership team, your recruiting, and/or hiring managers? If yes, how? (Be as specific as possible with examples.)
USP utilizes candidate experience benchmark data to quantify and demonstrate the impact of employer branding on leadership, recruiting, and hiring managers, highlighting how positive or negative candidate experiences directly influence key business outcomes. Here’s how we do it:
Quantify the Impact with Metrics
We are using specific candidate experience metrics and benchmarks to illustrate improvements or areas for growth in our employer branding.
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- Application Drop-Off Rate: Measure the number of candidates who abandon the application process.
- Candidate Satisfaction Scores (NPS): Utilizing the NPS and post-interview surveys to quantify satisfaction.
- Time-to-Fill: Track, monitor hiring stage disposition data and share reductions in time-to-fill due to stronger employer branding and a structured process. We recognize that candidates are more likely to apply and stay engaged when a strong employer brand exists.
- Offer Acceptance Rate: We quantify that an improved candidate experience and a compelling employer brand lead to higher offer acceptance rates. We measure this by identifying when USP is a direct source of hire and feedback.
- Referral Rate: Highlight how satisfied candidates, whether hired or not, are more likely to refer others if their experience was positive.
Compare Against Industry Benchmarks
- Regularly compare data to industry standards to show how we perform from an industry standpoint. Performance helps us to measure our branding. We demonstrate this in terms of:
- Candidate experience (e.g., satisfaction scores)
- Time-to-Fill
- Interview-to-Hire
Correlate Candidate Experience with Employer Branding Efforts
- Brand Perception: We use post-hire and post-application surveys to gather data on how candidates perceive USP before and after recruitment.
- Showcase shifts in perception based on changes to employer branding.
- Revamped our entire Careers site and working on updated social media presence to support the brand.
Review Platforms
- Analyzing data from sites (like Glassdoor, Indeed) to track how candidates and employees rate our organization.
Showcase Business Impact
- Through reduced hiring costs we can quantify how our improved employer brand reduces recruiting costs by increasing the volume of quality applications, decreasing dependency on external agencies, and minimizing time-to-hire.
Using Testimonials and Success Stories
- We plan to gather testimonials from teams that have experienced improvements in recruitment quality or efficiency after enhancing the employer brand.