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In today’s competitive job market, the race for top talent is fiercer than ever. 58% of contingent workers intend to leave the temporary workforce for full-time employment in the next year, according to Bullhorn’s most recent GRID Talent Trends Report, even as many employers rely on the flexibility and scalability of contingent employees. In order to keep highly-skilled candidates in their talent pool, agencies need to make the talent experience as simple and personalized as possible.
To learn more about how agencies can attract – and keep working with – top-tier talent, Bullhorn’s Luuk van Neerven sat down with three recruitment experts at Engage London 2024 – Glyn Blaize of La Fosse, Helena Sullivan of Trinnovo Group, and Chris McCormick of NES Fircroft. They shared their thoughts on digitizing talent engagement, the role of automation and AI, and balancing tech with the human touch, all in order to build a recruitment experience that will keep talent coming back again and again.
A journey through recruitment technology evolution
Recruitment has come a long way in the past several years, in no small part due to the evolution of recruitment technology. “20 years ago, we were still doing a lot of print advertising and a little bit of email marketing, but there was definitely no automation in there,” said Sullivan. Since then, recruitment technology has moved from a mere tool to a transformative force in the industry.
“That speed of development today is phenomenal,” added McCormick. “Trying to keep abreast of that and deliver a coherent tech stack to support the business is a massive challenge. Whilst I love technology as much as the next person, I’m only ever interested in what it can deliver for the business.”
Engaging the talent you’ve already met
Having the latest recruitment technology is one thing, but making the most of it is another. Instead of spending valuable time and effort acquiring candidates, recruiters should look to their own database when looking to make their next placement.
“We have nearly 3 million candidate records in our database, but we’re not maximizing their value,” said McCormick. “If we can give the recruiters those tools to better engage those candidates, we can start to make headway.”
“We’ve got a candidate base there who want to work with us, who probably experienced something positive with us in the past, and who might not have heard from us for a while,” added Sullivan. “What are we doing to maximize what we already have? And how can we utilize technology to do that at scale and actually get the right people in front of our recruiters so they can do what they do best?”
Segmenting your database can help your team determine where automation is the most effective, said Blaize: “Break down the actual process maps of what you do with all of those candidates and the way they move through the cycle. Work out the journey, work out where they are, and work out the bit at which they’re ready to engage with us as candidates.”
Balancing tech and the human touch
“When someone’s in a process, we definitely want that to be the recruitment consultant that’s managing that and having that contact with them. But I think technology still plays a part,” Sullivan said. Her team automated gathering NPS scores from candidates throughout different points of the recruitment process, not just post-placement, and were able to pinpoint areas for growth as a result. “Even when people are in process, and you don’t want to take away that relationship part from the consultant, you can always use technology to make improvements and look under the hood a little bit.”
“The scale is the challenge,” McCormick added. “How do we take good processes and scale them? This is where the AI piece could come in for us. We won’t do things we’ve never done before with AI. But we can do better at what we already do. How do we keep hot lists together? How do we put talent pools together? How do we engage effectively with candidates?”
“We’re working with automation on removing that base layer of boring manual tasks,” added Blaize. “On the trajectory, we can see a horizon where the tedious work is automated, and humans do the rest. And this part of the journey has been really exciting for us.”
Data hygiene: The foundation of effective talent engagement
Your tech is only as good as your data, so ensuring data hygiene is paramount. Technology like automation, analytics, and AI can play a key role in ensuring clean and compliant data. “We have a program of email communication that we send out after periods of inactivity to capture key information so that we can run analytics over the top of it,” said McCormick.
One of the first automations Sullivan’s team built helped them to ensure GDPR compliance, and she advised doing the same: “You want to make sure that when you start building all these wonderful automations and reaching out to people, that you’re allowed to be reaching them and you don’t open yourself up to that can of worms.”
Top tools for talent engagement
The panelists shared their go-to technologies for digitizing recruitment strategies, including:
- Automation platforms: “We couldn’t live without automation,” said Sullivan. She highlighted how it streamlines communication and engagement.
- Data analytics tools: McCormick noted, “Good data hygiene drives better business outcomes. Analytics gives us the insights needed to make informed decisions.”
- Integrated systems: Blaize stressed the importance of having a cohesive tech ecosystem: “Choose tools that work seamlessly together to avoid inefficiencies.”
While technology is a powerful enabler, the heart of recruitment remains human connection. By combining automation, analytics, and AI with a people-first approach, organizations can achieve both efficiency and excellence in talent engagement.
For more expert insights, check out the Engage London Content Hub.
