In the wake of COVID-19, the candidate experience had to move to a virtual space. With the lack of in-person touch, companies' online presence and brand reputation became increasingly important.
We sat down with Erika Thorson-Garay, Head of Global Talent Acquisition, and Kaitlyn Matta, Talent Acquisition Operations Lead at LiveRamp to learn why it's essential to strengthen your employer brand during the crisis.
Is it important to invest in an employer brand during a crisis or recession?
For sure! Reprioritizing our hiring goals has given us more bandwidth to focus on our employer brand. Even as other companies slow down or pause their hiring efforts, in-demand roles remain difficult to fill. We still need to differentiate ourselves from others and ensure that our values and culture are clearly reflected in everything we do.
This is especially important given shelter-in-place. Candidates need to feel comfortable with the possibility of joining entirely remote teams. There is a great opportunity right now to figure out and showcase what really makes your company worth working for beyond office amenities and catered meals.
How does Glassdoor serve in building your employer brand?
First of all, Glassdoor gives prospective candidates a real insight into our hiring process and employee sentiment. Our Head of People and Culture reads every employee review and responds to as many as possible, and Erika, Head of Global Talent Acquisition, does the same for the interview reviews. We ask for feedback often and we consider it fuel for change; we're always looking for ways to make LiveRamp better for both employees and candidates.
In addition to reviews, we regularly post company updates on our Glassdoor profile. It's important to keep our current and future employees abreast of what's happening. Also, it's a great opportunity to highlight the little things that may not come up in the interview process but speak to our company culture, such as philanthropy or engagement events.
Finally, we track our analytics and meet with the Glassdoor team regularly to review our metrics and discuss ways to improve our presence and visibility. It's great to get a sense of trends over time as well as how we compare to similar companies in the industry.
How do you ensure the best candidate experience during shelter-in-place?
In a short amount of time, we had to transition onsite interviews into virtual experiences. To make sure they run smoothly, we designed best practice guides for virtual interviewing for interviewers and interviewees. We recorded virtual office tours, emphasizing our unique culture in each of them. Our recruiters run prep-chats with candidates before an interview and debrief them post-interview. We implemented online whiteboard and coding platforms for engineering candidates.
To summarize, the virtual experience is very different but we want to make sure candidates feel empowered, updated and connected.
What challenges do you face in this historic moment and how do you navigate?
First of all, it is essential to establish good alignment with hiring managers. Moving the collaboration fully online was a new experience for many, and we have to make sure hiring managers are on the same page.
Due to shelter-in-place, we needed to reevaluate our candidate experience processes to suit the current circumstances. We took action quickly and edited as we learned, rather than remaining unresponsive with the candidates who were in the hiring process already. We shared actionable guidelines with all candidates to ensure they are prepared.
Finally, we have to be aware of the technical issues that we might face and aim to minimize them. Problems with internet connectivity, platform errors or general user comfort with the conferencing tool can bitter the experience. We developed resources and processes that help ensure a smooth, stress-free experience.
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