Building In-House Recruitment Capability. Age UK and Cygnus Resourcing Case Study

Transcription

1 Building In-House Recruitment Capability

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3 Building In-House Recruitment Capability An Overview Age UK is the country s largest charity dedicated to helping everyone to make the most of later life. With a network which includes Age UK, three national charities, Age Cymru, Age NI and Age Scotland and in England, 165 local Age UK partners and over 400 smaller organisations called Friends and Forums, the charity and its people are fast-growing, and as such, require robust people planning services. Recruitment is headed up by a team of industry professionals, led by Head of People Operations, Tracey Bright, and People and Performance Director, Caroline Bendelow. In September 2014, Age UK approached Cygnus Resourcing in search of a partner to work with them to build their in-house recruitment capability. The Aim The aim was to assist Age UK in making substantial savings that would be reabsorbed into the work of the charity, by identifying areas of recruitment where potential savings could be made. These were identified as: - minimising the use of third party recruitment agencies - reducing recruitment advertising spend - exploring the potential implementation of a central recruitment system. Cygnus Resourcing worked in partnership with Age UK to help develop a strategy that would see both parties realise this cost saving. This was to be achieved via improving the charity s use of technology, identifying appropriate recruitment advertising sources and offering a reduced cost direct sourcing service.

4 Identifying Sourcing Mixes Cygnus Resourcing worked to provide advertising packages which included a range of job boards designed to reach a widespread and relevant reach candidates across a variety of sectors, therefore increasing the number of applications received for roles across the entire Age UK network. candidate audience at a reduced cost. Implementing this new sourcing mix, alongside using Cygnus A variety of roles are recruited for across the charity including marketing, finance, business development, procurement, HR, training and retail staff for the network of over 400 Age UK shops. This initially involved auditing its current sourcing mix which comprised newspapers, magazines, job boards, sector-specific boards and social media. Following analysis, Cygnus Resourcing provided creative advertising solutions that would Resourcing s end-to-end recruitment management service (which included advert copywriting, candidate shortlisting and telephone screening candidates) streamlined Age UK s internal processes and provided cost-effective efficiencies. Implementing Recruitment Software It was identified that the team would benefit from using an applicant tracking system to help manage the high volume of applications that the charity was attracting. To help the team transition from its traditional ways of working to a more technology focussed approach, a scaled down version of an applicant tracking system (ATS) was implemented. This helped to streamline internal processes and provide a platform from which Age UK could report on key management information and make informed recruitment decisions in the future. Within 10 months, a full ATS system and careers site was implemented. Today, through its recruitment software the charity is able to: - Manage all job adverts - Set up application forms to allow for the effective screening of incoming candidates - Maintain a talent pool to allow for speculative registrations - Generate reporting to see which advertising sources/suppliers provide the best candidates - Capitalise on employer branding by allowing Age UK to reflect its working culture on the site through videos, Twitter feeds, images, and further information about learning and development and benefits.

5 The Results Since working with Cygnus Resourcing, Age UK has been able to achieve the cost-savings and efficiencies which were anticipated in keeping with this partnership. Complementing the industry knowledge and experience of the Age UK Recruitment Team, Cygnus Resourcing have helped to drastically reduce their use of third party recruitment agencies and provided technology to allow them to achieve an efficient and cost-effective in-house recruitment service. Why it Works Flexibility To be able to meet its objectives, Age UK has access to Cygnus Resourcing s portfolio of solutions, and are able to use what they require on a flexible basis, depending on the volume and types of vacancies they need to fill. Integrity Another reason why the relationship between Cygnus Resourcing and Age UK works so well is it s open, honest and transparent. Expertise Age UK is supported by Cygnus Resourcing s expert team, as well as wider departments such as technology and implementation. It s this level of expertise that Age UK has access to that helps ensure value is created and realised. Age UK s Careers Site

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