You’ve probably heard of the “customer journey.” This phrase describes the process that customers go through as they are considering products and services to buy. Job prospects go through a similar process that is known as the “candidate’s journey.”
To keep customers engaged and moving through the buyer’s journey, you work hard to meet their needs and maximize every opportunity to impress. If you want to attract the best candidates, you need to do the same during the candidate’s journey.
The Stages of the Candidate’s Journey
There are seven key stages of the candidate’s journey. These are:
- Becoming aware of an opportunity with your company
- Considering whether your organization aligns with their needs
- Determining that they are interested and how interested they are
- Completing the necessary steps to apply for the job
- Navigating the selection process
- Choosing to accept the position and negotiating the details
- Integrating into the company through the onboarding process
Each of these stages can look very different depending on the position, the candidate, and the hiring process that you have created. For example, this journey can take place entirely online, in person, or both.
Candidate Journey Touchpoints
When candidates make their way through this journey, they will interact with your brand multiple times. These interactions will be direct and indirect and can happen on various channels. Here are some examples:
- Reading a job listing
- Visiting your social media pages
- Filling out an application online
- Sitting for a phone interview
- Watching or reading reviews and testimonial videos
- Reading the blog on your career page
- Subscribing to an email list for prospective employees
- Speaking to a hiring manager at a career fair
The candidate’s experience during every possible touchpoint can make a big difference in their decision-making process.
Creating a Great Candidate’s Journey
It takes effort and understanding to create a positive candidate journey experience. Here are some steps to take to help you better understand what job candidates experience and how to improve that process:
Complete your Application Packet
Have you ever sat down to apply for a job at your own company? Did you know that employers significantly underestimate the amount of time it takes to complete their application? Most candidates take several hours, but hiring managers assume it takes less than one hour.
As you complete the application, look for other sources of frustration as well. Do you find questions that are confusing or irrelevant? Is there too much repetition?
More than 60% of applicants will stop filling out an application and abandon the journey altogether if they become frustrated. If you are part of the majority of employers who think this is a good thing, it’s time for a new perspective.
Many employers take the view that the most dedicated workers will continue the application process, while the apathetic will quit. That’s not true. Talented workers have plenty of options. They don’t need to jump through hoops to find a good job.
More importantly, they will see these kinds of frustrating roadblocks as red flags. If your application process is deliberately complex and difficult, what kind of company culture do you offer?
Would you have a good impression of your company if you applied for a job there?
Prioritize Relationships with Candidates
You pursue positive relationships with potential customers and should do the same with your candidates. After all, people in both groups are deciding whether they want to pursue a relationship with your company and convert in one way or another.
This relationship management is an area in which hiring teams can learn quite a bit from marketing teams. Why? Marketing teams are experts at creating personalized experiences and maximizing every opportunity to meet customers’ needs at every stage.
Meanwhile, most candidates report that they are never even informed when a potential employer makes a hiring decision. The result is that they feel as though they have wasted their efforts in applying only to be ghosted.
The difference is that marketing teams treat customers as important from the first stage of the customer journey. Hiring managers need to learn to do the same to attract good talent in the current hiring ecosystem.
This approach means stepping away from the current transactional methods solely focused on the end result of filling an open position.
Map the Candidate’s Journey
Use a whiteboard or paper to create a map of your candidates’ journey from finding your job listing to accepting or rejecting your employment offer. Focus on points where they are communicating with you.
Consider the current channels you have made available to them and others that you might add. Identify points of friction, and make annotations with ideas for improving the process. For example, you could automate email responses to offer faster feedback, shorten forms, or add links to helpful documentation on your career page.
You will probably conclude that there is no way to create a perfect, completely frictionless application process. However, you will almost certainly find ways to make improvements to your current candidate experience.
Most importantly, this exercise will help to give you an empathetic point of view that will help you see candidates in a similar light as your customers.
Collect Feedback
Be careful that your efforts to understand the candidate’s journey don’t become an exercise in navel-gazing. You have to look outward and get feedback from your employees and candidates as well. This feedback will give you the most accurate view of the candidate’s journey and how your company’s recruiting methods are viewed.
