How Big Data Is Changing Recruitment Forever

It used to be said that employers made up their minds whether or not to hire a prospective candidate within 5 minutes of sitting down to interview them. It’s hard to say if this is true or not, but many people in positions with responsibility for hiring would probably admit that they had made appointments based on a “gut feeling” – simply whether or not they felt the person was the right fit for the vacancy. Well, all that is changing. Taking on a new employee represents a huge investment for most companies, particularly in a managerial or professional role. A large proportion (40% to 60% by most estimates) of a company’s revenue goes on staff salaries.
Those hoping to rely on the “old school tie network” may be out of luck. Analysts Gartner compiled a study for a US financial services company which examined the performance of employees during their first two years with the business. What they found was that while all the best performers had finished school and gone on to get degrees, their individual grades – and particular school or college they attended – did not correlate with success or failure. Another often-cited example is that of office equipment manufacturer Xerox. An analytics firm was asked to monitor staff performance and then come up with a profile of an ideal candidate for its call centres. Among the surprising findings was that previous call centre experience was no indicator of success, and that candidates with criminal records often performed better than those without. Their experiment let to a reduction in staff turnover of 20%.
If you’re on the other side of the fence – trying to find a job for yourself, rather than someone to do a job for you – the implications are just as vast. Everything we do online (and increasingly in the real world, thanks to mobiles and wearables) leaves a digital footprint. Employers long ago got used to carrying out ad hoc Google checks on candidates they are considering hiring, to find out if there were any skeletons in the closet which hadn’t come out during the application or interview processes. These days it goes a lot further than that – and we could find ourselves being rejected based on what we haven’t said, rather than just what we have said.
As it is in many other areas of business, Big Data is helping to take the guess work out of recruitment. Rather than relying on the famous “gut feeling”, those taking a more scientific approach to appointing staff are finding it leads to more suitable people who stay happy and on the job for longer. Just as importantly, candidates hopefully will no longer have to hope that they won’t be overlooked because the interviewer doesn’t like the tie they are wearing, or because they went to the wrong school.

Reference: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2015/07/how-big-data-is-changing-recruitment-forever-2/