Can You Believe It’s Already Mid-November?
Like most of you, I’m counting down to Christmas, looking forward to time with family, friends, and, of course, my Dachshund, Rubi (who’s already sent her list to Santa!).
This past week has thrown us a fair few challenges – from hiring managers keen to lock in teams before the new year, to tying off loose ends on projects before our shutdown period. Our pre-holiday to-do list is massive: streamlining onboarding, upskilling hiring managers, fine-tuning the candidate experience, having internal career conversations, and, naturally, planning days. Mix this with our regular BAU, and the weeks are vanishing at warp speed.
As a leadership team, we’ve been digging into our latest engagement survey, navigating reporting changes, and mapping out our key strategic projects for next year. This has sparked some lively chats around team metrics and how we measure success.
Traditionally, we’ve looked at metrics like:
- Time to hire (Candidate)
- Headcount time to hire (Hiring Manager)
- Source quality
- Brand strength (via applications)
- Diversity
- Time in status (Candidate)
Beyond that, we also consider internal vs external hires, hires by line of business, agency spend, advertising ROI, and career site visits, although some of these wouldn’t resonate widely.
Looking to 2025, I keep coming back to one question: what’s our hero metric? What’s the ultimate measure of success, and what really matters to our brand in the next year?
I reckon as a TA community, we’re all familiar with these metrics, and there are probably a few you’d call essential. But if you had to choose just two or three, what would they be?
It’s a big debate, and it can shift depending on where you’re at in your hiring or EVP journey. But ultimately, it comes down to this:
What’s the truest measure of success?
Do you focus on candidate or hiring manager experience? Brand strength? Diversity? ROI?
We’d all likely agree that people—whether candidates or employees—are a business’s most valuable asset. So, if you prioritise internal talent, you’re offering pathways for growth, boosting ROI, and strengthening your brand through referrals and positive feedback. But external candidates bring fresh skills and perspectives that enrich culture. Do they get measured by the same metrics?
For hiring managers, do you look purely at time-to-hire (research says it’s their top concern), or do you include quality of hire and longevity in the role?
I could go on forever, but it’s probably a great topic for a future ATC event, which I’d be thrilled to join.
For now, we haven’t pinned down our “hero” metrics, so we’ll continue reporting on the lot. But making our success metrics sharp and meaningful is high on the agenda for next year. We’re hoping to zero in on two or three we can confidently share with our exec team.
So, over to you:
What do you think are the essential hero metrics? Are there two or three that stand out, or should we always keep the full suite in play when measuring team success?
Links that caught my attention this week:
Metrics that Matter – webinar playback
Right on theme – have a watch of 3 great minds coming together to discuss recruitment metrics and think about the metrics that matter for you.
Gen Z at work
According to recent research, they’re the most engaged at work, are ambitious and keen to do things differently. Have we got Gen Z wrong?
Is the boss watching?
Monitoring for efficiency and the creep of devices into the home means that workplace surveillance is everywhere. How do we balance the safety and compliance elements of workplace surveillance against the right for people to switch off?
