Empowering community health and wellbeing
Each is a prominent Australian not-for-profit health and social care provider with over 50 years of experience, delivering comprehensive services across mental health, primary health, aged care, disability, housing, and family wellbeing to strengthen communities nationwide. With over 1,400 staff, the organization serves individuals and diverse communities across Australia, championing inclusivity and empowering everyone with the support they need to live well.
Talent Function / Team
The Talent Acquisition Business Partners partner with hiring leaders to attract and secure the right talent for Each. The team provides recruitment expertise, market insight and practical guidance to support quality hiring decisions and a positive, consistent candidate experience. This is enabled through structured workflows, consistent templates and resources, clear recruitment processes, and technology-enabled communication and recruitment practices.
The problem
As recruitment volume and complexity increased, so did the pressure on consistency, timeliness and care. Candidate experience risked becoming fragmented and overly dependent on the capability of individual hiring managers. Each set out to move from a variable, manual approach towards a consistent, inclusive and scalable candidate experience that could be maintained regardless of role, location or hiring leader.
Strategic alignment
Each brought together clearer processes, practical guidance and technology to support a more consistent candidate experience across the organisation. The approach combined human-centred design with systems that supported consistency, rather than treating candidate experience as a series of separate Talent Acquisition or hiring manager interactions.
The five objectives below translated this approach into practical priorities for candidate communication, inclusion, hiring leader support and continuous improvement.
Shared processes, data and inclusive practices helped make candidate experience more consistent, while continuing to rely on people to deliver it with care.
Goals & Success Metrics
Each established five core objectives:
- Remove friction from the candidate journey, particularly for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, people with disability, culturally and linguistically diverse communities, and LGBTIQA+ individuals.
- Ensure every candidate (no matter the outcome) receives clear, timely communication and meaningful closure.
- Embed inclusive and culturally safe practices as standard.
- Equip hiring leaders with structured tools and guidance.
- Use data, candidate feedback and system insights to measure and improve the experience.
Quantitative measures
Candidate experience was measured using candidate feedback through the Circle Back Initiative, digital engagement analytics and recruitment system data. Measures included Application and Hired Candidate Satisfaction and NPS, careers portal engagement, applicant diversity, workplace adjustment requests, and Talent Community engagement.
Qualitative measures
Each also looked for evidence that candidates experienced clearer communication, respectful interactions, meaningful feedback, accessible processes and a well-structured recruitment journey.
Secondary / Aspirational Goals
The work sought to create a more relational candidate experience, including maintaining connections with candidates beyond an individual application through Talent Communities.
Stakeholder Engagement
Candidate experience was treated as an organisation-wide responsibility rather than solely a Talent Acquisition activity.
Internal stakeholders included Talent Acquisition Business Partners and hiring leaders. Recognising the direct influence hiring leaders have on candidate experience, Each centralised recruitment resources within its Recruit & Onboard Hub, providing templates, guides and structured workflows in one accessible source of truth. Talent Acquisition Business Partners supported hiring leaders in delivering the process consistently.
Each also identified its Learning team as a partner for the next stage of the work, with plans to develop digital learning to strengthen hiring manager capability and confidence.
Approach / Actions Taken
- Redesigned the candidate “front door”
Each redesigned its careers website to remove barriers at the earliest point of the candidate journey. Changes included approximately 70 language translations, mobile-first optimisation, screen reader compatibility and high-contrast display options.
The redesign was informed by user feedback and a Job Access review, with the aim of broadening access and improving early-stage engagement for candidates with diverse needs.
- Standardised candidate communication
Candidate communications and job advertisements were standardised to create greater clarity at every touchpoint.
The Circle Back Initiative commitment was embedded across advertisements and communications, candidates were directed to a Hiring Process Guide explaining what to expect at each stage, and rejection communications included an anonymous experience survey to create an ongoing feedback loop.
- Built consistency into hiring manager delivery
Each created a central Recruit & Onboard Hub containing templates, guides and structured workflows.
Its “A guide to Each’s recruitment process” reinforced the behaviours expected throughout recruitment, particularly transparency, timely updates and respectful outcomes.
This shifted candidate experience away from being dependent on individual hiring manager capability and towards shared standards supported by Talent Acquisition.
- Made candidate closure more human
Each strengthened post-interview feedback, with communication designed to be timely, meaningful and delivered verbally wherever possible.
The intention was to ensure unsuccessful candidates felt respected, received a clear outcome and could maintain a connection with Each. This supported candidate dignity and trust, as well as Each’s long-term reputation as an employer. One unsuccessful candidate described the approach as:
“Thank you for taking the time to respond and not leaving me in limbo…”
The candidate said this was why they would recommend others apply to Each.
- Embedded inclusion into recruitment design
Each partnered with Job Access to improve accessibility throughout recruitment and introduced a structured workplace adjustments approach.
Job advertisements were redesigned to remove unnecessary criteria, reduce bias and improve readability, with the aim of widening access and supporting more equitable outcomes.
- Moved beyond “apply and wait”
Using SmartRecruiters, Each began actively nurturing Talent Communities rather than limiting candidate relationships to individual vacancies.
Campaign open rates of 61–75% showed ongoing candidate engagement, supporting a more relationship-driven model of candidate experience.
- Used automation to support consistency
Recruitment workflows were redesigned to include automated, status-based candidate communications and integrations with Xref, CheckWorkRights. MyInterview and Dayforce.
The purpose was to reduce manual effort while improving timeliness and consistency of communication.
Ethics & Governance
Inclusion and equity were embedded into the design and reporting of the candidate experience. The work included accessible design, workplace adjustments, changes to job advertisements to reduce bias, and measurement of representation and accessibility outcomes.
Outcomes & Results
Each assessed the work across several measures: candidate feedback, careers portal engagement, applicant diversity, workplace adjustment requests and Talent Community engagement. Together, these provided a broader view of recruitment, rather than relying on a single candidate experience score.
Candidate experience
Over the last 12 months:
Application experience:
- Satisfaction score: 88.6 (benchmark: 88.7)
- Net Promoter Score: 65.2 (above benchmark 63.1)
Hired candidate experience:
- Satisfaction score: 96.8 (benchmark: 93.5)
- NPS: 93.7 (above benchmark 85.5)
Application NPS and both hired-candidate measures exceeded their benchmarks. Application satisfaction was slightly below benchmark at 88.6 compared with 88.7.
Careers portal engagement
Following the March 2025 launch of the redesigned careers portal:
- +220% increase in average time spent on Each’s Careers page
- +51% increase in unique visitors
- +30% increase in Careers page views
- The Careers page became the 4th most visited page on Each’s website.
Inclusive hiring outcomes
Alongside these changes, Each recorded changes in applicant representation and supported workplace adjustment requests:
- +61% increase in applicants identifying as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander
- 9.6% of applicants identified as neurodiverse, a measure that had not previously been captured
- 5 workplace adjustment requests were received and successfully supported.
Talent Community engagement
Talent Community campaigns recorded 61–75% open rates, with some campaigns achieving 32–42% click-through rates.
For Each, these results indicated engagement with Talent Community communications beyond an individual application.
Challenges & Do-Overs
Key Learnings
Each identifies one central learning:
Candidate experience is not finished at launch. It needs to be checked with candidates, measured and refined over time.
The work remains ongoing. Each identified four priorities for further development: accessibility, end-to-end analytics, personalisation and hiring manager capability. These form the next stage of improvement outlined below.
Lessons for other Talent Teams
- Reduce reliance on individual hiring manager capability. Shared standards, structured workflows, templates and guidance can make candidate experience more consistent at scale.
- Treat accessibility as part of candidate experience design. Each incorporated language translation, mobile optimisation, screen reader compatibility, high-contrast options and workplace adjustments into the recruitment journey.
- Use automation to improve consistency, not remove human interaction. Each automated status-based communications while strengthening verbal post-interview feedback wherever possible.
- Measure more than successful hires. Each measures experience from application through to hire, alongside digital engagement, candidate feedback, inclusion outcomes and Talent Community engagement.
- Keep designing after launch. Each’s stated learning is that candidate experience needs continuous measurement and refinement.
Next Steps
Deepening accessibility: building on the careers portal improvements by further improving screen reader optimisation, alt-text coverage and keyboard navigation, so candidates can navigate information and recruitment steps more easily.
Expanding end-to-end analytics: strengthening visibility across the recruitment funnel to identify candidate drop-off points and improve conversion.
Increasing personalisation: tailoring candidate journeys and communications for different cohorts.
Uplifting hiring capability: partnering with the Learning team to develop digital learning that strengthens hiring manager capability and confidence, supporting fair, consistent and human-centred hiring practices.
This case study was sourced through the Internal Talent Awards (ITAs), spotlighting great work from Talent teams across Australia. The Internal Talent Awards (ITAs) shine a light on the people and teams advancing Talent Acquisition across Australia, surfacing their work so others can learn from their experience.
