The secret to a world class Employee Referral Program
Rob McIntosh
I help companies turn recruiting solutions into top and bottom-line business results based on my 25 years of experience and lessons learned.
If Employee Referrals are not your number one source of candidates at your company, then you are doing something wrong. Many articles and studies have shown that employee referrals are consistently the best quality of hire you can make.
Here is what I have found personally, and you will also find similar approaches from companies that achieve 40-50% of their hires from employee referral programs.
Its not about the Tech.
Its not about how much you pay your employees a referral bonus.
What it is about, is three simple principles:
- Top Down: Your CEO and executive leadership team must drive top down messaging and the continual importance of having employees (whole company) proactively identify and attract top talent.
- Bottom's Up: You and your Talent Acquisition function must make it as easy as possible for a employee to refer a person. It does not matter if the name comes to you on the back of the napkin, just make it painless and easy.
- Follow up and Follow Through: You must create a consistent experience where every referral gets contacted and every employee is informed of progress and outcomes.
There are a lot of different tactics that you can employee to market, brand and evangelize your program. There are a lot of different Technologies that can help simplify and track. This short piece was not designed to go into each of the different technical, program or branding solutions for employee referrals for a very simple reason......
My advice to you, is as long as you stay focused on these three principles and not get enamored by the bright and shinny Tech, then your'e on your way to world class.
Businessman, Author, Motivational Speaker, and Mission Founder.
7 年I totally agree Rob. It takes strong leadership cooperation to have a great ER program, coupled with committed effort from the recruiting team. It can't be just one of those. There are great systems for follow thru now. Depending on the type of roles, incentives are helpful. But at some levels, unnecessary. :)
Absolutely! And I don't necessarily believe employees should be incentivized to refer either. If the company is that great to work for, and the person being referred would be that great of a colleague, I'd hope (naively, perhaps - but I peaked my employee referrals at over 80% without incentives) they wouldn't need a referral fee.
Executive Search Leader & Talent Intelligence SME; Deloitte
7 年Well stated Rob....especially the Technology comment. Might I add a suggestion based on several projects we've run here? As counter-intuitive as this might sound, make sure your employees understand the profile of a qualified applicant...don't assume anything especially in larger siloed organizations with several lines of business. Here at Deloitte for example, referrals are the largest % of Experienced Hires, but are far from our most Effective Source of Applicant....right around 5% or so; .so we are constantly educating our staff on what we look for outside of their particular practice area.
Content Creation and Marketing Communications
7 年Absolutely, I agree with you Rob: "employee referrals are consistently the best quality of hire you can make." Not least because whenever an employee makes such a referral, he or she is putting her own reputation on the line. Employees will not wish to be linked to a bad hire, and employers would be wise to trust their own employees' judgment.
Managing Partner | Executive Search Expert for Pharma & Biotech | Connecting Industry Leaders with Top Talent
7 年Right on point Rob! Three simple (and cheap!) things ANY organization can do and yet it amazes me how often #3 is ignored. Every referral doesn't need to get an offer, but they all need to have a good experience - including communication and follow up.