Candidate feedback
It’s in our human nature to understand how we’re perceived in the world; it could be how we
present ourselves on first introductions, what qualities we possess that people that know us
well feel strengthen or weaken our personality and along that same theme, what areas in our
career history and experience, prevented us from securing a dream role?
Feedback. Some of us welcome constructive criticism and others are more sensitive to
criticism. Regardless of your preference, when you as an individual have spent time and
effort fully preparing for an interview, thinking of examples, picking out an outfit that fits the
mood of the interview and definitely more recently, completing tasks and compiling a
presentation that really shows your understanding and highlights your skills – at the end of
the process, if you haven’t been successful, you at least want some feedback so you can
understand why.
Candidate feedback is just as important as securing the right person for the role. The way an
organisation communicates with candidates in the recruitment campaign, really can show
how you conduct yourself as a business, and how important communication, culture and
customer experience is for you. Timescales on feedback and decision making does play an
important factor too; take too long to provide feedback, even if good news, can make the
candidate concerned around how quickly decision making takes and would this ultimately
reflect how they could do their role effectively and efficiently. Obviously, there will be
occasions where a delay just can’t be helped, be it sickness, last minute meetings etc, but
we as an agency, who speak to candidates daily and understand how important feedback is,
would suggest a catch up meeting is booked the day after the interviews, to be able to
dedicate that time to make a decision, and provide solid feedback to those who weren’t
successful.
With the Consumer Duty standards being introduced, the same can be applied to the
recruitment process. Putting customers needs first and delivering good outcomes, can be
translated to putting candidate communication first and delivery a fantastic experience for
them, to make them want to re-apply and work for the organisation. Especially if there could
be opportunities for them in the future, and you’re keen for them to keep your organisation in
mind.
Quite a significant amount is asked of candidates in the process, researching the company,
thinking of examples, completing tasks relating to the role on the day and being asked to
prepare presentations to showcase their capabilities.
Candidates take their evenings and weekends to really prepare for a 30 minute- 1hr
interview, (more if invited back) and it’s courteous to dedicate some of your working day to
advise why they weren’t selected. It does make such a difference – being on the recruiter
side and when we provide solid feedback, candidates are so very grateful and it helps them
know the areas to focus more on for any future interviews.
So when you next undertake an interview process, put yourself in the candidates shoes and
ask, ‘have I given the feedback I would expect’?
Emma Bennett