Organizations everywhere are turning to Big Data to make smarter decisions. But how can you leverage it to improve the recruiting process? As the Assistant Director of Market Intelligence within the Career & Professional Development Office, I leverage data to enable students and organizations to understand the recruiting landscape at HBS and the types of opportunities that are of interest to our students. Organizations often look to our data to improve their recruiting strategy and job offer negotiations, but organizations also have extensive data of their own to leverage for similar purposes. Below is a high level breakdown of the various data that can be leveraged to review and improve your organization’s recruiting strategy
Employ internal data:
- Think about the hires that did well within your organization. What skills and characteristics did they possess? On the flip side, what was it that made others less successful? Whether through performance reviews or another avenue try and quantify this information so you can tie this data together and look for common threads.
Leverage external partners who have data you can borrow:
- Work with your partnering schools to understand what’s happening on their campuses. What trends are they seeing by industry, function and/or location? And what compensation information do they have that can help you create competitive compensation packages? Many schools publish these statistics on their websites. Our office provides data on the recent graduating classes as well as historical information which can be a great reference during the hiring process.
How do you tie it all together?
- These days many successful hires are based on a reciprocal relationship. Organizations need candidates with particular skill sets and qualities. Candidates are looking for organizations that can provide the experiences they need to grow. By linking what works well within your organization to what candidates require for professional growth, the right hire is just around the corner.
