Hiring and retaining the right people is essential to the success of any business. It’s especially important in the oil and gas industries, energy, processing, power, manufacturing, and utilities, where specialized knowledge and strong interpersonal ties on project teams are integral. If your business struggles to find the right people for projects, it may be time to evaluate at your hiring metrics.

When it comes to recruiting, people are “the” business, and establishing expectations, standards, and goals can mean the difference between finding candidates who stick and those who do not. “External” recruiters or staffing firms track metrics such as cost per hire (CPH), turnover, offer completion ratios, and more to ensure they are meeting client expectations. Not only is staffing an intuitive process, but recruiters should hold themselves to high standards and be willing to pivot their approach when the numbers aren’t working in the client’s favor.

At Footbridge, we celebrate successes but also meet daily to discuss what we can do better. If you’re looking to do the same, here are five metrics today’s managers must track to understand and improve their hiring outcomes.

  1. Time to Hire

Time is one of the highest costs during the hiring process, as every day a position is open represents lost productivity. Typically the larger the company and more complex the job,  the longer it takes to complete the hiring process. By tracking time to hire, you can identify and reduce inefficiencies that may be taking too long, such as background checks, interviews, candidate responses, and approvals.

  • On average, how long does it take to hire someone within your organization, from the date you post the job to the date the new employee starts work?
  • Does it take longer in certain positions? If so, which ones?

2. Cost to Hire

Time costs money in lost productivity, but other hidden costs are attached to hiring new candidates as well. Examining costs can help you focus limited resources on the outcomes that provide the best results and give up methods that simply aren’t working for your team.

  • What is the return on investment on each of your candidate outreach methods?
  • Where do most of your new candidates come from, and how much are you spending?

3. Applicant to Interviewee Ratio

Job postings tailored to job demands and a fine-tuned automated system can ensure your applicant pool offers more qualified candidates, improving the quality of those you hire.

  • When your company posts an opening, how many applications hit your applicant tracking system?
  • How many of these are filtered through for your consideration?
  • Of those, how many do you end up considering seriously – or scheduling interviews for?

4. Dropout Rates

Dropout rates provide rich insight into inefficiencies and other weaknesses in your hiring process. Companies that don’t track them, however, lose the chance to fix these problems.

  • How many applicants withdraw their applications or say “thanks, but no thanks” when you finally contact them for an interview – or worse, with an offer?
  • Where do most of the dropouts occur in the process?

5. Compensation Levels

While you don’t always have to offer the highest salary to attract the best talent, your overall compensation package must be competitive. By examining the numbers, you can find ways to make your offerings more attractive to top performers without breaking your budget.

  • What are your company’s compensation ranges for each position?
  • How do these break down into benefits, wages, salaries, commissions, and other compensation forms?
  • How do they match up with competing companies?

At FootBridge Energy Services, our recruiters can help you create a strategic staffing plan that tracks necessary metrics and utilizes them to improve your hiring outcomes. Contact us today to learn more about our recruitment services.