What is Recruitment Analytics?

Recruitment analytics is the use of data to track trends related to various hiring activities, from sourcing to hiring to retention. This allows recruiters to answer pertinent questions that can help them throughout the hiring process, such as whether the places they use to source candidates are effective, how long on average it takes to hire new employees and associated costs, and how many quality hires are being onboarded. When recruiters have this type of data in their toolbox, they can refine their process to make it as effective and efficient as possible during each stage of hiring.

In order to make sound hiring decisions, it's important for recruiters to take a data brave approach to their work—and utilizing recruitment analytics is the way to do it. Some professionals may wonder what is recruitment analytics when it comes to daily decisions since many recruiters tend to rely on their intuition when making hiring choices. However, the use of recruitment analytics can be the difference between recruiters achieving their goals and missing the mark.

Why Is Recruitment Analytics Important?

Recruitment analytics is important because having data allows recruiters to know exactly where they stand and what's causing challenges in the hiring process. Having numbers in black and white can inform decisions that ultimately lead to a more efficient hiring process, as well as better quality hires. Without this information, organizations may end up wasting time and money on ineffective strategies that don’t yield enough new hires, as well as hiring candidates who don’t perform as well as expected or leave the company in a short period of time.

How Recruitment Analytics Can Enhance Your Hiring

Recruitment analytics can enhance hiring in several ways:

Increasing efficiency

If there is an area in the hiring process that isn't running as efficiently as it could be, data analytics will help recruiters identify what's going wrong so they can take steps to fix it. Getting the numbers from recruitment analytics can reveal bottlenecks in the hiring process, and once those issues are addressed, the entire system can run more efficiently, leading to better results.

Controlling costs

Every recruiter knows that hiring can be expensive, so keeping track of the costs at every step can go a long way toward ensuring budgets are not wasted. For example, identifying ineffective sourcing channels can help companies save money on places that may not yield the best talent choices.

Boosting diversity

If an organization wants to increase its diversity, collecting and analyzing recruitment analytics are the key to a successful diversity recruitment plan because recruiters need to know exactly which demographics are represented in the staff and which ones are not. Having this data helps companies know where they stand with their diversity recruiting strategies to determine if the methods they’re using are effective in meeting their goals.

Revealing recruiting team performance

Collecting recruitment analytics can paint a picture of how members of a recruitment team are performing. Maybe a recruiter is having problems finding the right candidates, which makes the time to fill positions much higher than it should be. Or maybe a recruiter is spending too much time with candidate sourcing strategies that just don't work, thus increasing the cost of hiring. Whatever the problem is, paying attention to the data can help companies identify any problems the recruiting team is experiencing so they can be solved.

Enhancing candidate experience

 If the candidate experience is unsatisfactory, it will have a detrimental impact on recruiters’ ability to hire the talent they need. By tracking information like how many candidates drop out of the hiring funnel at any particular time, it can reveal if the process is too difficult for candidates to navigate their way through. As a result, data can provide clues on what can be fixed to make that process easier.

Improving quality of hires

 If an organization has a high turnover rate, collecting recruitment analytics can help to identify the qualities of the best hires in the company, and how they were sourced, so recruiters can replicate that success. Looking at data can help boost the quality of hires brought into a company, as well as increase the chances of retaining this talent.

Anticipating future needs

The last thing recruiters want is to find themselves behind the eight ball of staff shortages when they could've been proactive hiring the talent they needed right on time. Although recruitment analytics won't turn hiring professionals into psychics, it can help them track trends in an organization so they are able to read the tea leaves, and have an idea of when staffing needs will pick up and when they will slow down.

Top Recruiting Metrics

Although there are various metrics that recruiters can track, collecting data for its own sake isn't going to help them make informed decisions. In fact, too much data can actually complicate the process and slow it down, so it’s important to focus on some of the top recruiting metrics so they’re more likely to reach their goals. The following metrics are a good place to start.

Number of open positions 

Tracking the number of open positions can be a good starting place to help recruiters understand how successful their hiring efforts have been. If there is a consistently high number of open positions, it could be an indication of something not working in the process. Also, this can be a sign that an organization needs to improve its employer brand to get people more interested in working there.

Number of applicants per position

Knowing how many applicants apply for each position can help recruiters figure out if their approach for finding talent needs to be tweaked. If there is a low number of applicants for a position, it may mean the way job descriptions are crafted should be changed. This metric can also tell recruiters if they’re getting an abundance of applicants who aren’t qualified for the open jobs, which can be an indicator that sourcing locations aren’t attracting the right talent.

Application completion rate

The application completion rate tells companies whether or not their application process is user-friendly enough. If the rate is low, it could be a sign that the process is too long and onerous, the recruiting website has too many glitches, or the application system is not mobile friendly. In addition, there could be problems with the actual content of applications. If there are so many questions that it takes more than 15 minutes to complete an application, or if the questions are inappropriate in nature, it can also impact the completion rate.

Time to hire

The time to hire metric refers to how long it takes for a position to be filled from the day it opens to the day someone accepts the job. This metric can vary depending on the industry, as well as the type of position itself. As a result, the time to hire can range anywhere from a week to several months. Having this information helps recruiters compare the current and baseline rates to determine if there are problems clogging up the process.

Cost per hire

The cost per hire metric lets recruiters know if they're getting enough bang for their recruitment bucks because it reveals the average cost to hire workers from sourcing to onboarding. This information tells companies if specific expenses are cost effective, such as belonging to professional networks, posting on specific job boards, and using the services of agencies. In addition, cost per hire can include money for travel, training and development, and background checks. Knowing how much is spent for each hire and where the money is going allows organizations to eliminate strategies that aren't worth it.

Source of candidates 

Whether candidates are coming in through a company’s website, professional networks, or advertisements on job boards, tracking the source of candidates metric helps recruiters understand which outlets are the most effective for attracting top talent. This data means organizations can decide which sources to keep in their recruitment toolbox and which ones need to be replaced.

Diversity of hires

Companies that have implemented a diversity recruitment plan should pay attention to the diversity of hires metric to ensure they're hitting their targets. This data may be measured across demographics, so recruiters can determine which communities are represented in their hiring, and which ones need more attention. Once recruiters discover who is being hired and who isn’t, they can adjust their strategies to successfully hire talent from underrepresented backgrounds.

Acceptance rate 

The offer acceptance rate metric reveals whether or not a company’s hiring process is effective, or if there are problems along the way that need to be addressed. In addition, if the offer acceptance rate is low, it can be an indication that compensation packages aren’t adequate for the type of talent companies want to hire, or that they need to be more clear about their expectations and culture when engaging with candidates.

Quality of hire 

Recruiting metrics shouldn’t end when new employees are hired. The quality of hire metric tells companies whether or not recruiters have been on target when choosing new hires because it’s all about how well employees have performed within their first year of working at an organization. Quality of hire can be a bit more challenging to track than other metrics, however, it generally includes factors such as performance during the probationary period, productivity, and how well supervisors believe new employees fit into the company and their roles.

Retention rate

Another important post-hire metric organizations should track is the retention rate. Tracking how long it takes for people to generally leave an organization can reveal several potential problems. Perhaps job descriptions aren’t an accurate reflection of the positions being filled or hiring managers aren't evaluating candidates in a way that leads to the right employees. Low retention rates can also be caused by problems with a company's culture or compensation. If retention is lower than it should be, it’s time for companies to investigate possible causes and act on that information.