One of the most common questions I get asked when I am doing talent acquisition process optimization with a client is “how do you measure recruiter productivity”?  It is a great question particularly if you want to get the ROI out of doing any kind of TA optimization.

I always recommend two metrics that every company should have in place (there are always situational specific or company specific metrics that can be added).  They are Customer Satisfaction and Time to Accept.  Let me address Customer Satisfaction hereand I will come back with another post on Time to Accept.

Customer Satisfaction in the case of recruiting or talent acquisition has two components.

1. Hiring manager satisfaction - how satisfied are they with the process, the quality of the candidates, the volume of candidates, the interaction with their recruiter, and I like to add a value metric like “if our TA organization was an outside agency, would you recommend them to a colleague” or a question about whether the new hire is performing up to the level that they expect.
2. Candidate satisfaction – how satisfied are the candidates with the company’s recruitment process.  This feedback comes from both candidates that accept jobs and those that do not.  It is triggered at the point an on-site interview is conducted.  Questions such as; How did they find out about the position, did the interviews consistently describe the scope of the role, did the recruiter clearly outline the interview process, was the recruiter responsive to inquiries, and would the candidate apply again or recommend the company to a friend.

For both hiring manager and candidate satisfaction I recommend no more than 5 questions.  I use a 10-point scale in the Net Promoter score format.  This gives you Promoters (9 or 10), Passives (7 or 8), and Detractors (< 7).

The NPS is calculated by subtracting the % of survey respondents who are detractors from the % of survey respondents who are promoters. Your score will land somewhere between -100 to 100.

The Net Promoter Score or NPS gives you a really good metric to not only evaluate individual recruiters and evaluate recruiters relative to one another but, it also allows you to have some insight into how effective the organization is running the interview process.

You can compare candidate responses between functions or between businesses within the organization.  It is a metric that can be used at the individual recruiter level and it can be rolled up and used at the highest level.  It evaluates both the recruiting process from a hiring manager's perspective and from a candidate’s perspective.