Workforce Management Blog

Before looking at how E-recruiting helps organization save it is important to understand what E-recruiting is. E-recruitment (Employee recruitment) is the process of staffing an open position through the hiring of a new employee. An e-recruitment workforce management solution enables job management, capture of applicant resumes from various channels, creation of an applicant pool and bi-directional matching between applicants and job requirements to identify candidates more suitable for the organization’s needs.

So how does E-recruiting help companies save?

Saving on the cost of advertising:

Traditionally when companies were looking to hire someone for a position they would advertise in magazines or newspapers or have booths in job fairs. This method reached a limited number of individuals and the costs could add up quickly. However now organizations can reach millions of potential candidates by listing positions online free of charge. Recruitment software also allows companies to tap into social media websites such as LinkedIn to post jobs or connect with potential candidates at no cost.

Saving time on assessing candidates:

An organization which advertises a position sometimes receives an overwhelming number of responses from potential applicants. Unfortunately the majority of these applicants may not have the necessary qualifications and/or experience that the company desires. E-Recruitment software allows organizations to pre-define required qualifications and experience levels and filter resumes based on those qualifications and levels of experience. That way only the resumes which require serious considerations are the ones being read which streamlines the entire recruitment process.

Saving time on hiring the right candidate:

Many types of E-Recruiting software allow individual’s resumes and information to be kept on file. This is important since often organizations will have to wait for suitable candidates to apply for a position. However with the ability to keep resumes and other information on file organizations can quickly browse through a list of qualified candidates who they previously did not have positions for. Also as mentioned previously recruitment software can leverage social media so just in case an ideal candidate does not apply for a position the company can actually recruit the qualified candidates on their own. In either case E-recruiting software ensures organizations do not have to wait for applicants to apply and allows organizations to quickly fill the vacancy needed to help continue their company’s success.

Click here to learn more about the benefits of an e-recruitment solution.

What is E-Recruitment and why is it needed?

Recruitment involves advertising a position, attracting candidates to apply for the position, screening the candidates and ultimately selecting one of the screened candidates to fulfill the position. Organizations may choose to utilize recruiters in-house, have an external agency do their recruiting or take a hybrid approach where an external agency will send pre-screened applicants to an in-house recruiter. The decision of how an organization would conduct its recruitment process would be based on a number of factors such as:

-       Financial Resources

-       Time constraints

-       Number of positions which need to be filled

-       Number of applicants that apply for a position

-       Seniority of the position

Although recruitment is integral to the success of a corporation, traditional recruitment was prone to a variety of issues which included:

-       Escalating costs of advertising job positions

-       Difficulties in screening out unqualified candidates

-       Having enough qualified candidates apply for positions

However once again technology intervened and has helped make the recruitment process much easier to manage thanks to E-recruitment. E-recruitment is similar to traditional recruiting as the goals are still to advertise a need in an organization, attract candidates, screen them and then select the appropriate candidate(s). The difference is that with E-recruiting this process takes place online. E-recruitment has evolved to the point where employers are now advertising jobs, accepting resumes, using tools to screen resumes and even conducting interviews completely online. The benefits of E-recruitment include:

-       Costs: Many websites will allow organizations to post job listings online for free

-       Attracting more applicants: Organizations can leverage online tools such as LinkedIn to attract more candidates

-       Screening Employees: Recruitment software allows organizations to capture incoming resumes and match them against pre-defined criteria so that HR professionals do not have to spend their time reading unqualified resumes

-       Interviewing: Using webcams and the internet organizations can easily meet with candidates that may be located in another geographical region at minimal cost

1)    Price: This is always a consideration when a company or organization makes a purchase. However it is not always in the best interest of the organization to go with the lowest price. E-recruitment software is an investment and the return on investment may be much higher with a premium software package. Alternatively a low cost solution may not fulfill your organization’s requirements and any price paid will not be worth it.

2)    Support: Analyze the level of support your organization will receive from the seller. Do they have a support team that you can easily get in touch with? Do they have dedicated individuals on the support team that will be able to follow up with you for ongoing issues? What is the cost of getting support for your software? Is support built into the contract?

3)    Expertise: It is important to purchase your product from a company that has a solid and well established reputation in the software industry. Recruitment software is a sizable investment and your company should do their due diligence when selecting a vendor. Getting references from a potential seller is something that should always be done. Ask the references questions not just about the software but about the implementation and support process to get a full picture of your potential business partner.

4)    Features: E-recruitment software comes with a variety of features and each software solution can be vastly different from the next. For example some newer recruitment software solutions have the ability to leverage social media to hire candidates, while others can parse different portions of candidate’s resumes and provide a more holistic view of the candidate’s total experience. Therefore when considering a recruitment software solution you should have detailed demons done and ask as many questions as you can think of so you know exactly what you are investing in.

In recent years, enhanced by the economic crisis, we have seen a growing awareness of the need to better manage labor costs, and in service oriented industries improve customer service, as a mean to expand organizational profitability. Time and Attendance solutions represent one way of addressing the concerns of the organization about the productivity and efficiency of their workforce. Automating workforce management represents the leap that organizations are required to make to gain more control over their labor costs.

Benefits of an automated solution:

Reduce payroll error rate and processing time

Automated data collection and processes, interfacing to other software packages such as ERP and Pay systems, reduces the need to establish and maintain employee information within different organizational systems. As a result the amount of human error that can increase payroll costs is eliminated. With the elimination of manual intervention, organizations can move towards more an administrator-rule environment to create consistency between union agreements, as well as federal, provincial/state, and local regulations and different types of payment for employee work categories. Data automated transfer between employees, managers and payroll administrators increase accuracy, reduces re-work and reduces payroll overpayments.

Reduced overtime
Minimizing overtime is crucial to controlling work costs, which must be taken into consideration when allocating work or shift time to an employee. With reporting capabilities of automated time and attendance, solution managers are able to assign work more cost-effectively, based on who is least likely to incur overtime rates. A rules-based solution governing work agreements and regulations assures that payments will be made according to employee schedules, preventing unnecessary payments of overtime due to unauthorized early arrivals and late departures.

Eliminate costs of time sheet and time cards:

Savings are gained in any organization based on paper elimination by reducing storing, archiving and restoring of time sheets and time cards. Significant savings occur in organizations with more than once-a-month pay periods.  Gartner offers a calculation of $0.03 savings per time sheet, multiplied by the number of employees and pay periods. There is also less of an opportunity for these records to be lost, damaged or destroyed.

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Calculating an organization’s payroll may seem like a relatively simple task:

-  Take each employee, identify the number of hours worked in a pay period, multiply by the hourly wage and then pay that amount.

This would be correct in an ideal world however in the real world things are a lot more complicated and so a lot of errors are made in determining payroll. In addition to identifying the specific wage each employee makes and identifying the number of hours worked for each employee, organizations must also take into account:

-          Sick days

-          Vacation days

-          Overtime

-          Statutory holidays

-          Provincial/State tax deductions

-          Federal tax deductions

-          Benefits

-          Retirement Plans

-          Unemployment insurance

-          Etc

Statistics have shown that 33% of employers have made payroll errors which have a variety of impacts such as legal implications, unhappy employees, lost revenue, etc. Studies have also shown that many organizations overpay employees as a result of human calculation errors. Even if organizations discover this overpayment recouping the payment can become a long process which will negatively impact morale in the company.

What can you do to avoid payroll errors?

A great solution to avoiding payroll errors and the negative impacts associated with them would be to automate your organization’s time and attendance using workforce management software. In an automated system, employees can sign in and out of work using a time clock which lets employers know exactly when their employees came into work and when they left. The time clocks in combination with the software calculates the exact amount to pay an employee based on their hours worked, wage and the various other considerations mentioned above (taxes, benefits, etc).

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