It is no surprise that the pandemic has accelerated the adoption of new technologies. In a global study measuring the impact of the coronavirus crisis on business behaviour, Dell Technologies found that 80% of businesses fast-tracked at least some digital transformation projects in 2020. Similarly, a June 2020 survey of over 2,500 global business leaders found that the pandemic sped up companies' digital transformation by an average of six years. Undoubtedly, in response to the crisis and its abrupt and catastrophic impact on the way we work, your company will have moved at pace towards a cloud-based ecosystem, integrating several new platforms and tools into your existing HR tech stack to enable your business to survive (and thrive).
As part of this mass adoption of new digital systems, we have seen the ongoing rise of the video interview (whether as part of a company's in-house hiring programme or as a service offered by their recruitment agency partners). Typically, video interview platforms offer you three methods: two-way video interviewing (which can be recorded and shared with other members of your company), one-way video interviewing (where questions are sent to the candidate to record their responses), and video applications (candidates include a video along with their CV when they apply for a role). Using these methods can help you screen candidates more effectively, whether you're interviewing across different time zones (or with hiring team members in different locations), assessing intangible skills that can't be effectively communicated on a CV, filtering out irrelevant candidates (predominantly those who have significantly oversold themselves on their CVs!) or interviewing remote candidates.
According to a recent HR Research Institute survey, HR professionals who rated their organisation's overall talent as above average were 15% more likely to use video-based interviewing systems in their recruitment process than their counterparts. Video interviewing is here to stay and we're not surprised, given it means you can skip first-stage interviews, minimise diary coordination, access better talent and halve your hiring time!
We've recently added video interviewing to our suite of services; here are some of the benefits we're now able to pass on to our clients:
1. Reduce your time to hire
Whether real-time or recorded, video interviews can be time-saving. Think of all the accumulated time invested in organising the logistics of physical interviews from booking and setting up the meeting space to welcoming candidates to your offices, offering them coffee, walking them to the meeting room, conducting the interview itself, and then escorting them out. The time spent in that may seem minimal for a single interview, but consider how it adds up with every single candidate who looks good on paper. Using video as your first screening tool essentially eliminates the traditional first-stage interview, especially if you choose to use the one-way or video application methods which mean you can choose exactly when and where you review your applications. If you use a recruitment agency to conduct your first-stage interviews, you can watch the recordings of them interviewing your candidates and review at your own pace. With video interviews, you can also share them (or relevant snippets) with other internal stakeholders. You're shortlisting your first-stage interviews without leaving your desk.??
2. Offer a better candidate experience??
It's not just better for you, it's better for the candidate too. With video interviews, applicants don’t need to travel or take a day off so won’t miss out on the first-round interview due to scheduling problems or costs. If they are two-way interviews, candidates will greatly value a personal conversation in support of their CV or letter. If you choose to go down the one-way or video application route, applicants can re-record themselves repeatedly until they are happy with their answers and how they are coming across. We can't tell you how many times candidates tell us they thought of the perfect answers to the interview questions after leaving the building – pre-recorded video interviews offer candidates the chance to give their best responses and feel they've presented their best selves for the role. This process is stress-relieving and also helps hiring managers assess candidates more objectively, as nerves can often hinder a candidate’s performance in an interview.?
3. Reduce the bias in your recruitment process
According to Deloitte's research, there is a growing consensus among experts that traditional interviews are an unreliable measure of candidates' potential for on-the-job success. Unlike traditional free-flowing interviews, on-demand interviewing platforms provide the framework needed to develop standardised and structured interviews that consistently and objectively evaluate candidates. For instance, on-demand video interviews present the same pre-recorded questions in the same order to every candidate. Being able to share the recordings with your staff, whether they're your colleagues in HR or the applicant's potential new team, can also help to reduce bias by broadening the reviewing process. Video interviews cannot completely remove bias, but they can help assess candidates more objectively.
4. Reach out to global talent
If you only hire locally, you risk missing out on great candidates. With video interviews, you can connect with remote employees and with people from different regions who are thinking of relocating. You can also overcome the barriers of different time zones, as one-way video interviews and applications allow candidates to answer questions and interviewers to review recordings at their own convenience. Using a video interview platform opens your company to a more diverse talent pool, which can only be a good thing.?
Let us show you how it works!
We'd be happy to give you a demonstration of the technology and how we use it to help you build better, more motivated teams by making the right hires from the start. You can call us on 01932 355000 or email hello@amber-employment.co.uk to find out more.
