ROI and data


Understanding the


strategic importance the internship programme has at Thales was the founding principle in developing a


robust conversion process to allow the organisation to build a strong talent pipeline for future growth.


Maximising return on investment during recruitment and selection


Graduate recruitment at Thales has a profound impact on the future success of the organisation in the UK. With over 250 hires annually onto our apprenticeship, internship or graduate programmes, the organisation has faced many of the challenges connected with recruiting STEM graduates. Laura Herbert, Early Careers Resourcing Manager at Thales discusses the partnership with Saville Consulting, A Willis Towers Watson company, in the redesign of the recruitment and selection process.


A


s we have developed and grown our employer brand nationally and advanced our presence on


campus, recognition has come with a remarkable increase in application numbers with close to 300% increase between the 2013 and 2015 campaigns. This was an impressive and welcomed growth but presented a series of challenges in being able to effectively develop and manage a best-in-class graduate recruitment function with an ever increasing applicant volume and a pre-screening process ill-equipped to deal with the substantial growth in applicant numbers.


With the graduate recruitment strategy being critical to the development of organisational capability in the UK, a series of tangible outcomes were devised


22 Graduate Recruiter | www.agr.org.uk


by the Early Careers Resourcing Team as targets to achieve for the 2015 campaign: • Implement an effective and practical way to deal with the increasing applicant volume and re-design the assessment centre process


• Reduce number of assessment centres to focus on quality of candidate and utilise business time more effectively


• Improve hire ratio at assessment centre stage


• Improve candidate experience • Increase internship conversion to retain emerging talent


The solutions A radical approach to the redesign of the entire end-to-end resourcing process was undertaken and Thales enlisted the expertise of Saville Consulting, A Willis Towers Watson Company to review the


current provision of applicant testing. Saville Consulting worked with the Early Careers Resourcing Team to build on their understanding of what good looks like in each of the roles being recruited for; for example, what it means to be a great Systems Engineer, in order to accurately assess the suitability of the candidate in more depth. We adopted the Swift Analysis Aptitude test range; an 18-minute candidate-friendly assessment that measures overall intellectual agility. This was completed online and remotely, using the latest advances in item banking to help limit any security concerns.


Following the initial screen-out stage, the remaining candidates then completed a strengths-based behavioural assessment: Work Strengths. This allowed for a tailored interview guide and behavioural


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