What a difference a year makes.
Business practices had to change on a dime as the tidal wave of COVID-19 swept the familiar out of its way—and with little or perhaps even no notice or time to beta test.
Business as usual in the financial services industry “came to a screeching halt” as business were “blindsided” by the COVID-19 pandemic, said Toni E. Whaley, a financial planner with PlanMember Securities Corporation, in a webcast concerning technology and financial professionals. “We’re told this is a contact sport,” she said, but suddenly it became technology-driven.
You must adopt at least some technology, Whaley said, and if you don’t, “you’ll be in the dark ages.”
Come Aboard
The sudden shift to virtual work didn’t just include revenue-generating functions; recruiting practices were among the flotsam and jetsam.
To be sure, job applications including a video component, as well as virtual interviews, were not new. But they were an option, not the expected practice. With the advent of the pandemic, however, virtual recruitment and hiring became de rigueur.
For some, this meant accelerating practices already in place and replacing in-person recruitment efforts entirely with electronic means. But for those who had not yet implemented electronic tools into their recruiting and hiring process, it was a sudden jump into very cold water.
Alorica Inc., a company that works to build and improve the customer experience for its clients, was among those that had already been using electronic tools to recruit potential employees. Alorica has approximately 100,000 employees and 300 recruiters, and has been expanding its staff to meet higher demand for its services. With the onset of COVID-19, Alorica Senior Director of Talent Acquisition Jeff Luttrell indicates that in part, it was business as usual. Alorica held virtual interviews before the pandemic on a smaller scale for call center roles, and on larger scale for support or corporate roles, he says.
As the pandemic hit and in-person contact plummeted while virtual communication became a necessity, the firm’s approach to recruiting was “nothing new,” according to Luttrell. “We were already using Text Recruit, AI, chatbots, etc,” he noted. Even so, Alorica’s use of electronic means of recruiting grew still more. “We had existing virtual processes, but needed to scale them larger and add in efficiencies,” Luttrell says. He reports that the firm changed the way it recruits potential employees by “moving many of our on-site local teams to virtual” and that they also “started recruiting for almost all work-from-home roles.”
Getting to Know You
During the last year, business-related meetings are among the aspects of professional life that have changed greatly, observed Whaley. And that includes interviews. As with recruiting, some interviews had been taking place electronically—but with virtually no warning, that practice expanded exponentially.
Alorica illustrates that spike in holding virtual interviews with potential employees. Luttrell says that 80%-90% of the interviews for its call center jobs are virtual interviews, and almost all of the interviews to fill other openings are virtual.
Whaley remarked in her webinar that one positive aspect of the shift to using electronic means to do business, perform functions, meet and communicate is that it “shows how technology can help with establishing contact and building a business.” Alorica bears that out: Luttrell reports that the virtual interviews Alorica is holding are similar to those they conducted before, but also different. “It is important that we build relationships with potential new employees, and that face to face or recruiter/candidate interaction is critical,” he says.
“Pre-pandemic we were almost always in front of the candidates,” says Luttrell, continuing, “Now, we spend more time on transitions from step-in process and on building those relationships.”
And actual contact with individuals was only part of it, Luttrell indicates. “Community partnerships were a big part of building our funnel and many of those organizations closed or stopped services, so finding new ways to increase recruiting pipelines virtually was initially challenging,” he says, and reports that Alorica was “able to find amazing partners in schools, colleges and universities, technical schools, social service organizations, churches and social groups.”
The “what” and the “who” are not the only considerations—Whaley pointed out that the “how” is also a critical factor. She suggested that one should remember that a firm will need equipment, internet access and a virtual meeting platform of some kind. Further, she suggested considering how the office compliance team handles rules about meetings and webinars. Luttrell indicates that she is on to something, remarking that Alorica asks interviewees questions about home office set-up; they also confirm other crucial factors such as internet access and speed.
And the results? Luttrell reports that virtual recruiting and interviewing has worked very well for Alorica. “We have been hugely successful,” he says, noting that they have filled all of the positions they needed to fill.
What’s Next?
Those new recruiting procedures may get more of a workout this year, according to the Society for Human Resources Management (SHRM). According to SHRM, while turnover rates fell sharply during the pandemic-induced economic strains of 2020, experts expect that many more people will leave their jobs for new ones in 2021.
Bureau of Labor Statistics data from the start of the year suggest that so far the experts may be right. Their data show that the January 2021 the “quit” level in the U.S. workforce—the level of people voluntarily leaving their jobs—stood at 3.3 million, and rose in some sectors; it also rose slightly in February.
| Measure | “Quit” Rate | Sectors in Which the “Quit” Rate Rose |
| January 2021 | 3.3 million |
|
| February 2021 | 3.4 million |
|
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics, Job Openings and Labor Turnover, January 2021 and February 2021.
SHRM numbers Danny Nelms, President of the Work Institute, as one of those who expects voluntary turnover to increase; further, they report that he anticipates that this trend will make recruiting even more important.
And what’s next for recruiting practices? For Alorica at least, Luttrell says, “We are working on how we can do virtual recruiting better—creating efficiencies and using new tools to assist.” Beyond that, he says, “We also have to work in a hybrid model, with some on-site and some virtual” and that they need to consider how they can do that, and do it well.
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