English, Talent Acquisition, Interview
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Vocal Characteristics
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EnglishVoice Age
Middle Aged (35-54)Transcript
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Hello and welcome to the first edition of the Connected Workplace sponsored by Cornerstone Rpo and Pherson. Today, our first guest is a longtime industry confidant of mine and I consider him a great friend. He's the manager of talent acquisition at Carmax Jack mccarthy, Jack. Welcome to the podcast and I appreciate you being the uh guinea pig and our 1st 1st ever guest. Thanks, pleasure to be here. Appreciate you having me on great. Well, as you know, it's unprecedented times right now in talent acquisition, we've been doing this for almost 17 years and I've never seen the market quite the way that it is today with over 10 million open jobs in the US and only 7.7 million unemployed. What is Carmax doing to attract and retain talent in y'all's organization? We are leveraging so many different tactics and really putting together strategies and refreshing on our strategies regularly. Um One of those is really expanding our team and being able to support the growth and the evolution of our business. Um But when it comes to, to talent acquisition, we've just had to go out and find as many people in the different industries, uh not just staying industry focused on automotive or retail. You know, we've been working the the pathway of paid leads. We've been doing as much as we can in the median marketing space. We've been leveraging employer branding. We have a very much a, a differentiated brand and based on our culture and our work environment, we've also gone national with remote roles. We've not done that traditionally. And so we've really had to pivot quickly specifically in the technology area, say, where are we going to find those software developers? They're not gonna all be in Richmond, Virginia or wanting to move to our corporate headquarters or work remotely in Richmond, Virginia. So we've, we've had to go down lots of different paths like that to make sure that we're finding the talent that's gonna help us continue to, to not just survive but thrive in this, this ever challenging market. One of the things that we're seeing as a trend is candidates actually moving out of very populated areas into more remote or rural areas. So the fact that you're looking for and your company can be flexible in remote talent has that added an additional candidate pipeline for y'all. It's been absolutely huge for us, Ronnie, being able to find people that are not just in your major metropolitan areas has helped us find the, the talent that we need, that's very team oriented, but also has the functional expertise to do what they do every day. Specifically when you think about again, that example about technology, you can develop software and work in agile teams anywhere with, with the prevalence now of Microsoft teams and other technology that we use at Carmax. Uh So we, we've been able, we were in a very good position before the pandemic with those communication and collaboration tools. So we were able to very quickly move to utilizing those but also getting talent that is in those remote locations to be able to stay really connected with the team. So it's uh it's, it's definitely something that we are gonna continue to do as we, you know, weather, this uh this storm that that keeps on coming at us with the pipeline being as tight as it is right now. One of the other things that a lot of companies are considering is how they look at internal talent. Are y'all looking at internal talent differently now than y'all did PRE COVID. So we've always had a culture of promoting from within and helping people learn, grow and develop. So we have ramped up retooling reskilling associates that have been with us and that have a certain interest. We are rolling out new programs in order to facilitate that process. So our learning and development and training teams are very attuned to the needs of the business and we have in fact, built out more of those programs and technology is one of those areas where it's ever evolving and ever changing. So we want to provide those opportunities for people that want to maybe switch careers or add another technology to their, their tool belt, their skill tool belt. So, yes, that's something that we've, we've focused on and we'll continue to do. So. So, one of the things that um we've talked about now is we've got the sourcing and you've got the candidate pipeline. What about the interview process in and of itself, how much has that changed Post COVID? It's, you know, one of the stats that I've seen is one in three job seekers prefer interviews via phone or video conference. Has y'all's interview process um changed or how is it adjusted since post COVID? So it definitely has changed to. So our panel interviews are now done virtually. So the beauty of that is that we're able to do a lot more of them and we're able to do them faster, we're able to make decisions, we're able to make offers faster. So the the the process time from application to offer and on boarding is definitely been dramatically cut and it, you know, technology has enabled us to do that. And so we absolutely are taking advantage of that to be able to move candidates through quicker. We're actually in the process of also refining our application process to make that faster, more streamlined and more mobile friendly. I think a lot of businesses have been doing the same thing and we're definitely falling in line with that because it really starts with that initial engagement of the application and then then following through from interview to offer. So I know talent acquisition teams have been quick to adopt the virtual interviewing techniques. What change management or communication or training have you done for the actual hiring managers or panels to get them ready for the virtual interviewing environment? We put together resources for our managers so that they and and this is delivered with every single interview invite as reminders. So we have frequently asked questions how to set up the interview properly. Here's a resource in case something doesn't work technology wise. And so we, we provided them with best practices and tools for them to research and understand before they even go into the interview. So there was definitely a learning process. Uh and we got feedback from them in order to, to make sure that we were delivering the right information for that experience, not only for the hiring manager, but also for the candidates so that it was the uh a top notch candidate experience because that's certainly a differentiator as well in the marketplace. Great. Well, Jack, look, thank you so much for taking some time to spend with us today and we really appreciate it. This has been the connected workplace sponsored by Cornerstone rpo and Versant, Jack mccarthy was our guest today, longtime industry confidant and friend of mine. Appreciate you taking the time. Thanks so much, Rodney.