Managing recruitment in the retail industry is an ongoing challenge. HR teams in retail organizations are tasked with hiring a constant, high-volume flow of new retail workers while managing a turnover rate and seasonality that is simply not present in any other industry. In Canada, the retail industry has one of the youngest workforces, with more workers under 24 years old than most other industries. A young workforce can lead to challenges when it comes to retention. According to EY, the younger the employee, the less likely they are to stay with an employer in the long term. 

Retail HR teams must also manage their mass recruitment in a way that identifies the best candidates cost-effectively, because modern-day retail also has to compete in profit with its online retail competitors. But managing an ongoing and constant flow of new hires can put strain on HR teams and result in rushed or unsystematic onboarding processes; in turn affecting revenue and productivity while increasing turnover. 

In order to achieve their talent acquisition goals, retail recruitment teams should utilize the best tools available on the market.

This is where a best-of-breed talent acquisition platform helps. 

A best-of-breed (BoB) platform allows retail talent acquisition teams to build a suite of the best software modules for their needs, available in a one-stop source. The Scout Talent platform, for example, allows retail teams to have the best software for tracking and managing candidates, onboarding new hires, and keeping passive candidates engaged. These software modules can be easily integrated to keep your talent acquisition data and processes in one place.

Read on to learn more about :Recruit, :Engage and :Onboard, Scout Talent’s premier TA software modules; as well as options for partner integrations, such as intelliHR.

Comprehensive ATS and recruitment CRM

Applicant tracking systems (ATS) and recruitment customer relationship management (CRM) tools are useful for all industries. They allow HR teams to better track, manage, evaluate, and engage with candidates. When dealing with so many candidates, utilising an ATS and recruitment CRM such as Scout Talent :Recruit will drastically reduce errors, streamline the hiring process, and provide a better candidate experience. 

These benefits are highly impactful when working in the retail industry, as it makes recruiting en masse much easier and mitigates common challenges in retail processes, such as ghosting (where a candidate disappears because they found a job elsewhere while they were applying and interviewing with you), as your smooth recruitment process and candidate care can be enough to convince a candidate to go with your organization. 

:Recruit, Scout Talent’s premier ATS and recruitment CRM module, has a range of features that support retail recruitment, including:

• Quick job posting (with branded talent landing pages) to multiple job boards;
• Easy communication with candidates, through branded email templates, batch communications and event scheduling;
• Automations to screen applications and identify top candidates in your talent pool; and,
• The ability to build hiring workflows that keep your entire team informed and allow for collaboration.

These features empower retail organizations to hire at high volume efficiently, and showcase why :Recruit is a best-of-breed ATS and recruitment CRM. 

But recruitment is about more than just hiring new people – it also encompasses maintaining a talent pipeline for future hiring needs, and managing retention. That’s why :Recruit is supplemented by :Engage and :Onboard. 

Reducing the biggest problem in retail: high turnover 

Often in retail, recruitment can swing between extremes. In some hiring drives, there may not be enough quality candidates whilst in others, you may not have enough budget to hire all the stellar candidates. If your recruitment model is reactive, both of these scenarios will pose a problem because you won’t have a time-efficient way to source candidates, store their data for future hires, or recruit them successfully. 

Combat these challenges and cater to future hiring needs before they pop up with :Engage. Through Scout Talent’s :Engage software module, you can build and nurture talent pools, strengthen your employer brand, and recruit passive candidates. 

Learn more about :Engage and how you can secure your talent pipeline here. 
Equally as important to attracting and hiring talent is retaining your organization’s new retail hires. One of the most critical steps to reducing turnover in the retail industry is ensuring new team members are onboarded properly. This is a common difficulty in retail, as the environment is fast-paced and keeps every team member busy, but studies have shown that organizations who have a strong onboarding process are more likely to retain talent.

The Scout Talent platform offers an onboarding solution through the :Onboard module, helping you to maintain your new hires for longer and maximise their productivity. 

Discover how :Onboard can help you with your employee retention.

The best part of a BoB platform is that you can work with our partners to integrate other modules that may suit your organization’s needs better. For example, our partner, intelliHR, can help with your onboarding; alternatively, if you are already working with intelliHR, you can easily integrate the Scout Talent platform to complement it. 

Designed to reduce employee turnover rates (particularly in high-turnover industries such as retail), intelliHR has tools and capabilities that help to dramatically improve engagement – all in ways that are easy to use and perfect for mass onboarding new retail hires. These tools help to reduce admin tasks and optimise the employee experience even before their first day.

Some key features of intelliHR’s onboarding software include:

• Welcome systems for new hires;
• Automated workflows;
• Wellness check reminders;
• Monthly check-in reminders; and,
• Performance management tools.

Click here to learn more about intelliHR and how it can empower your onboarding process. 

End-to-end talent acquisition in the retail industry can be easier

Retail organizations all throughout Australia can benefit from powerful software that is available through a single, collaborative source. Drive successful outcomes and productivity in HR teams through a BoB platform that enhances and streamlines the hiring and onboarding process.

If you’d like to discuss implementing a BoB platform through Scout Talent, contact us here.