‘Out of 150 candidates, 11 people have been recruited, which is similar to the offline figures’
When Bangalore-based start-up Wooqer was relatively new to the business, it faced a big challenge. Talent was aplenty, but the time required to sort the talent was not adequate. The three founders of the company, Harish Reddy, Vishal Purohit and Pavitra Saxena, also could not always be together to conduct the lengthy interview processes. Moreover, they did not want young recruiters of the organisation to sift through people for senior management positions. Getting candidates from abroad to come to Bangalore for interviews did not seem feasible. That is when they stumbled upon the idea of conducting online interviews.
Having a ready platform at Wooqer worked to their advantage, as they were able to design the process on their own platform.
Wooqer is a platform that offers a searchable interface for consumers to find best deals and offers analytics to brand managers for various products. It also provides a do-it-yourself collaboration platform to users to mentor/monitor/measure themselves and activities with the scope. The Wooqer platform is used to sift candidates and interviews are conducted online. The success of this strategy can be gauged from the fact that big corporates including a leading Indian retail firm and a major business consultancy are in discussions with the start-up to get this human resources (HR) strategy implemented within their company using this platform.
“This is a time-saving exercise for people. Organisations in the business consulting field, who recruit in bulk, can not only save thousands of hours but qualitative analysis is also possible though this platform,” said Vishal Purohit, founder and CEO, Wooqer.
Since it is done online, overseas candidates can also take part. Purohit explained big corporates can benefit from this factor. Moreover, HR tends to ignore several aspects of a candidate’s profile, which if viewed online, may be more effective and user-friendly, according to him. He said there was also additional time available for a candidate to research and come back better prepared for an interview, through this process.
Whenever they come up with a new profile for hiring, the person responsible mentions a process in the platform, where he outlines the core common attributes required for the given profile. A standard set of 12 such questions is then fixed, based on the set company point of view. Here, eight such questions require video responses.
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If they like a profile, they assign the process to an individual. The prospective candidate gets a notification, giving details of what he needs to do. Creation takes six to seven minutes and the assignment takes a few seconds. A fall-through rate of 50 per cent is seen, where 50 per cent candidates do not respond beyond this point, similar to offline recruitment processes.
Then, by the remaining 50 per cent candidates, video responses are given by taking a video which is possible by using a phone or webcam, which is then uploaded on to the Wooqer platform. Written responses are done in a document which is also uploaded as an attachment. The candidate also gets to see what comments have been given to his responses by all the three interviewers. They take their own time looking at the profiles and put their comments on that. If there is a difference of opinion, the videos are viewed together and a consensus is arrived.
This is followed by a final personal interview. If a candidate has passed through the video interview, then there is a 90 per cent chance of being recruited. The attempt here is to minimise the number of sessions needed with the candidates during the hiring process.
“Our platform has enabled all these possibilities. Out of 150 candidates, 11 people have been recruited, which is similar to the figures offline. Around 75 per cent of the hiring in the last few months has been done through this technique. Since the start-up is based on technology, the aim is to see how comfortable candidates are with the platform,” added Purohit. On an average, he estimates, 25-30 hours of time is saved in each hiring process.
Wooqer had recently also created a process within the platform to allow prospective candidates to get into a networking environment. Here, people can share their experiences to make it a knowledge pool for other each other and future candidates.