Healthcare Homes provides residential and nursing homes, homecare and live-in care across the South and South East of England. We upgraded their Applicant Tracking System so they could process all their recruitment activity in one place.
The HARBOUR experience starts the candidate journey off on the right foot.
Graham Parkin, Recruitment Manager, Healthcare Homes
No healthcare company wants to fall short in a CQC inspection but there’s always that worry. Thanks to their upgraded ATS, Healthcare Homes don’t have that. They were able to stop sending out forms via email, which could so easily be overlooked in a busy recruitment team, and use the system’s automated reference checker instead. Handily, we integrated their DBS company, uCheck, into the ATS, too. And the easy-on-the-eye dashboard makes keeping track of everything a breeze.
Graham says...
‘Those little green ticks and red crosses on the dashboard? It sounds simple but it makes it really easy to see what’s outstanding. Since we upgraded our ATS, the business has gone through several CQC inspections and there’s been absolutely nothing missing in the candidates’ files.’
Prior to the ATS upgrade, Healthcare Homes’ onboarding pipeline was done manually on an Excel spreadsheet. It was a time-consuming exercise and it was difficult keeping track of which new starters to prioritise. And that wasn’t the only issue. Because onboarding activity was processed on their server, there was a risk of data being lost if the server went down, not to mention the financial implications if there was a GDPR breach.
Graham says...
‘We’re confident that all our data is now stored, saved and secure. And the portal has revolutionised our onboarding. We can easily see a candidate’s notice period and can prioritise who we need to make compliant first so we don’t risk losing them. Everyone in the recruitment team has full visibility in the portal so if someone’s away another team member can see what’s outstanding and deal with it. Now that everything’s automated, we can onboard a candidate in one or two days rather than a week.’
A major objective for Healthcare Homes was to up-level their management information access/reporting. So we gave them one port of call for all their MI. Even better – the reporting is live. Which means improved decision-making and a business that can react quickly to their recruitment needs.
Graham says...
‘It’s having that visibility, so when a home manager says they’re not getting any candidates we can show them why. We can now see which job board is bringing in the most candidates and make decisions on where to invest our advertising spend. And because we’re advertising in the right places – and getting better candidates – we’ve massively reduced our agency spend.’
When it came to the candidate experience, Healthcare Homes knew there was room for improvement. There were sticking points throughout the recruitment cycle – like a clunky job application stage, candidates not being progressed in a timely manner and onboarding that left a lot to be desired.
Graham says...
‘Candidates used to be diverted to our website or sent to an email address, but now they can just click one button to apply. The upgraded ATS means we don’t have candidates stuck in the system and, once they’ve been progressed, they can log into their onboarding portal to view their offer letter and contract plus things like a welcome letter and details about training opportunities. It’s great for our candidates – and shows that Healthcare Homes are an efficient and professional company.’