Surveys and performance reviews are the best sources of this information, but they do take time to develop. The utilization or production rate of various recruitment techniques allows the assessment of the return on investment of specific recruitment strategies. If a particular sourcing technique shows diminishing returns, a change of strategy can be easily justified. Activity measures may not directly effect the bottom line, but certainly play an important role in determining how to staff the recruitment function. The volume of recruitment needs will dictate the number of recruiters required to satisfy them on a timely basis.
Retention is critical for many reasons.
The duration or tenure of employment measured by function, department, location or source of recruitment can speak volumes about quality, culture, leadership, competitiveness and return on investment. For many, time has become the key metric. Time to fill is often deemed more critical than cost per hire because how long a position is vacant equates to considerable losses in revenues, production, and, perhaps, end customer satisfaction. For individual recruiters, time to fill is often the key discriminator between being busy and being productive. Costs per hire, costs of turnover, costs of recruitment strategies will always capture the attention of management, and provide the basis for planning future recruitment strategies.