Recruitment to Retention

This type of recruitment process is long and arduous. So, why, you may ask, would your candidates want to put themselves through something so difficult? There are two reasons for making your recruitment process so daunting. For the first reason, let's use our imperial analogy again. Back in ancient times, those who passed the examinations were rewarded with high positions and lavish lifestyles. Something similar is true of graduate schemes - the young people you hire get the opportunity to grow and develop and take major positions within your organisation. However, with big rewards on offer you also need to test your candidates' abilities and motivation, which is our second reason for making things so tough. You are looking for people with great qualifications and fantastic skills who really want to be part of your team. For this reason, many organization's spread their recruitment out over several months to ensure the people who complete the process have the desire to be part of their team in the long-term.

"You are looking for people with great qualifications and fantastic skills who really want to be part of your team."

Once your candidates have navigated their way through your strenuous recruitment process and are safely aboard, it is time to think about their progress and development, particularly your succession planning and training programs. By completing such a long and arduous recruitment process, both you and your new hire have shown your desire to build your relationship to last. However, this is just the beginning. Once your new hire is firmly ensconced within your organisation, you need to live up to your side of the bargain - you need to develop them so that they can one day fill your most critical positions. The key here is to generate a clear and lucid development strategy.

Having brought in such promising young talent, the obvious temptation would be to try and utilise them as quickly as possible.

This, though, is an urge you must resist - graduate schemes are based around long-term satisfaction rather than instant gratification. Therefore, many graduates in established training schemes spend their first year - or even two years - rotating roles and developing a wider understanding of your organisation. This could mean staying in one location, but spending separate three months stints in different departments, or, even moving between geographic locations. For instance, a friend of mine in Tianjin is currently involved in such a scheme with a Canadian steel producer. He is spending the first two years with his company completing six month spells at different sites. The first was in the UK, the second at their headquarters in Canada, the third in Tianjin and the final one in Memphis in the USA.

"Graduate schemes are based around longterm satisfaction rather than instant gratification"

Only after your young talent has developed an understanding of your company and is fully integrated, can you begin to think about utilising them to their full potential. The first step here is to sit down with your hire and discuss where they will fit best into your organisation. This should be a dialogue involving the hire, HR and the managers who have supervised the candidate during their first year. Once you have identified the right area and appropriate role for your candidate, you then need to develop a clear career path. Identify roles that you feel the candidate can reach in the future. For example, have a plan for 5, 10 and even 15 years into the future. One element that is vital here though is that this strategy must be supported by a strong training plan. For each step on the organizational ladder, show the experience and training your hire will require and how they can accomplish this.

Financial Foundations

By outlining the opportunity to develop towards prestigious, wellrewarded senior roles in your organisation, you will go a long way to fending of other suitors offering your talent a few extra yuan. However, you cannot overlook financial considerations. Most graduate schemes in Europe tend to begin with the employee earning a salary that is equivalent to, or fractionally higher than, the national average. For instance, in the UK, several major organisations such as the National Health Service and Civil Service offer their graduates a starting salary of around 20-25,000GBP.

Obviously though, as a graduate scheme is a long-term solution, the starting salary is not your biggest consideration. Instead, you need to think about the way your hire's salary develops in the same way their skills and position develop. Most organisations with graduate schemes offer a bump in salary after the completion of the first year. However, after that, you need to align your career path planning with your financial rewards. When you map out your young talent's career path, it is vital to show them exactly how they will climb the pay-scale. If you have role's earmarked for them in 5, 10 and 15 years, you need to communicate the rewards that will come with those roles.

Win-win

A graduate scheme is a win-win situation. It allows you to handpick the very best young talent around and to then develop that talent into stars of the future. It provides young graduates with a secure future and the chance to rise quickly within an organisation.