Measuring Talent Acquisition Success in 2024: A Balanced Approach

At TA Innovation Hive, we’ve been getting our thoughts together on how to measure the true success of Talent Acquisition (TA) in 2024. While hitting those hard metrics like time-to-hire and cost-per-hire is still crucial, we know that balancing them with softer measures is more important than ever. In today’s competitive talent market, TA success comes down to both art and science—and that means ensuring you’re not just filling roles but also building the relationships that will drive long-term growth.

Partnership and understanding the business and managing the recruitment risk on brand attractiveness are some of the areas that are hard to measure. We bring science but also market insights and interpretation. Recruitment is art and science—the art of storytelling and the ability to interpret the data (science).

Here’s how we’re approaching it.

The Hard and Soft Skills Economy 💼

In today’s job market, soft skills have become as valuable as technical expertise. Hiring managers are increasingly looking for candidates who excel in collaboration, communication, and adaptability.

At TA Innovation Hive, we know that hiring managers expect a balance of hard and soft measures in recruitment, blending technical assessments with relationship-building efforts. It’s about ensuring you’re not just recruiting employees but cultivating individuals who will help shape the company’s future.

The Hard Measures 🧮

These are the core metrics that give us a clear understanding of how efficiently our TA team is functioning and where improvements can be made.

1. Candidate Experience & NPS - In 2024, candidate experience is more critical than ever. With top talent having countless opportunities, a poor candidate experience can harm your brand’s reputation—not just now but for years to come. Failing to focus on this could mean losing key hires both today and in the future. At TA Innovation Hive, we measure candidate satisfaction through Net Promoter Scores (NPS) at each step of the process, ensuring that even candidates who don’t get the job leave with a positive impression of our company.

2. Time to Hire & Fill Rate - Speed matters, but it’s no longer just about filling roles quickly. We focus on balancing time to hire with ensuring that the candidates we bring in are the right fit for the role and the culture.

3. Cost per HireCost per hire - is still a fundamental metric for tracking the efficiency of your recruitment spend. But in 2024, the focus is on smart spending—allocating resources to channels that consistently deliver top talent without breaking the budget.

4. Quality of Hire - When it comes to quality of hire, we track new employee performance, retention, and their growth within the company. This tells us how well our recruitment efforts are aligning with long-term business goals.

5. Sourcing Channel Effectiveness - Tracking sourcing channel effectiveness helps us determine which platforms are most effective at bringing in the best candidates. This allows us to refine our strategies and ensure we’re using the right tools to attract top talent.

The Soft Measures 🧠

While harder to quantify, soft measures play a significant role in understanding the cultural and relational impact of your TA strategy. These reflect how well you’re building the relationships that matter most in recruitment.

1. External Brand Advocates - One of the best indicators of success is when candidates—whether hired or not—become brand advocates. A positive experience can lead to them recommending your company to others, creating a ripple effect that enhances your employer brand.

2. Hiring Manager Satisfaction - Today’s hiring managers want to see both hard and soft skills in the candidates they bring on board. Tracking hiring manager satisfaction ensures that recruitment efforts are not just filling roles but fostering relationships that align with long-term company goals.

3. Diversity & Inclusion - At TA Innovation Hive, diversity and inclusion (DEI) are integral to our strategy. By measuring DEI metrics, we ensure our recruitment processes are equitable, promoting a wide range of perspectives and ideas within the company.

4. Employee Engagement in Recruitment - When your existing employees are proud to help with recruitment efforts, you know your culture is strong. Whether through referrals or participation in hiring events, high engagement shows that the workforce is aligned with your recruitment goals.

5. TA Team Happiness - A happy and engaged TA team is essential for a successful recruitment operation. If your team is thriving, they’re more likely to build stronger relationships with candidates and hiring managers, leading to better outcomes overall.

At TA Innovation Hive, we believe that measuring the success of your TA efforts requires a balance between hard and soft measures. It’s not just about hitting targets like time-to-hire or cost-per-hire. In 2024, candidate experience has become a top priority—failing to get this right could harm your brand and make it harder to attract crucial hires in the future.

But it’s also about recognizing that recruitment is both an art and a science. We bring data science but also market insights and interpretation. It’s the ability to interpret the numbers and tell the story behind them that truly drives success in today’s soft skills economy.

Thanks for buzzing through this with us!— Becky and Rob