The-Ultimate-Guide-to-Graduate-Recruitment

THE ULTIMATE GUIDE TO
GRADUATE
RECRUITMENT

SETTING UP A GRADUATE SCHEME?
THIS IS THE GUIDE FOR YOU!
ATTRACT, RECRUIT AND RETAIN TOP GRADUATE TALENT
Setting up a graduate scheme for
the first time, or even reviewing an
existing graduate scheme can be a
daunting process. Quite often, the
graduate scheme in any business
receives a lot of attention: there is a
certain pressure to attract, recruit
and retain the top talent and there
is a lot of noise about this in the
media.
That said, it doesn’t have to be as
daunting as it sounds…and nothing
has to be final! No matter what
your size – small or large – your
talent development programme
will never be perfect. It will evolve
constantly as you learn new things,
try out new models, receive
feedback and grow.
At Gradvert, we have been
designing, building and developing
graduate schemes for nearly four
years now and we have had the
utter privilege of working with
some of the smartest and some of
the biggest companies going. For
this reason, we have been lucky
enough to get a rare bird’s eye view
of the market.
As a way of consolidating our
learning, and to help inform other
businesses looking to build or
improve their graduate scheme,
we’ve compiled ‘The Ultimate
Guide to Graduate Recruitment’.
The guide answers the following
questions:
1. What are the most common
types of graduate scheme
and what are the pros and
cons of each?
2. What questions do you need
to answer when setting up a
scheme?
3. Why does graduate
recruitment fail and what can
you do to avoid failure in your
business?
4. How can you use digital
media to attract graduates?
5. How much should you pay
your graduates?
6. How do you retain your top
talent? The Gen-Y challenge!
7. How to prepare your
managers to ‘lead’ a graduate.
PAGE 1

1
ONE
WHAT ARE THE MOST COMMON
TYPES OF GRADUATE SCHEME AND
WHAT ARE THE PROS AND
CONS OF EACH?
When considering graduate
programmes in particular, there are
three main types you can consider.
In this section, we’ll outline the
three types and consider the pros
and cons of each.
PAGE 2

THE ROTATIONAL SCHEME
PROS AND CONS
The rotational graduate scheme is
one of the most popular types of
graduate scheme. The essence is
that the graduate is brought on for
a management or leadership
position and is therefore given the
opportunity to gain experience
across a range of teams,
departments, sites and sometimes
even countries!
The aim is to give the graduate a
really broad understanding of the
company and how it operates, as
well as help them to grow their
network across the business for the
future.
PROS:
• The graduate develops a really
broad understanding of the
business, gaining exposure to
different teams and
departments, learning how it
all ‘fits’ together.
• The graduate is moved into a
series of new environments at
quite a quick pace and so
develops team building and
relationship building skills as
well as an ability to deal with
change and get up to speed
quickly!
• The graduate gets to try new
things in each new setting,
rather than being pigeon
holed based on their
performance in the initial
months.
• The graduate builds their
network across the business.
• The wider business has the
opportunity to bring on an
additional resource for a set
period of time.
• The various teams get to ‘trial’
a graduate, exposing more of
the business to the benefits of
employing graduates. This can
increase internal demand for
graduates, and therefore
builds support.
CONS:
• There is a risk that the
graduate becomes a ‘jack of
all trades, master of none’.
Without being able to
develop skills in one function
or operational area, their
knowledge can remain
superficial.
• Time is short to work on
specific development areas.
Often the rotations are 8 and
sometimes 6 months
meaning it’s really important
that the graduate owns their
own development plan and
discusses it with each new
manager.
• It can be disruptive and costly
to the graduate, especially
with the travel involved and
they may expect some of this
to be supported. Additionally,
it can be disruptive to the
teams that accommodate the
graduates – as soon as they’re
trained, it seems they’re gone
again!
PAGE 3

THE TECHNICAL EXPERT SCHEME
PROS AND CONS
Another popular type of scheme is
the ‘technical expert scheme’. This
is popular in trades such as
Accounting, Engineering and Law.
The idea is that you hire a graduate
from a selected field and develop
their skills in something very
specific.
Within this type of programme, you
can still employ a ‘rotational
structure’ but the core
differentiator here is that the
graduate rotates within one
department or business function.
PROS:
• The graduate has the
opportunity to hone their
skills in a niche area,
becoming a technical subject
matter expert who can add a
very specific benefit to the
business.
• The business strengthens its
technically ability, hiring a
talented graduate with formal
training in the form of a
degree and / or masters.
• The graduate gets to build
strong relationships in one
business function or team,
working on a series of projects
in their area of developing
expertise.
• The training programme can
be very structured with
specific training titles and
modules. This can be used
year after year and can be
delivered in house, by more
senior, technical experts.
CONS:
• The graduate might get an
insulated view of the
company and not get the
opportunity to see how their
work contributes to the larger
picture.
• The graduate can miss out on
the chance to meet people
from different teams and
departments.
• There is the age old challenge
of moving technical experts
into leadership roles –
leadership and managerial
training should also be
considered as part of
technically based schemes.
• Technically based graduates
can be hard to come by and
the market can be very
competitive. Taking
engineering as an example,
there are not enough
engineering graduates to
sustain demand and this is
pushing up the average cost
of recruiting engineering
graduates.
PAGE 4

THE PROJECT SCHEME
PROS AND CONS
The project based graduate scheme
is a happy mix of the rotational and
technical graduate schemes. In this
set up, the graduate is often
brought into a particular function,
such as ‘marketing’ but is given a
range of projects within that
discipline that sees them operating
across teams, operational areas and
often locations.
Typically, what emerges from these
schemes are ‘Consultants’ who
work at a shared service level to
help develop a particular area of
the business.
Sales based graduate programmes
could fall into this bracket – they are
learning skills in one function
(namely sales) but develop their
knowledge across a range of
products and services.
PROS:
• This is a happy medium in
that you develop a technical
graduate in their field (be it
Sales, Marketing, Consultancy,
HR etc), but they get a wider
exposure across the business.
• The graduate develops skills
that can be used in various
settings, across the business.
• The training programme can
be very well structured, as
with the technically based
scheme, as they are
develop ing skills in a
particular function, such as
Marketing.
CONS:
• This type of programme works
best for disciplines such as
HR, Sales or Marketing. It can
be hard to recruit people for a
role like this without
recruiting based on degree
discpline.
• There can be negative
perception of graduates in
consultancy based roles. It’s
really important to equip
them with the right
knowledge, skills and
experience to give them the
best chance of success.
PAGE 5

2
TWO
WHAT QUESTIONS DO
YOU NEED TO ANSWER WHEN
SETTING UP A GRADUATE SCHEME?
When setting up, or reviewing a graduate scheme, there is a list of
questions you can answer to help cover all bases, and build “buy in” across
the business.
PAGE 6

DEFINING THE GRADUATE SCHEME
WHAT IS THIS SCHEME ABOUT, AND WHAT IS IT HERE TO ACHIEVE?
1. What are the overall aims of the scheme? What does the long term
talent plan look like for your graduates?
2. How many will you be recruiting and into which teams?
3. What kinds of roles do you have / what will the graduates be
expected to deliver?
4. How long will the graduate scheme last and what is the structure of
the scheme e.g. will there be rotations?
5. What support and training might be offered to your graduates and
who will deliver it?
6. Who are your competitors in terms of attracting top talent? What do
you need to offer to stand out?
7. How do you want to portray your brand to the graduates?
8. How will you log applicants / store CVs? Will you use an in house
system or would you consider a new bespoke system?
9. Will you be setting up a graduate portal on your web site? If so, who
will own this?
10. How will you measure the success of your graduates scheme?
11. What timescales are you working towards?
PAGE 7

LAUNCHING THE GRADUATE SCHEME
WHAT MAKES THIS SCHEME DIFFERENT, AND HOW WILL YOU
POSITION IT WITH POTENTIAL RECRUITS?
1. What are the main USPs / promotional points of your scheme – what
needs to feature on marketing material?
2. What marketing tools can you use e.g. social media, PR, recruitment
fairs, search engine optimisation, competitions, open days, adverts, job
boards? Who in your company could offer advice / expertise?
3. Which job boards might you use to promote your vacancies? Did you
know it’s free to add your vacancy to most university websites?
4. How else can you drive traffic to your job listings? Perhaps you could
write some useful blogs or tips to promote through social media or perhaps
you could interview existing graduates etc. to show off the scheme.
5. What speaking / networking events could you attend to meet graduates?
6. Are there any local sponsorship opportunities which will grant exposure
to graduate markets?
7. How will you measure the success of your promotional work?
PAGE 8

ASSESSING YOUR APPLICANTS
HOW WILL YOU BE ABLE TO SPOT YOUR ‘STARS’ ON THE DAY
AND WHO CAN HELP YOU?
1. How many CVs are you expecting? What are you looking for in the best of
the best?
2. Who can help you to filter / pre-screen candidates?
3. How many interviews will there be? Will there be other people involved?
Can you set the dates now?
4. Will there be an assessment centre? How will it work? Where will it be?
What will you need? How many graduates will you invite? Will there be
psychometric tests to complete before hand / on the day?
5. What questions will you ask in interview / how will you assess each exercise?
Can you mock up independent scoring sheets to help keep the
assessments objective and fair?
6. How will you make the job offer? Do you have contracts ready?
PAGE 9

MANAGING YOUR GRADUATE SCHEME
WHAT IS THIS SCHEME ABOUT, AND WHAT IS IT HERE TO ACHEIVE?
1. What is required in the onboarding process – will there be an induction
event? If so, what is the purpose, where will it be, who will run it?
2. Who will manage the graduates? Will they be mentored too? Do you
have a coaching programme?
3. How often will the graduates be ‘reviewed’ and what objective and
behaviour frameworks as well as review documents do you need?
4. Will there be awards / performance bonuses?
5. What happens if a graduate falls short of expectations?
PAGE 10

3
THREE
WHY DOES
GRADUATE RECRUITMENT
FAIL?
As a graduate recruitment and retention company, it’s our job to not only
source top talent, but to ensure the company retains that talent. What we
have learnt over the past four years is that there is not one formula for
success. That said, there does seem to be a finite number of top mistakes
companies make over and over when recruiting graduates for formal
graduate schemes and we have outlined them as a ‘list to avoid’.
PAGE 11

WHY DOES GRADUATE RECRUITMENT
FAIL?
DRAWING OUT THE PROCESS
Perhaps the biggest mistake we
see is companies drawing out the
graduate recruitment process.
When graduates start looking for
jobs, they often apply to a range of
companies across sectors.
They can quickly become disheartened
with setbacks and so when
one company offers them a shot,
even if it’s not their first choice,
many are inclined to take the role
to ensure employment.
It is very rare for a graduate to turn
down an opportunity in the hope
that another will come through.
If you have a plan to recruit graduates,
it’s important that you set out
the stage dates in advance, from
announcing the scheme all the way
through to offer letters.
The shorter you can make the timeframe
in between each stage, the
better!
Plus, by being clear with graduates
on what they can expect and when
you build the emotional contract
and help to ensure they can attend
all stages by booking them out in
their diaries!
PAGE 12

DRAWING OUT THE PROCESS
COUNTING ON SINGLE
CANDIDATES
Once upon a time, you could list
your graduate vacancy on popular
graduate job boards and receive
enough of the ‘right kind’ of
application – people fit for the role –
to fill your graduate scheme.
Lately, the quality seems to have
diminished somewhat and our
clients have been reporting that
the response to job adverts alone is
not enough to secure the top talent
needed for future talent pipelines.
We have therefore introduced a
range of other measures such as
head hunting, social media
recruitment and building university
partnerships to proactively find
that top graduate talent.
It seems putting job adverts out
and hoping for the best won’t cut it
anymore – the graduate job market
is just too competitive. If you’re
recruiting graduates in house , we
really recommend trying to
develop upwards of 5 ways to
connect with and source your
graduates. The results will speak for
themselves.
One of the toughest elements of
graduate recruiting is that moment
when you offer the job to the star
candidates and a few of them turn
down the role! The impact is hard
hitting because you often pin your
hopes on the stars and start to rule
out the other candidates you met
and even, start to feel disgruntled
about the whole process meaning
it can stall recruitment drives for
months on end.
We recommend a daily dose of
pessimism when recruiting graduates
– not all of the candidates
coming into the process will be
available at the end.
Some will take other jobs, some
will find its not the scheme for
them and others will hesitate at
the offer stage. It’s important to
cover all angles and ensure your
recruitment process is flexible,
open and realistic – be ready for
everything.
PAGE 13

FORGETTING IT’S ABOUT
ENGAGEMENT
Bringing graduates into the
business is a two way process, in
fact, you could even say it’s a three
way process because the scheme
not only has to be right for the
graduates, but the wider company
has to accept and embrace the
talent development programme
too; it’s not all about the discretion
of the HR or talent teams and this
can make it very challenging to get
new schemes off the ground.
There are two key elements here
that are key to remember.
The first is that the wider business
is a key stakeholder in the process.
Not only could they be your biggest
advocate for the scheme, passing
the news on to family and friends,
but they could also be critical to its
success when graduates join the
business formally. Creating an
internal communication plan is
important.
The second thing to remember is
that the graduates have to ‘choose’
you too. The entire process is not
just about satisfying your needs as
employers, but it’s about selling
your company, brand and
prospects over competitor
employers.
PAGE 14
The more you can ‘engage’ the
graduates, the more likely it is you
will get more of the right candidates
to that ‘yes’ stage.
PROVIDING NO ‘FORUM’
Building an effective graduate
scheme gets easier over time. It’s
all about building relationships
with the graduates and building
credibility in the graduate recruitment
market.
One way to do this is by providing
subtle ways to connect with future
talent, not necessarily for immediate
placements. For example, you
could set up a Twitter handle or
Facebook group whereby graduates
can engage with you in the
early days, ready to apply on graduation
or following their first year in
industry.
It’s important too, to capture graduates
who might not have been
successful in their first attempt –
they could grow into the role and
more than that, they are in the
‘market’ as it were and they could
well mention the scheme to your
next star!

4
FOUR
HOW TO SET UP A
‘DIGITAL’ GRADUATE RECRUITMENT
PROCESS
Recruiting digitally is becoming
common practice for employers,
large and small.
For the larger employers, having an
active, social brand is part of their
attraction process and for smaller
employers it plays a much bigger
role in the wider recruitment
strategy.
But no matter your size the same is
true: digital recruitment extends
your
reach and maximises your
advertising spend…when you get it
right!
We use digital media heavily at
Gradvert and in fact it is one of the
ways in which we have reached
page 1 on Google for ‘graduate
recruitment’.
So, how do you build a digital
recruitment strategy? Here are the
7 essential steps:
PAGE 15

DEFINE YOUR PROPOSITION TO
ATTRACT THE BEST
Graduates are picky. Whilst a lot of
people will settle for a close match
job, the best want that dream job:
they want to work for the company
that is well known and in demand,
a company that matches their own
values and aspirations.
It is therefore important to ensure
your proposition is competetive.
Take some time to think about your
vacancies or your scheme. What
makes it attractive? Why would a
graduate choose you? What are the
longer term opportunities?
All of this needs to go into your web
site, either your graduate specific
web site or the section on your site
dedicated to graduates. It’s not
enough to have one page
dedicated to graduate jobs.
The best employers have career
portals filled with things like:
• graduate case studies
• career plans / roadmaps
• interview and assessment
center advice
• details about the scheme and
even specific rotations
• The interview process details
and key dates
You can see a good example for an
SME at BedeGaming.com and for a
larger organisation, see BT Graduates
or Virgin graduates. Whilst the
Virgin scheme is closed when
they’re not recruiting, the company
still has a way for graduates to register
interest which is important.
Remember, we live in an age where
140 characters can get more attention
than the best written white
paper so try to be clear and concise
wherever possible.
PAGE 16

PICK YOUR PLATFORMS TO MAXIMISE
YOUR EFFORTS
We once heard it said that it’s
better to pick 1 or 2 platforms and
manage them very well than it is to
manage 5 or 6 poorly. In our
experience, LinkedIn, Twitter and
Facebook tend to work the best but
they all have their pros and cons.
When setting up your platforms,
remember that your brand is what
gives you the ultimate credibility so
use the same banners, icons and
style across the platforms and
continue this theme into your web
site. This will help graduates to
recognise you in different places.
Don’t forget, too, that one of the
most important parts of your digital
recruitment strategy is how you
measure it!
Here are a few ways in which you
can do this:
1. Create unique pages in your web
site for the same job. Then use different
links on different platforms
or mailing lists. That way you can
see which platform / approach
drives the most hits to your site.
2. Ensure you have analytics or
some sort of traffic measurement
tool set up on your web site. This
allows you to track hits to certain
pages and gives you a way to see
what graduates click on when in
your site.
3. Use social media buttons such as
‘Tweet’ and ‘Share’ so you can track
how many times a particular post
or page is shared via social media.
PAGE 17

THEME YOUR MONTHS AND WRITE
CONTENT TO GRAB ATTENTION
Once you have your pages set up
and your social media platforms
ready to go, you need to drive traffic
to those pages. It is easy to do it just
takes time and effort.
The best way to do this is to think
about what graduates want to read,
consume and share. It’s funny to
think that your actual job posts
might be ignored in favour of a
topical blog or a big hitting story
but this is the nature of social
media – it’s social.
Remember, more people are likely
to read and share interesting,
topical things so try to include real
life stories and news linked to
popular media stories.
An example of this would be
writing a blog about ‘How the new
Doctor Who got his job and what
you can learn’ or ‘5 ways to get a job
from your kitchen table’.
Sometimes a simple twist on a title
can help to drive interest.
The best way to manage your content
plan is to theme your months.
So, if you know you have 6 months
until your scheme starts, pick a
theme a month (such as CVs, then
interview prep, then assessment
centre prep, then how to handle
the first month etc.) and try to write
4-6 blogs, articles or top tips per
month. With digital media content
consistency is so important and this
kind of activity will actually help to
drive you higher up in Google.
Remember to use your analytics to
see what material is getting the
most hits. These days, the best content
is mixed. Different people
respond to different things and it’s
likely that a funny graphic or a picture
will get more attention than a
wordy document.
See if your design team can come
up with a number of graphics and
images for you. Even things such as
inspiring quotes will help with your
content mix.
PAGE 18

BUILD YOUR PRESENCE - POST AND
ENGAGE DAILY
POST, POST, POST
ENGAGE, ENGAGE, ENGAGE
We’ve mentioned the word
‘consistency’ above and this is so
important in digital recruitment.
Social media is like a cup of tea –
the long you leave it the colder it
will get. Therefore, make sure you
post daily at least on LinkedIn and
Facebook and if you can manage it,
3-5 times on Twitter to make sure
you remain a constant presence
and build your online brand.
We’ve mentioned two key words in
this section so far – content and
consistency. The last in the trio is
‘connections’. Posting out content
will get you so far, engaging directly
with people will get you even
further. Try commenting on
LinkedIn and Twitter statuses and
Re-Tweeting or sharing graduate
content. This will build your profile
in that space and encourage other
people to do the same for you!
PAGE 19

5
FIVE
TRENDS IN
GRADUATE RECRUITMENT
Of course, things are moving all the time and it’s important to keep up
with recent trends. In this section, we outline 5 key trends we have spotted
lately.
PAGE 20

5 TRENDS IN GRADUATE
RECRUITMENT
DEVELOPING RAW TALENT
A growing number of companies
are recruiting based on raw
potential rather than on skills and
are then developing this potential
themselves through training and
development programmes.
Given Gen Y’s apparent hunger to
acquire new skills, this focus on
training, is likely to exert a positive
impact on a company’s ability to
attract, motivate and retain graduates.
Developing this pipeline of
talent is increasingly important as
competition for new talent continues
into 2017.
THINK GLOBAL, ACT LOCAL
In response to the global talent
shortage, employers are looking at
a much wider talent pool as the
world is now deemed a much
smaller place due to the improvements
in technology and social
mobility.
for what is needed now locally. This
is going to be a huge challenge as
graduate vacancies are set to rise in
2015 to pre-recession levels, rising
by 8.9% from 2014(High Fliers Research).
As competition increases and the
‘war for talent’ intensifies, it is
important employers start to plan
for and develop strategies to
attract and recruit from further
afield while maintaining a focus
on the needs of the local business
function.
Building a network of potential
candidates from international students
studying in the UK to those
who are relocating from overseas.
The time is now to ensure you are
the first in attracting a more diverse
talent pool of students and graduates.
There is a big difference between
recruiting for what is needed for
future leadership roles globally and
recruiting
PAGE 21

SOCIAL MEDIA WILL BECOME
CRITICAL TO THE HIRING
PROCESS
2017 will also see social media play
a bigger role in the hiring process
than it has in the past. Lots of
employers are already warming up
to the benefits it offers – the ability
to carry out pre-employment
checks on social media profiles for
example.
Importantly, networks like Twitter
and LinkedIn are widely recognised
as useful places to find students
and graduates who are looking for
work. As the jobs market improves,
there’ll be more candidates using
these channels to research
potential employers and to apply
for graduate jobs and schemes.
Ensuring you are in this digital
space and building your profile as a
graduate employer is essential.
WE ANTICIPATE MOBILE
CONTINUING TO BE A STRONG
THEME FOR THE FUTURE
Whilst 88% of UK candidates
searched for jobs via mobile in
2013, jobseeker mobile activity has
already doubled in 2014, according
to Eploy.
we’ve seen a massive 190% increase
in applications made from a mobile
device, and a 196% increase in
mobile logins on our clients’
candidate portals. We’re only half
way through 2014 and yet the
number of mobile logins and
applications is almost equal to the
whole of 2013.”
- Chris Bogh, Technical Director at
Eploy.
Innovation in mobile ready career
sites is set to rocket in 2015. It is
critical in attracting new talent,
mobile everything is sparking
interest in large well established
organisations to support their
recruitment strategy as well as
bolstering opportunities for SMEs
to attract more candidates. Mobile
isn't going away and it is only going
to get easier and more available to
more people.
Making it part of the graduate
recruitment strategy is imperative if
employers are to take advantage of
every possible recruiting
technology available.
Is your careers website mobile
optimised?
“By comparing our clients’ average
monthly figures from 2013 and
2014,
PAGE 22

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