The Power of Employee Referrals

The Power of Employee Referrals
Presented by Austin Cooke,
Vice President of Human Resources Vistaprint
Context: Who is Vistaprint?
•
We are transforming a market
> We make it easy for micro businesses to
create professional marketing materials
(previously only available/affordable to large
companies)
•
We are growing rapidly
> We have grown from 1 to 2,800 employees
> We serve over 11 million customers per year
> We have grown annual revenue to $817M
•
We are global
> 14 offices in 12 countries
> 24 localized websites
> Serving customers in 130 countries
Context: 24 Localized Websites
North America
• Canada
• United States
Europe
• Austria
• Belgium
• Czech
Republic
• Denmark
• Finland
• France
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Germany •
Ireland
•
Italy
•
Netherlands •
Norway
Poland
Portugal
Spain
Sweden
Switzerland
United
Kingdom
Asia Pacific
• Australia
• Japan
• New Zealand
• Singapore
• South Korea
Context: Our Products
Customers can create over 40 different custom products using thousands of matching
design templates
•
Business identity product examples
>
•
Promotional product examples
>
•
Banners, lawn signs, posters
Digital marketing services examples
>
•
Apparel (printed and embroidered), pens, mugs
Signage product examples
>
•
Business cards, direct mail postcards, letterhead
Websites, email marketing, blogs
Consumer product examples
>
Holiday cards, calendars, wedding invitations
Context: Disruptive Business Model
•
Focus on customized products
and services required in very low
volumes
•
Harness Internet to centrally
aggregate to previously
inconceivable production
volumes
•
Low Volume
Markets
Unit
Cost
High Volume
Markets
Apply broadly:
>
>
>
>
>
Print
Apparel, signage, gift items
Websites and email marketing
Graphic design services
Mailing services
Vistaprint
Volume
Context: Hyper Growth Company
$817
$670
$516
CASE
$401
$256
$152
$91
$35
FY2003
$59
FY2004
FY2005
FY2006
FY2007
FY2008
FY2009
Millions, fiscal year ending June 30
FY2010
FY2011
July 2006: Our Challenge
•
Hire the right people with the right skills to fuel the
“hyper growth” engine of Vistaprint
•
Keep the bar “ridiculously” high and don’t lower it!
•
Hire world-class engineers, analysts, and direct
marketers globally
•
Recruit talent from top companies (Amazon,
Microsoft, Capital One, etc.)
Our Challenge – continued
•
Hire from the best schools (Harvard, Princeton, MIT,
CMU, etc.)
•
At the time the team consisted of 1 full time recruiter
and 4 contractors
•
Approximately 85% of all hires were from job boards
and agencies
Our Idea
What if everyone in the company referred one person a year?
•
Recruiting Team would grow from 5 to 740 recruiters overnight!
•
Create a culture that encourages everyone to be responsible for
recruiting (not just HR)
•
Double the company’s headcount every year
•
Empower our employees to be our cultural gatekeepers
•
Challenge our employees to find people they really want
to work with
Our Perspective
•1 Get our leadership involved in the program
•2 Build trust back with our employees
•3 Brand the program
•4 Market the program internally as well as externally
•5 Create a easy and clear referral submission process
Our Perspective - continued
•6 Publically recognize people who participate
•7 Track and publish referral metrics internally
•8 Create relevant and easy to understand incentives
•9 Engage our employee’s “significant others” in the
program
•
Communicate and educate our people
Our Program
•
Everyone Here is a Recruiter
Our Roadmap
•1 Leadership support
> Letter from the CEO announcing the importance of the program
> Presentations at every quarterly all-staff meeting
> Managers encouraged and supported the program at team
meetings
> Announcements at the “holiday party”
Our Roadmap
•2 We developed trust with our people
> Follow up with every referral!
> Employees well informed on their referral status
> Open and constructive feedback to all referrals
> Dedicated “significant” time to recruiting internally
> 3 day rule within our team
Our Roadmap
•3 We branded the program
> ERP meant different things to different groups within our company
> Easy to remember
> Easy to refer to
> We created a buzz with the name
Our Roadmap
•4 We marketed the program internally
sent weekly emails
hosted a company party
placed posters
around the office
desk drops for the launch
sent postcards to
employees’ homes
Our Roadmap
•5 We made the process clear & easy
>
>
>
>
>
>
Clearly communicated all open positions on a weekly basis
1 point of contact for all questions
— Hired a “marketer” who manages the program
Clear & easy directions on how to submit referrals
— Mailed to all new hires before they start
— Reviewed with all new employees at orientation
— Sent out weekly emails for each geography
Rules and submission instructions were kept on the company
intranet
Flat fee’s were organized by geography to make it easy and clear!
All marketing materials included internet address for the program
Our Roadmap
•6 We publicly recognized people who participated
> Each week we sent out an email with the names of people who
had made referrals that week
> We recognized new hires that were a result of a referral and
named the employee who made the referral
> All prizes were given away at high profile company events
> We promoted the program with a DVD that featured employees
who participated in the program
> We displayed running charts in public places that listed all of the
people eligible for the grand prize
Our Roadmap
•7 We tracked & published referral metrics
Hire Sourcing Mix– June ‘06 0 to date
Referral Program Starts (% of Total)
July 06 to date
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Q4 '06
Q4 '07
Q4 '08
Q4 '09
Q4 '10
Q1 '11
Referrals
Agencies
Networking
Job Boards
Our Roadmap
•8 We offered clear and creative incentives
> Monetary bonus
— Flat fee’s by geography (we experimented with a “hot jobs” list)
> Monthly raffle
—
—
—
—
iPod Nanos
$100 Visa gift cards
Tickets to sporting events
Show tickets (Theater)
> Team Prizes
> Recruiting team hosted, cooked and served breakfast
> Grand Prize
— Trip to Hawaii
— 54” Plasma TV with Bose Surround Sound
Program Killers
•
Referrals having a bad candidate experience
•
Recruiters not following-up with candidates or
employees
•
Employees are asked to push out jobs
•
Employees don’t know the right contacts for
specific jobs
Program Killers - continued
•
Employees don’t know how to submit a referral
•
Employees don’t know what positions are open
(or will be)
•
Employees don’t know what to do with a lead
•
The program is not constantly marketed internally
•
Consistently making employees seek out their
referral bonus
Our Results
We increased our referral rate from
15% in July ‘06 to 46% to date
We have hired thousands of people and
are fueling the engine!
Questions?
Austin Cooke
Vice President of Human Resources Vistaprint
[email protected]
(781) 652-6491