Predictive Hiring in manufacturing creates long term employees

With the renewed push to Make Australia Make Again, local manufacturers are in search of great employees looking to build a long-term career in the industry.

Globalisation has certainly seen the nature of Australian manufacturing change significantly over the years. Yet, while some manufacturing has left our shores, high-value manufacturing continues to thrive – employing around 900,000 people and contributing more than $350 billion to the economy.

That's set to get a major shot in the arm from the federal government, with plans to invest $22.7 billion over the next decade to build a 'Future Made in Australia'.

While that's great news for local manufacturers, they're still hampered by a skills shortage and high turnover rates. Private sector manufacturing and production firms faced 18% employee turnover at the end of 2023, according to the Australian HR Institute.

Of course, turnover is not just a challenge for hi-tech manufacturing, Australia also has a burgeoning food and beverage manufacturing sector. For example, international doughnut giant Krispy Kreme has substantial production facilities in Australia to meet demand from its retail stores and partners.

Look beyond resumes to find great employees

When Krispy Kreme set up operations in Western Australia, they knew they would be swamped with job applications. As a long-time customer of Expr3ss!, they turned to us to help manage the interview process. Beyond this, we also helped them define what to look for in great production, processing and retail workers who are keen to become long-term employees.

Our customers primarily use Expr3ss! predictive hiring to look beyond resumes in their search for great employees.

Related article: You think you know me from my resume, but you don't

Using short surveys, Expr3ss! lets employers quickly and cost-effectively pinpoint job applicants with the right skills, attitudes, temperament and cultural fit. The surveys typically take around six minutes, while ensuring that the best applicants make it through to the interview stage. 

Krispy Kreme also used Expr3ss! to look at its existing workforce, to help it determine the common characteristics of great long-term employees who work well in a team environment. Hiring people who are a great fit for your team and are keen to stick around really helps reduce employee turnover and minimise business disruption.

Find your superstar employees

The business conducted what we call a cultural survey, looking to its superstars across every area of operations. From this cultural survey, Expr3ss! created customised benchmarks for Krispy Kreme's production, processing and customer-facing roles.

As soon as applications for these three roles in Western Australia went live, Krispy Kreme was swamped with 1800 applicants for around 140 jobs – all to be handled by a single recruiter.

What seemed like an impossible task became much easier with a simple button click, as Expr3ss! predictive hiring highlighted the 300 applicants who should be interviewed first because they had the right skills, attitudes and characteristics for the job.

When it comes to CV and cover letters, people try to tell you who they are, or at least who they want you to think they are. Meanwhile, Expr3ss! surveys let them actually show you who they really are.

Removing unconscious bias

Rather than scanning resumes, it's as if Expr3ss! conducted a virtual group interview stage with all 1800 applicants, to help Krispy Kreme identify the 300 applicants who seemed like the best fit. Every applicant was considered on their merits, without the bias around age, gender and race that can sneak in when people quickly skim resumes to decide who makes the cut.

Rather than relying on generic benchmarks, applicants were assessed against Krispy Kreme's own unique Expr3ss! benchmarks for what makes a great long-term employee in different parts of their business.

Related article: Trying to avoid conscious and unconscious bias? Technology can help

To make the actual interview stage easier, Expr3ss! created an online interview calendar which allowed those 300 applicants to book in for a group interview time. From these group interviews, the recruiter appointed 142 applicants, whittled down from 1800 people in only 15 days.

That's an amazing outcome, especially when Krispy Kreme could be assured that it had taken advantage of technology while ensuring that it took bias out of the equation.

Would you like AI with that?

Sometimes AI recruitment tools are trained on previous hiring decisions, which actually reinforces existing biases rather than ensuring the best candidates shine through.

For example, Amazon was forced to abandon its experimental AI recruiting tool after discovering it discriminated against women.

The problem was that the AI was trained by looking for patterns in the resumes of Amazon's successful applicants over a 10-year period. Of course, this only entrenched the existing male dominance across the tech industry: because men usually got the job in the past, AI decided that men must usually be the best candidate for the job.

At least Amazon recognised what was happening and put a stop to it. Some organisations wouldn't even see the problem, because the AI's bias would align with their own.

Not so with Krispy Kreme, which took advantage of Expr3ss! predictive hiring to ensure that every applicant was considered on their merits. It quickly found the right people for the job, knowing they had not just the right skills but also the right attitudes and temperament to become a great long-term employee.