Head-hunting on video
A job recruiter in White Plains has turned her idea for cutting time and adding convenience in the hiring process into an online video business about to launch this summer.
The business, Candid Capture, will offer a hosted website and application software for job interview videos to staffing agency recruiters and companies”™ hiring and human resources managers. Its founder, Allison Madison, called the service “a win-win” of time-and-money-saving convenience for both job candidates and the recruiters and companies interviewing them.
Madison, president of Reinhard-Madison Approach Staffing Inc. at 7-11 S. Broadway, went looking for such a video product for her own agency, which her mother, Marion Reinhard, started in 1988. Finding none, she decided to make it. The result, Candid Capture, took about 18 months to develop, she said.
“I essentially had the idea but I didn”™t know how to implement it” with technology, said Madison. Inspiration was wedded to technology when Andrea Bloome, who formerly ran her own website design and development company in Cortlandt Manor, DTG Productions, joined Candid Capture as chief technology officer. Madison also is working with Hudson Fusion L.L.C. in Ossining to market the service.
“As a recruiter, my goal is to get people to work,” said Madison, who joined her mother”™s agency in 1996. “As a recruiter, your job is to get people in those jobs as fast as possible.” But she found the hiring process, with its rounds of candidate interviews, was “interminably long.” Candidates typically are interviewed at least three times, she said.
“If a candidate is working” at another job, “it”™s difficult for them to take off from work three or four times to interview,” said Madison. Preliminary interviews, recorded on video by candidates at their home computers, eliminate those scheduling problems and can potentially reduce hiring time by one-third, she said.
For employers, drawn-out hirings can result in lower productivity while a job goes unfilled and can distract managers involved in the interviewing process from other duties. “That time to hire is a huge expense for companies,” Madison said. “There are so many aspects that can influence a company”™s bottom line. That time to hire is really critical for companies.”
Madison said video interviews could create a broader pool of candidates for companies, who often pay travel expenses only for prospects within a fixed distance from the company”™s office. It will allow applicants in foreign countries to be considered for jobs and enable corporate managers at national headquarters to screen local candidates for jobs in distant locations.
“This isn”™t meant to be the full vetting process” in hiring, Bloome said. “It”™s really a screening.”
Madison said subscribers to the service, which costs $110 monthly for each user, can provide candidates with questions prepared by Madison or customize the interview questions. Candidates have a specified time limit to give their answer on camera.
“We”™re trying to capture as much as possible the spontaneity” of a face-to-face job interview, Madison said. “The idea is to try to get the most genuine answer and try to capture the real person.” Still, “There”™s nothing to replace that face-to-face contact. Ultimately you would do that.”
Madison said the scripted questions for video interviews could give employers some legal protection against charges of discriminatory hiring practices. “You”™re making the screening process more consistent” with the same questions for every candidate, she said. “You”™re kind of comparing apples to apples.”
The controlled video setting also eliminates any foot-in-mouth flare-ups for interviewers and consequent legal risks. “You don”™t have the possibility of the just stupid question,” said Madison. “You eliminate those folly questions, at least early on in the process.”
With the technology available today,” I think it”™s a perfect storm for video” in business, said Bloome.
Though video has long been talked about in the recruiting industry, said Madison, “There”™s just a new kind of comfortability for this. It”™s common enough that people don”™t have the anxiety about it ”¦ People are just more adept at it.”
Her Candid Capture product can be viewed online at www.candidcapture.net.