Company profile

Headquartered in Raleigh, NC, WakeMed Health & Hospitals is one of the first hospital systems to open its doors in the country. Named one of the top 50 hospitals in the nation by Leapfrog Hospital Quality & Safety Survey, the 800-plus bed health system provides a network of health care facilities throughout North Carolina. With over 7,000 nurses, technologists and medical support staff, 1,000 affiliate physicians and 1500 volunteers, WakeMed provides its patients with the best technology, facilities and most advanced healthcare in North Carolina.

Business challenge

For many years, the health organization utilized an outside provider to manage their recruitment process. The vendor was unexpectedly acquired, providing WakeMed an opportunity to review their strategic talent goals and explore new innovative approaches to meet their future talent management needs.

WakeMed Human Resources knew that having a sophisticated recruitment management strategy to drive their strategic hiring goals was crucial. Like most health organizations, they continuously strive to improve efficiency. The recruiters at WakeMed needed a flexible and robust solution to manage multiple unique workflows. Additionally, the health provider wanted to enable effective communication with their candidates and upgrade the candidate experience without placing more work onto the recruiter.

PeopleFluent solution

PeopleFluent Talent Engagement Cloud provided WakeMed with a comprehensive solution that provided automation to their recruiting and onboarding processes. These solutions provided the efficiency and consistency the company was seeking along with enhanced communication and engagement levels for all stakeholders.

Recruiting

As WakeMed began evaluating other talent acquisition systems, PeopleFluent Recruitment Management System (RMS) became the leader early on and ultimately won the contract. Because RMS is tied to powerful reporting and analytic tools, WakeMed could achieve enhanced visibility into their recruitment practices, impacting their ability to better manage current and future talent acquisition challenges.

The custom configurability of RMS was a key feature for WakeMed; recruiters could create unique workflows for college recruiting and paid scholars programs where the application steps can be uniquely streamlined. Anna Baird-Hensley, Director of Employment for WakeMed states:

The ability to attract high-quality health professionals was a fundamental initiative WakeMed wanted to tackle. At any given moment, WakeMed recruiters could be managing up to 600 candidates for a single open position and between 200 and 340 open vacancies. In addition, attracting high-quality nurses and other hard-to-fill specialties was a top priority. With RMS, WakeMed can manage the high quantity of resumes while keeping sight of the best talent available.

In addition to full-time and part-time staff, WakeMed brings onboard approximately 1,000 volunteers each year. WakeMed relies heavily on their volunteer base, which contributes over $1.5 million in labor savings. They needed a process-driven plan to recruit, train and then route their volunteers into the workforce. Using RMS, volunteers can apply online with the same technology candidates use when applying for open positions. “That’s the beauty of RMS; it provides our volunteers, some of which are retired CEOs, with a positive online experience,” added Anna.

Besides streamlining the recruiting process for their new hires and volunteers, the solution also bridged the communication gap between the recruiter and hiring manager. By increasing their level of collaboration, the expectations for each hire are fully met. RMS provides WakeMed with the proper workflows and processes to turn their strategy into reality, while saving users quality time that used to be spent on manual tasks.

The onboarding solution automates the necessary processes of forms and task management, and immediately immerses a new hire into WakeMed’s corporate culture. This solution bridges the gap between offer letter acceptance and the new hire’s first day of work, ensuring a smooth experience for both new employees and volunteers within the WakeMed Family. The online New-Hire-Portal, customized to represent the WakeMed brand, allows new hires to gain insight about WakeMed, enroll in company programs and learn other vital company information that will help socialize new employees from the start.

The results

WakeMed has surpassed their recruiting and onboarding goals since bringing in targeted solutions from PeopleFluent’s Talent Engagement Cloud. The business analytics and reporting tools built into the solutions have allowed WakeMed to strategically evaluate and manage their recruiting and onboarding initiatives more efficiently. Since partnering with PeopleFluent, WakeMed’s talent management achievements are impressive.

Accomplishments include:

• Reduced time-to-hire by 50% for key positions
• Reduced time-filled for all positions by 30%, from 61 days to 43 days
• Improved efficiency and socialization of Onboarding process
• Improved communication between recruiters and hiring managers
• Enhanced online experience for all stakeholders

“With the best quality nurses, doctors and volunteers, we are able to provide the finest care to our patients. PeopleFluent has provided a robust recruitment management and onboarding solution that helps us recruit and retain the very best talent for every position.” Anna Baird-Hensley, Director of Employment