Navigating the recruitment landscape can often feel like embarking on a complex journey, with each step presenting its own unique challenges and opportunities.
As recruiters, it's essential to understand the intricacies of this process, especially in today's competitive market where attracting top talent is crucial.
That's where the recruitment funnel comes into play. In this blog, we'll simplify this concept, breaking it down into actionable steps that recruiters can easily follow.
From attracting and engaging candidates to selecting and retaining the best fit for your organization, we'll provide practical insights and strategies to streamline your recruitment efforts.
Exploring the art and science of talent acquisition, we'll decode the recruitment funnel to help you build a high-performing team with ease. Whether you're a seasoned recruiter or new to the field, this guide will empower you to navigate the recruitment process confidently and effectively.
What is a Recruitment Funnel?
A recruitment funnel, also known as a hiring funnel or talent acquisition funnel, is a visual representation or conceptual model used by HR professionals and recruiters to illustrate the stages that candidates go through during the recruitment process. It typically consists of several sequential stages that candidates move through as they progress from being potential applicants to being hired.
The objective of the recruitment funnel is to get as many potential candidates at the beginning of the process as possible and filter those candidates who fit into the job or company until they have found the most suitable candidate.
The stages of a typical recruitment funnel may include:
- Awareness: Candidates become aware of the job opportunity.
- Interest: Candidates research the company and the role.
- Application: Candidates submit their resumes and applications.
- Screening: Recruiters evaluates candidate's skills for the role.
- Interview: Candidates participate in interviews with the hiring team.
- Evaluation: Recruiters assess candidates' fit for the role.
- Offer: The selected candidate is extended a job offer.
- Onboarding: The new hire integrates into the organization.
Top Recruitment Funnel Metrics to Evaluate and Improve the Hiring Process
A human resources professional's work will increasingly center on monitoring recruiting metrics and enhancing them by adjusting different funnel stages as the hiring process grows progressively automated.
Some recruitment funnel metrics show how you could refine different parts of the recruitment funnel with the required changes. The metrics used are:
1. Source of Hire
The source-of-hire metric assists you in identifying the platforms such as LinkedIn, or any job sites, that offer you the most number of qualified candidates.
According to Entelo Recruiting Trend's report,
On average, talent acquisition professionals spend nearly 1/3 of their workweek (about 13 hours) sourcing candidates for a single role.
Why should one track the source of hire?
Monitoring the source of hire is crucial as it enhances your methods for attracting talented personnel. For example, if the CPC that you are receiving for a particular job opening on the website is low, you can up your game in marketing or promoting the opening, accordingly.
Firms can use the data from this recruitment funnel study to guide decisions like increasing their social media presence, purchasing a premium job board ad, or changing recruiting firms.
How to track the source of hire?
There are 2 ways how the source of hire can be tracked; tracked links and candidate surveys.
- Tracked links, allow you to analyze where a candidate clicked through to your job application.
- Candidates surveys ask the candidates, where they saw the job posting, through a survey towards the end of the recruitment funnel.
Where to use this metric?
The stages of awareness and attraction are when the source-to-hire measure can be applied. It adjusts the marketing efforts appropriately.
By adjusting your message for various audiences, you can increase the effectiveness of your channels. Avoid taking a one-size-fits-all strategy.
2. Quality of Hire
This metric for the recruitment funnel aids in evaluating the caliber of applicants who advance to the next round of the hiring process.
This is the most important aspect for hiring managers to track in the recruitment funnel, as the challenge is to not hire quickly but hire good quality talent.
According to LinkedIn Global Recruiting Trend's report,
39% talent leaders agree quality of hire is the most valuable metric for performance
Why should one measure the quality of hire?
Higher retention rates result from this since more quality hires are a better fit for the organization.
You can figure out whether you are regularly hiring high performers or whether your hiring process is just producing low- and average-quality candidates by monitoring top recruitment funnel metrics like these.
Where to use this metric?
This metric is applied at the awareness, attraction, assessment, and interview stages of the recruitment funnel.
There will be more talent if you increase awareness of the positions. Higher caliber applicants will come through the funnel if the talent pool is larger.
This statistic will help you draw in the correct pool of qualified applicants. The condition of drawing in the right crowd can be improved by offering attractive salaries, emphasizing the special advantages of the business, placing job advertisements where the target audiences are, and optimizing the job ads.
The quality of hire metric is utilized at the assessment stage since employers must evaluate candidates before placing them in actual jobs. Instead of combing through resumes, hiring managers utilize skills assessment platforms like WeCP to evaluate applicants for on-the jobs skills
Communication, confidence, professionalism, and other skills are typically not examined during an examination. To avoid mis-hires, recruiters conduct interviews with candidates to assess these competencies before hiring.
3. Time to Hire
Another statistic that offers consistency to your organization is time to fill. It calculates the duration required to locate, hire, and train a new employee. It may indicate that something is wrong with your recruitment funnel if it is taking a lengthy time to fill openings.
According to The Josh Bersin Company's report,
It takes an average of 44 days to recruit people, energy & defense has the longest time-to-hire rates at 67+ days
Why measure the time to hire?
Every organization must hire people at some point, therefore it's crucial to make sure the process is done well. You always have a lot of work on your plate, as HR professionals are aware, so you want to make sure you're maximizing your time.
It costs your company more money the longer you take to hire someone. Whether they ask for it or not, your company's management wants evidence that the time they spend on hiring is worthwhile.
Time to hire is one metric that you can use to show them the fruits of your labor; it's something they can easily comprehend and could even be familiar with.
How to measure the time to hire?
The time to hire is measured by counting the days between the application and the moment the successful candidate accepts the job. To give a clear picture of how to measure this metric, let’s start with an example:
XYZ Company’s hiring gets to know that there is an opening for a Web Developer. This day is considered as Day 1. They start doing the necessary to hire a candidate. A suitable candidate applies for the position on Day 15 and accepts the job offer on Day 49. Here, the time to hire is calculated as 49 – 15 =14 days.
You can calculate the average time to hire too. If the company had openings for 4 different job roles and the time to hire for each of them was 55, 24, 16, and 38 days, then the average time to hire would be (55 + 24 + 16 + 38) / 4 = 33.25 days.
Three elements must be kept in mind while measuring the time to hire. They are: measuring time per stage, differentiating between the different roles, and tracking the quality of the candidates.
Where to use this metric?
During the recruiting, evaluation, interview, and attraction phases, the time-to-hire measure is applied.
The job of posting a job ad and attracting people is done by the time-to-hire metric. Therefore, it saves the recruiter a great deal of time. It takes a long time to evaluate tests by hand. The time to hire is shortened with the aid of assessment tools because tests are assessed considerably more quickly.
Interviews can be organized using meeting scheduling software, and they can be automated with the candidate responding by phone or video to pre-recorded questions. Consequently, reducing a little more time. During the hiring process, save time by automating procedures and utilizing technology to obtain digital signatures.
4. Cost per Hire
Cost-per-hire is one of the most essential and widely used for recruitment and hiring metrics. Cost-per-hire is associated with hiring qualified individuals and applies to the whole cost of getting a new person into the organization, which includes the expenditure of the hiring procedure, equipment, transportation, administrative fees, and benefits.
These expenses comprise the price of sourcing and recruitment advertising, as well as onboarding and referral bonus programs.
According to the (SHRM) Society for Human Resource Management's report,
The average cost per hire is around $4,700.
However, some experts suggest that the cost of hiring may be as high as three to four times the salary of a position.
Why measure cost per hire?
The cost per hire defines the recruitment and HR budgets. Tracking your cost-per-hire data allows you to determine what financial resources you'll need to hire in the coming time.
It aids in projecting expenses for a given year while offering a clear indicator of recruitment's contribution to the company's bottom line. It has a significant beneficial effect on HR and recruiting expenditure because it reduces recruiting and onboarding costs.
Certain difficult-to-fill positions will require a higher cost per hire than others. However, you should ensure that you are receiving your money's worth. The cost-per-hire metric assesses recruiters' performance. The metric also indicates how your recruiters manage their resources.
How to measure the cost per hire?
The cost per hire is computed by dividing the internal and external recruitment expenditures by the total number of hires in a given time. It also needs the period to be computed.
The first thing you need to do is identify your expense report for a specific period. Then, record all internal recruiting costs in a single column on a spreadsheet. Third, record all external recruiting costs in a single column. Finally, enter the formula: (internal + external costs) / number of hires.
For example, if XYZ company's internal cost was $5500, the external cost was $4560, and there were 8 recruits in December, the cost per hire would be ($5500 + $4560) / 8 = $1257.50.
Where to use this metric?
This metric is used at practically every stage of the recruitment funnel. It evaluates the cost of job ad postings. It determines whether an ad is posted in too many places or on expensive platforms.
Manual evaluation, such as résumé reading or talent testing, is exceedingly time-consuming, inefficient, and pricey. Minimise costs by implementing a completely automated solution at this stage.
To save money on having your panel members present, keep interviews to an hour or less. Online interviews can help to decrease office space expenditures.
Costs can be lowered by switching to a remote recruiting model, which eliminates the necessity for relocation, office space, and office maintenance services.
5. Offer Acceptance
The offer acceptance rate (OAR) is a recruiting metric that determines how often prospects who get a job offer from an organization accept it. The value is expressed as a percentage. If your OAR begins to decline, your team will be unable to hire the people they like. A low OAR may prompt you to reconsider your job's salary ranges or attempt other methods of connecting with prospects.
According to the Saratoga Workforce Index's report,
The national average Offer Acceptance Rate in 2022 was 84%.
Why measure the offer acceptance?
An organisation that can provide competitive pay, benefits, and other incentives that draw in top talent will have a high offer acceptance rate, which is a sign that you are effective in pulling in and employing the best individuals.
A low acceptance rate of offers might lead to a waste of time, energy, and money on hiring. It might be necessary for you to re-post job advertisements, hold new interviews, and begin the hiring process from scratch, all of which can be expensive and time-consuming.
Positivity in the employer brand is influenced by a high offer acceptance rate. Good recruiting experiences increase the likelihood that candidates will tell their network about the organization, which can help draw in more qualified applicants down the road.
Long-term retention for candidates is higher in cases where they accept employment offers. You can lower attrition and raise retention rates by making sure the people you hire are a good fit for both the position and the company culture.
How to measure offer acceptance?
The number of employment offers that are accepted is divided by the total number of offers, and the result is multiplied by 100. The equation is:
Offer acceptance rate = (number of accepted offers/number of job offers made) X 100
For example, if XYZ Company offered 458 job offers and 365 of them accepted it, the offer acceptance rate will be:
(365/458) * 100 = 79.694%
6. Candidate Experience
The candidate experience is a reflection of how a person feels about applying for a job at a company. This covers the beginning of their job search and application procedure in addition to the screening procedures, interviews, and onboarding procedures used by your company.
Whether they are positive or negative, these "feelings" of a candidate affect whether they decide to apply to your business or accept your job offer.
Candidates will lose respect for you as an employer and a brand if they have a negative experience with you, but a pleasant candidate experience can help you turn your top prospects into employees. Candidate experience, in general, has the power to elevate or diminish an applicant's perception of the hiring organisation.
According to Deloitte's report,
More than 80% of talent say a positive or negative candidate experience can change their minds about a role or company
Why measure candidate experience?
Your business will stand out from competitors who don't follow up or provide the same level of service if you provide candidates with an excellent candidate experience. If they had a good experience, even if they don't get the job, they might apply again later when they have more experience or tell their friends about your business.
Individuals desire employment with morally-responsible organizations that value the time and expertise of their staff. A candidate's time and effort are respected by your organization when it is evident in the efficient, well-planned candidate experience and the personal, open conversations that occur throughout the process.
Before the candidate's first day, this strategy can assist in helping them feel in line with the objectives and principles of the organization.
More contented workers, increased engagement, and longer retention rates can result from better candidate experiences. A favourable candidate experience sets the tone for the duration of their employment with your organisation, much like a great first date.
Hiring is costly, and the cost of hiring again after a poor hire is significantly higher. You may filter out unfit candidates with an organised candidate experience, automate procedures to speed up the hiring process, and establish workflows that enable you to fill positions fast without losing revenue or clients.
Applicants are impressed by the ease of a wonderful applicant's experience. You'll be able to hire more qualified applicants sooner than your competitors if you streamline the hiring and application processes.
How to measure candidate experience?
Surveys will become necessary to gauge the candidate experience. Hire a third-party research firm that can produce unbiased surveys and measurements if at all possible.
As an alternative, use an online survey tool to construct a candidate experience survey that you can then distribute to prospective employees and new recruits.
Include questions in the survey such as whether the job description clarified the role for them, what aspects of the interview process they found enjoyable or unappealing, how they felt about communicating with recruiters, whether they would apply for another position with the company in the future, and whether they would recommend friends to apply as well.
If there are many positive results or answers, it means that the hiring process was a great experience for the applicants. Likewise, if there are negative answers, you might want to improvise on that.
7. Recruiting Conversion Rate
The percentage of successful placements created out of all the jobs a particular recruiter works is known as the recruiting conversion rate.
Jobs worked to jobs filled make up the majority of recruiting conversion rates, which provide HR directors with information on how to find and address areas where their hiring procedures can be strengthened.
According to CareerPlug’s annual Recruiting Metrics Report,
In 2020, the average applicant-to-interview conversion rate stood at 15%. However, in 2021, this figure rose to 20%. Likewise, the interview-to-hire conversion rate experienced a slight increase from an average of 9% to 11%.
How to measure recruiting conversion rate?
Divide the total number of successful placements a recruiter has made by the total number of jobs they have worked to determine the percentage of successful placements the recruiter has made and the ensuing recruitment conversion rate.
Next, multiply that figure by 100 to determine your conversion rate. The formula appears as follows:
(Total successful job placements / total jobs worked) * 100.
So if your company has 850 total successful placements and has a total of 1590 jobs worked, the recruiting conversion rate will be: (850/1590)*100 = 53.459%
Why measure the recruiting conversion rate?
You can interact with prospects at each level of the hiring process to see how well-suited they are for the position. However, if a significant portion of candidates withdraw, this could point to more systemic problems with the hiring process.
If applicants are withdrawing after the first screening phase, it can mean that the job description is unclear or that the screening procedure is not optimal. Recruiters can solve the issues that are causing candidates to disqualify themselves or lose interest by identifying bottlenecks in the recruitment process.
This could entail making changes to the job description or screening requirements, expediting the interview process, or offering additional details about the position or organisation.
Recruiters can obtain valuable insights into the talent pool and their response to job postings and recruitment efforts by monitoring the conversion rate at every stage of the recruitment process. This can be used to focus recruitment efforts and interact with prospects more successfully.
Businesses can modify the compensation package, the channels through which they reach the audience, and other aspects of their recruitment strategies by having a deeper awareness of the talent pool, including demographics.
Recruiters can also learn more about the preferences and behaviour of the talent pool by monitoring the conversion rate, such as the qualities that most appeal to candidates for a position. In order to draw in and interact with candidates, this can be utilised to customise recruitment campaigns and create more potent communication plans.
Reducing hiring expenditures is another advantage of tracking recruiting conversion rate. You can really focus on that area by finding the recruitment tactics that yield the best outcomes. To ensure efficiency and reduce expenses, it is recommended to automate recruitment operations, create a hiring playbook, employ referral methods, and utilise social networks.
Assessing your recruiting pros' performance is another advantage of tracking your recruitment conversion rate. You can determine which recruitment experts are giving you the finest outcomes by knowing your recruiting conversion rate.
Using this data, a system that rewards and incentivizes recruitment experts to produce the greatest outcomes can be put in place. These insights guarantee that hiring managers carry out their duties efficiently and that the hiring process proceeds as smoothly as possible.
8. Diversity Hiring
Diversity hiring is the practice of selecting candidates on the basis of their qualifications while taking extra effort to ensure that recruiting practices have minimised prejudices based on an applicant's age, race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or other non-job-related personal traits.
The misconception that increasing workplace diversity is the purpose of diversity recruitment might lead to confusion regarding diversity hiring. Diversity hiring seeks to detect and minimise any biases that might be overlooked, turned off, or unintentionally discriminate against qualified, diverse applicants during the candidate sourcing, candidate screening, and shortlisting processes.
According to Glassdoor's Diversity & inclusion Workplace Survey,
76% of employees and jobseekers emphasize that diversity is a crucial factor when assessing companies and considering job offers.
Why measure the diversity hiring?
Identifying problems like discriminatory interviewing practices based on application volume or exclusionary job postings can be resolved with the use of hiring diversity measurement.
Employers who support diversity recruiting have access to a wider pool of talent than those who don't. Because more people from diverse backgrounds may relate to them, a larger pool of candidates will express interest in their openings.
Happy workers are those that feel valued and accepted for who they are, regardless of their gender, age, or ethnicity. Additionally, contented employees are more productive and less likely to quit early.
Amazing things happen when people from different backgrounds come together. Novel concepts and teamwork are stimulated by the amalgamation of diverse origins, modes of functioning, and experiences.
Similar to how selecting diverse candidates expands the talent pool, this seems like common sense. You will attract a wide range of clients, candidates, and possible collaborators if your brand is recognized for its diversity.
The variety of skills, abilities, and experiences in your staff rises.Therefore, recruiting a diverse workforce will enable you to comprehend the wants of your clients better. There is a greater likelihood that your staff will be able to meet the specific needs of each consumer the more diversified your workforce is.
How to measure diversity hiring?
Employers can track the percentage of workers from particular identity groups who enter your employment funnel and are recruited by using demographic surveys to measure hiring diversity. Following that, outcomes can be evaluated in relation to industry standards and internal diversity goals.
Afterwards, by comparing this data with other metrics from the recruitment funnel, particular insights regarding different stages can be obtained.
Stages of a Recruitment Funnel
The number of steps in the recruiting funnel can vary based on your company's hiring practices and the elaborate nature of your hiring procedure.
Here are some of the basic steps that are taken:
Awareness
The first step at the top of the funnel is increasing brand awareness for that business. Before organizations start searching for possible individuals, they must establish their brand. Employers should focus on employer branding during the awareness stage to attract as many qualified candidates as possible.
Getting prospective employees informed about the organization and the position it is hiring for is the main objective at this point. The company's social media accounts and job website are two crucial touchpoints during this stage. These serve as forums for companies to present their workplace culture, uphold their core values, and persuade prospective employees to join them. By increasing the awareness of your brand, prospective employees will be aware of your company right away and might be more inclined to work with you.
Attraction
The goal of the following stage of your hiring funnel is to draw candidates and job searchers to the particular vacant positions. The attraction phase is all about finding candidates. Potential employees are currently aware of your brand even if they haven't yet applied for a job with your organization.
Companies must use innovative job titles, well-written job descriptions, and targeted advertising to draw in prospective applicants. Composing job descriptions and recruitment advertisements, Some of the primary tasks of the stage include promoting job opportunities everywhere—such as on job boards, social media, and the company's employment page—and coming up with original strategies to draw applicants, like outreach campaigns.
Application
This phase outlines the performance of your team during the previous two phases. The application step needs to pay close attention to the candidate's experience to produce the maximum number of qualified applications.
Companies need to ensure the application procedure isn't lengthy or difficult. One of the most frequent issues and a significant obstacle to luring exceptional talent is an extensive application form or complex application procedure.
Applicants may become disinterested in the middle and decide not to apply at all. Provide an easy application procedure that requires the fewest clicks needed for applicants to submit their supporting documentation.
More and more job seekers are using mobile devices to apply for jobs. Verify that your online application or career page works well on tablets and smartphones. Another strategy for creating a great applicant experience is to communicate consistently.
Send out automated emails to candidates informing them that their applications have been received, expressing gratitude for their submission, and explaining the next steps.
Pre-Selection and Screening
The neck shrinking process continues at this stage. The shortlisting of candidates, the interview procedure, and candidate evaluation make up the selection stage.
While an applicant monitoring system can assist you in reducing the number of prospects, it might be preferable to interview each one personally, depending on the volume of applications. An ATS cannot establish links that humans can.
After your candidate pool is ready, it's time to evaluate and create a shortlist. This is how the screening procedure works. Eliminating candidates who might not be a good fit for the position is the goal here.
This will assist you in narrowing down your candidate pool to a manageable number so you can go on to interviews. To pick candidates for an interview, screening can be done in several ways, including quick phone or video calls, online skills assessments, personality tests, and reference checks.
Instead of trusting a recruiter with this task, some hiring managers would rather handle the screening themselves. This is effective when there aren't many applicants; but, it can become stressful when there are plenty of them for a single position. It is best to optimize the recruitment funnel for a quicker, more scalable screening procedure if the business must continuously screen candidates for technical skills.
Interview
Interviews are the next step in your funnel after you've screened your candidates and made a shortlist. Only the best applicants advance to this narrow neck of the funnel after screening. The most important part of the hiring process is the interview stage.
Several criteria will determine how many rounds of interviews—including aptitude testing, group discussions, and technical and HR rounds—you do with each candidate. A panel of individuals from various departments may participate in a single interview. It's also simple to use both in combination. There are two possible formats for the interview: in-person or video conference.
During the interview phase, a variety of interview questions are used to evaluate the candidate's technical, social, and verbal proficiency. Companies ought to establish fundamental policies for conducting interviews. By doing this, companies may thoroughly evaluate a candidate's technical and soft abilities while considering unconscious bias.
Hiring
The hiring phase completes the recruitment funnel. It's time to extend a job offer to your last applicant. You also bargain over terms of work contracts, including pay, perks, paid time off, etc.
All of the people on your hiring team who have participated in every round of the recruitment funnel should have contributed to this decision.
This phase may last longer or be more challenging than it seems because it might involve extra procedures like writing the onboarding procedure and running a background check.
Policies and training programs that can aid new hires in integrating with the organization should be part of the onboarding process.
Additionally, you should negotiate based on whether the candidate has accepted another job offer or has not signed the offer yet.
Retention
Retention is critical to keeping the finest employees and cutting down on the expense of new hires. Since hiring new employees can be costly, developing an employee retention plan is just as crucial as finding qualified candidates. Once a new hire is onboarded, they shouldn't be forgotten about.
Professionals usually leave their positions in search of more income or a chance for career advancement. Training and development are essential for improving retention. Employees have greater options to upskill for promotions and career growth as well as reskill for internal work responsibilities changes.
How Do You Create an Effective Recruitment Funnel?
Let us now look at how to create an effective funnel for your company, since we have seen the different stages of the recruitment funnel.
Focus on the Employer Brand and Build it Stronger
Craft an employer brand representing your company's values, mission, and culture. Highlight its unique selling features that make working at your company appealing. Make use of interesting content, films, and staff endorsements on your website and social media pages.
Define Your Goals and Objectives
Briefly state your objectives and aims for recruiting. Recognize the precise abilities, credentials, and qualities you seek in applicants. Coordinate your hiring process with the overarching company objectives and expansion plan.
Create Targeted Job Descriptions
Write job descriptions that highlight your company's culture and values in addition to the duties and requirements. Explain in a way that appeals to your intended audience and be open and honest about the prospects and requirements of the position.
Optimize Your Online Presence
Always make sure that the job postings, social media accounts, and website of your business are search engine optimized. To improve visibility on job boards and search engines, use suitable keywords. Engage with prospective candidates on social media and provide them with information about your workplace.
Implement a User-Friendly Application Process
Make the application process more efficient and user-friendly by simplifying it. A lengthy or complicated application form may turn off prospective applicants. To reach a wider audience, make your career page mobile-friendly.
Leverage Recruitment Technology
Utilize technological solutions to manage candidate data, facilitate repetitive duties, and improve the effectiveness of your hiring process. A few of these solutions include applicant tracking systems (ATS) and AI-powered tools. Benefit from data analytics to learn more about the effectiveness of your funnel and pinpoint areas that need work.
Engage Candidates Through Multiple Channels
Expand your hiring channels to reach a bigger group of candidates. To draw candidates, make use of job fairs, industry events, social media, and employee recommendations. Use webinars and targeted email campaigns to enlighten and engage prospective applicants.
Personalize Candidate Communication
Throughout the hiring process, provide candidates individualized attention in your interactions. Adapt emails and messages to the individual's experience, qualifications, and interests. Answer questions right away and tell applicants of developments regularly.
Seek Feedback and Iterate
Invite candidates and internal stakeholders to provide input during the hiring process. Take advantage of this feedback to continuously improve and enhance your recruitment funnel. You can adjust to shifting candidate expectations and market dynamics by using an iterative strategy.
Conclusion
In summary, the recruitment funnel functions as an itinerary for businesses looking to hire exceptional employees.
Through comprehension and optimization of every phase, ranging from raising awareness to cultivating a favorable onboarding encounter, companies can augment their capacity to draw in, assess, and hold onto the most qualified applicants.
A well-designed recruitment funnel is a dynamic instrument that changes as the employment market does, not merely a procedure. Organizations that place a high value on innovation, flexibility, and a candidate-focused strategy put themselves in a position to create a resilient workforce that thrives in the long run.