The Metrics That Matter: What HR Leaders Need to Know to Track Progress in 2024

Although improvements in efficiency, productivity and experience may have served as the initial motivation for HR leaders' investments in connected technologies, there is another benefit that is slowly but surely coming into the spotlight: objectivity. As digital tools expand and their capabilities increase, talent acquisition (TA) teams are increasingly recognizing the value that comes from quantifying results - especially in a field where "success" often feels like a moving target.

However, not all data is equal. Some metrics are more valuable to teams than others, and knowing which metrics align with your company's goals is critical to measuring performance and making progress. As you embark on the journey to digitally transform recruiting, understanding the metrics that digital suites can deliver and that matter in the context of your optimization journey is critical to improving results.

With statistics to success

Employ's recent Recruiter Nation study aimed to get to the bottom of the matter by asking participating practitioners to rate key TA performance metrics based on their value. Here's what they said...

Quality of Hire: Quality of hire was overwhelmingly cited as the most valuable metric that TA teams use to evaluate their success. Nearly a third (31%) of respondents placed this metric at the top of their list, and 73% ranked it in the top five. This metric considers employee productivity, engagement, culture fit, and other performance feedback to evaluate the performance of recruiters and consulting teams. It also helps teams correlate skills and qualities with successful hires to create more accurate profiles for different roles.

Time to Fill: Time to Fill reflects the length of time an average hire takes, from the day the job ad is posted to the day an applicant accepts the offer. For more than half (59%) of practitioners, time to fill a position is among the top five metrics, and for 14% it is the most important. This information can help identify opportunities to improve sourcing and interview processes by department, role or sector.
Currently, the average time to fill a position across all industries, company sizes and functions is 47.5 days, but can vary greatly from industry to industry. At one end of the spectrum are media industry positions that take an average of 62.21 days to fill in today's market. At the other end of the spectrum are healthcare jobs that require an average of just 38.23 days. When planning, it's important to know the time frame for your industry and see how your company compares to others.

Cost per hire: Cost per hire uses operational data to estimate how much it costs to fill a specific position. This metric ranks just behind time to fill, with 12% of respondents ranking it first and 57% ranking it in the top five. Knowing the cost of each hire helps teams contextualize recruiting spend and find ways to reduce waste by adjusting processes to avoid unnecessary costs.

Retention Rate: It's no secret that employee retention is a top priority in modern companies, and the employee retention rate data was an easy choice for respondents' top five lists. Although only 11% of respondents said it was the most valuable metric in their organization, 62% ranked it in their top 5 and 14% listed it as their second most important data point.
To determine retention rates, teams calculate the percentage of employees who meet certain criteria and remain employed over a specific period of time. This makes it possible to determine which characteristics lead employees to stay with the company long-term and which signs indicate that someone wants to leave the company.

Hiring manager satisfaction: Hiring manager satisfaction rounded out respondents’ top five metrics of value, with 53% of practitioners citing it among their top choices (7% said it was their most valuable). This measures managers’ overall satisfaction with the hires made on their behalf using data from qualitative and quantitative surveys. With this information, acquisition teams visualize performance, evaluate progress, and learn from feedback about areas they could improve.

Of course, all of the above metrics can function at various levels of the business to provide different types of insights and speak to different opportunities for improvement. For example, one company may look at retention rates by department while another may look at this measure through the lens of the recruiter that conducted the search. The former can give insight into ways to improve department-level management practices, while the other may speak to the performance of the TA team member.

The same is true for any of the metrics noted above—and others. As teams filter results down by various criteria, they are able to find patterns, identify correlations, and identify and test possible solutions.

What matters to you

Perhaps the most notable insight is the lack of alignment on the issue overall. Yes, some metrics—like quality of hire—stood out as clear frontrunners. Still, though, none of the options presented were seen as unanimously without value. Even those that scored lower overall were at the top of someone’s list, which speaks to a truth about measuring progress: The perceived value in any metric is directly linked to organizational goals. In short, the difference isn’t between having data and not having it; it’s how you use the data that makes the real difference within an organization.

Candidate relationship management (CRM) platforms, applicant tracking systems (ATSs), and recruitment marketing software (RMS) all serve as records of past successes and failures. For companies that are used to having “lifers” among their ranks, a metric like retention rate may not be important. But for someone else, finally putting retention performance into tangible, quantifiable terms may yield the insight they’ve been missing.

Because the possible variations, combinations, and applications of data made available by CRM, ATS, RMS, and other connected platforms are near infinite, it’s up to each company to identify what matters to them. That’s the beauty of connected operations; if you can capture it, you can track it and measure against it. That’s what allows you to experiment with new approaches and find solutions like IceHrm that move the needle for your business, whatever they may be.