B&Q recruits better-performing customer staff

THAME, U.K. - Feb. 23, 2015 - PRLog -- Home improvement retailer B&Q is recruiting and retaining better-performing customer advisors after creating a faster and more engaging, competency-based recruitment experience in partnership with assessment specialist Talent Q.

Each year, B&Q receives 150,000 applications for customer advisor roles in its 362 UK stores. It hires 5,000 people.

“Recruiting talented people who can advise customers and provide a friendly and efficient service is strategically important for us,” said Jo Leggett, Resourcing Manager at B&Q. “We know that every applicant is a potential customer, so it is critical for us to provide a positive recruitment experience to all candidates, particularly those who might be unsuccessful in their application as we don’t want to lose their future custom. We decided to replace our existing psychometric assessment with something that would be more engaging to complete and that would help us to make better screening decisions.”

Talent Q analysed the different requirements and success factors for B&Q’s four customer advisor roles: service (checkout roles), support (warehouse roles), sales (home design consultants) and expert (for exampleplumbers and electricians). The company then created state-of-the-art ‘adaptive’ situational judgement tests (SJTs) to help B&Q assess for the key competencies in each job.

“SJTs are commonly used to test applicants on how they’d handle typical workplace situations,” said Jo Leggett. “However, most SJTs have fixed scenarios. In other words, every applicant sees the same situations. Talent Q has broken the mould here by creating adaptive SJTs for us. This is very innovative because all of the situations that each candidate encounters in our SJTs evolve. Different consequences arise, depending on their previous responses. The benefit is that we can assess key competencies and hone in on a candidate’s behavioural tendencies in a more engaging and realistic way.”

Using a combination of photography, graphics and animation, in B&Q’s brand style, the four SJTs depict realistic situations with customers and life within a store. Each takes 15-20 minutes to complete and the tests are integrated with Taleo, B&Q’s applicant tracking system. Candidates complete the assessment online, prior to the telephone interview stage of the selection process.

Talent Q also created realistic job previews (RJPs), for each customer advisor role. Potential candidates can go through these interactive job previews on B&Q’s careers site, to get a clearer sense of what each role entails before submitting an online application.

“The four RJPs are aligned to our culture and values,” said Jo Leggett. “Each shows a series of scenarios that give an insight into what it would be like to work in these roles. The applicants are asked multiple-choice questions and they get instant feedback on their responses. This process helps them to decide firstly whether they’d enjoy working in the B&Q environment and secondly which role is most appropriate for them. It also helps us to create a good impression and build a rapport with people before we meet them.”

A validation study examining the competency-based performance ratings of 1,077 new customer advisors has confirmed that B&Q is now appointing better calibre recruits who are achieving their targets and who are more competent in the role.

“The validation study shows that a high score on the SJT correlates with high performance in the role, as judged by the individual’s line manager,” said Jo Leggett. “This means that our new SJTs can predict performance and success in the role. They’ve also enabled us to reduce the average time it takes to complete an application by 20 minutes. This is a significant time saving and it means more candidates are now completing their application in one sitting. On top of that, our store managers say we’re now recruiting people who are better suited to our business, have a better understanding of the role, are more customer-orientated and who are staying with us longer.”

James Beevers, Head of Professional Services at Talent Q, said: “The complex interaction between people, managers, colleagues and organisations means that there’s no such thing as perfect recruitment but B&Q has reduced the risk of hiring the wrong people, by understanding the requirements of the role, showing the realities of the job and building predictive assessments that are aligned to the required competencies. The new SJTs are cutting-edge and visually engaging assessments that not only assess each candidate very quickly, they also provide an entertaining and informative insight into what it’s really like to work in the roles. As a result, B&Q has not only speeded up its application process and improved the candidate experience, it is also making better selection decisions.”

For further information, please call Talent Q on +44 (0)1844 218980 or visit www.talentqgroup.com

Background notes: Founded in 1969 by Richard Block and David Quayle, B&Q is Europe’s largest home improvement and garden centre retailer. It employs 29,000 people nationwide and its larger stores stock over 40,000 products. www.diy.com

Talent Q provides personality, ability and competency assessments, as well as learning & development programmes and consultancy services. It works with over 500 clients worldwide.