Boxes and boxes of paper applications; line after line of data entry; information to vet and verify. These were the human resources challenges Best Buy faced not so long ago. By implementing Workforce Acquisition from Kronos, however, the electronics retailing giant has freed its managers from paper trails — and achieved considerable cost savings in the process.

“In the past, our application process was paper-based and very difficult,” says Kristina Parker, director of recruitment and selection for Richfield, Minn.-based Best Buy. “We have stories about applications being lost [and] applicants not getting called back because their papers were lost. There was no way to go back and look at potential candidates: applications were really inconsistent from a process standpoint.”

Best Buy’s decision to automate the hiring process was driven by two primary factors: the volume of applications per store and subsequent tracking. “We had nothing automated in place for either store level or corporate,” Parker says. Best Buy chose the Kronos system for its network of more than 1,200 stores “because it is easy to use and the company understood the retail environment really well,” she says. “Their corporate culture was similar to Best Buy’s, which we find makes things much easier from a partnership perspective.”

On average, 70 percent of the U.S. retail workforce is made up of hourly employees. Chelmsford, Mass.-based Kronos helps “field-based organizations like Best Buy improve the quality of their workforce,” says director of marketing Steve Earl. “The most important decision a company can make is in hiring [and] companies are not just looking for an automated hiring solution: they are looking for people who will stay with the company longer.”

One way that Kronos Workforce Acquisition distinguishes itself is that it doesn’t regard workforce quality improvement as a one-time event, Earl says. Customers use the software and services to automate the hiring process; they use the selection tools and analytics capability to identify which candidate is the best fit for a position.

“Over time, the solution improves as we work with other customers and fine-tune our selection tools to determine the best candidates according to the specific needs of specific customers,” Earl says. “We take a scientific approach to hiring. We do not eliminate turnover; managed turnover is often needed. We use science to shift the odds in favor of selecting better employees.”

Kronos’ system can provide reports to companies based on data gathered in the application process, and clients can compare their hiring results to those of their peers.

Consistent hiring process
Best Buy realized cost savings of $2.5 million in the first year of using Workforce Acquisition. Part of the savings came from automating crucial steps in the application process, such as drug and background checks, says Kristopher Arnes, selection technology manager for Best Buy. “We were able to lock down those processes so we could be consistent in hiring across hundreds of locations. There are controls in the system to make sure that everyone is following the same process.”

Kronos’ Workforce Management suite includes assessments which Best Buy uses for hourly associates. “We receive about one million applications annually so the assessments were a highlight for the Kronos product. We felt they would help us determine the best qualified candidates,” Parker says. The chain can also track successful job candidate sources and make better decisions on which sources to use in the future. “It makes a huge difference in what we now spend on job boards,” she says.

There is less data entry and, as a result, fewer data errors with Workforce Management, according to Parker. The system gives Best Buy the ability to put interview guides for managers online so the guides can be printed out at store level. “It helps ensure managers have everything they need,” she says. The system “also generates all new-hire paperwork and the required documents which employees must fill out,” Arnes adds. “This helps with compliance.”

No more cattle calls
The new solution has allowed Best Buy to alter its method of recruiting candidates. “With all our new store openings, we used to do lots of newspaper advertising and job fairs — really cattle calls,” Arnes says. Now, “we drive all that traffic through our website [and] the system helps our managers be more effective in their interviews because those they speak with have already passed the initial assessment.”

This is especially useful with holiday hiring (Best Buy hires as much as 60 percent of its base between September and December each year). The chain, which has a 99.8 percent compliance rate when using the system, hires more than 140,000 employees annually.

Training now is usually handled through a tutorial on the system. The solution is completely automated and fully integrated with Best Buy’s drug check vendor, background check vendor, work opportunity tax credit vendor and HRMS.

The latest offering from Kronos is Workforce Acquisition for Field Hiring version 8. “We acquired a company last year with a strong automation and technology platform,” Earl says. “We have taken our selection science and mixed it with a better automation platform so that the solution brings together our quality of selection and the efficiency of automation into a single platform.”

Kronos, he says, measures the improvement to clients’ workforce by the reduction in turnover rates and “whether employees who are being hired are staying longer. Reduction in turnover gives positive bottom line results and increased value for the customer.”