Envirem Organics + VidCruiter
Envirem Organics has been working with VidCruiter to streamline its hiring process and reduce the manual work required. To learn more about our partnership, we spoke with Bryan Thorne, Envirem Organic’s all-in-one safety manager, and HR support/recruiting. Bryan leads the recruiting efforts for Envirem, hiring for roles such as line operators, mechanics, and drivers.
About Envirem Organics
Envirem Organics is an environmental industrial and organic waste recycling company, specializing in organic bio-products for lawn & garden, turf & landscape, organic agriculture and biofuel markets. Envirem’s bagged and export bulk products are available for everyone – from the home gardener, organic farmers, greenhouses, to garden and hardware stores. The growing company currently has 10 sites in Atlantic Canada and one in the US.
The Challenge
A manual, lengthy hiring process that needed optimizing to better detect top candidatesThe previous hiring process was very traditional, requiring a lot of manual work to keep the process moving along. “We’d put out an ad, people would fax or email us their resume, we’d print it out and pass it around to the different managers. I would conduct a phone interview or an in-person interview. The hiring manager would do an interview and then we would follow up on references and provide job offers at the same time. So it was a very, very manual process.”
Over the past seven years, Envirem Organic’s workforce has nearly doubled in size due to the demand for its sustainable solution. “When I started at Envirem, we were slightly under 100 people, now we’re about 175,” Bryan told us. The number of locations also increased, with sites spanning a 500 mile (800 km) radius – and as a one-man recruiting team, Bryan was needed to conduct interviews all over the province, which, prior to COVID-19, were 95% in-person. “An in-person interview sometimes didn’t happen for a week or two because I wouldn’t be in that area.” Additionally, Bryan had to work around the preset schedule rather than when he had time to. “When you’re doing all of your recruitment manually, the candidates are dictating your day. So, if I needed to screen somebody, I’m screening them because I made an appointment with them, instead of when I had a free moment.”
The hiring process took a lot of resources but ultimately, their hard work didn’t always pay off. “We were going through a lot of people at one of our plants. It seemed like every week we had somebody leaving or quitting or you know, just not showing up for work.” Bryan felt as though there could be a way to better identify qualified candidates earlier in the process. “I think we were missing out on the really good people.”
“I would estimate we’re saving 50% to 70% of our time in the recruiting process.”The Solution
Using pre-recorded video interviews and other tools in VidCruiter’s recruitment suiteEnvirem Organics first heard of VidCruiter at a virtual hiring fair. “Attendees got access to a VidCruiter account for the fair. I started fooling around with the platform and thought to myself ‘there are time savings in this for me.’”
Bryan was pleasantly surprised that it didn’t take a long time to implement the hiring solution. “Bringing in new technology can be a very time-consuming and disruptive process, so I was kind of expecting to struggle to get this program up and running. Sneha and the rest of the VidCruiter team made it very easy. This was not difficult to set up. I think that how you guys manage that process for employers is huge because it’s not disruptive.”
Envirem Organics now uses VidCruiter’s full recruitment suite. This allows the company access to all of VidCruiter’s products, including applicant tracking system, pre-recorded video interviewing, live video conference, in-person interviewing, automated scheduling, and automated reference checking. The tools allow Envirem a modernized, automated version of their previous hiring solution, without significant changes. “Our process is pretty much still the same. It’s still the same flowchart. What’s changed is how the applicants navigate through the flowchart and how we’re reacting to them as they go through the process.”
The feature that drew Envirem to the solution was the pre-recorded video interviews. “I can just watch four or five videos of candidates answering the questions I was going to ask them anyways in person.” The candidates have been quick to engage with the new interviewing method. Bryan believes about 95% of candidates are able to do the video interviewing questions – he’s happy to manually interview the candidates who need additional support.
For the highly-skilled roles, Envirem Organics has a process to screen them further. “Instead of being a two interview process [like their other hiring process], it’s a 3+ interview process and we’re using skills testing also.”
Envirem Organics
The Results
Deeper insights into candidates early on, creating a better workforce overallBryan told us Envirem Organics new hiring process has helped them to identify the top candidates earlier on. “We were just talking about the fact that since we’ve gone to this system, we seem to be getting better people and I don’t think it’s because better people are applying – I think it’s because we’re identifying the better people earlier on in the process.” A deeper understanding of candidates has created an improved workforce overall. “Having better people in the system means that we’re not constantly understaffed or constantly dealing with turnover,” Bryan explained.
The pre-recorded interviews in particular allow Envirem Organics to save a significant amount of time. Bryan shared with us, “I would estimate we’re saving 50 to 70% of our time in the recruiting process. And that again goes mainly back to screening. You’re able to get a lot more information than you would out of a questionnaire or even a phone call.” The automated reference checking has also been a time-saver. While some references rather speak over the phone, the majority are happy to fill out the preset form regarding the candidate. “I’m cutting down on half of the reference checks, so we’re making progress.”
For a one-man recruitment team with several other duties, time is very precious. VidCruiter’s solution allows Bryan to free up his time for more pressing tasks. “COVID has added a lot of work for us safety managers. I was running towards burnout, so to speak, a year ago. It’s been very positive, just capturing back some of the time in the day to do other things that are essentially more important.”
VidCruiter Inc.
Envirem Organics + VidCruiter: A successful partnership
Significant time saved
Deeper insights early on
Less manual work
Time back for other tasks
