Measuring the Success of Your Veteran Hiring Program

Veteran hiring has certainly become a central part of modern recruitment. Most employers are cognizant of the skills and attributes that enable veteran workers to add value to their roles. Moreover, the government has several tax credit programs to incentivize veteran hiring for employers. The result is that many employers have implemented some form of a veteran hiring process in order to source and hire these valuable professionals. How successful are these programs in real terms? Is there any way to measure their success? This blog will explore those questions in more detail.

Measuring the Success of Your Veteran Hiring Program

Veteran hiring programs usually have a narrow bore focus limited to sourcing and recruiting veteran talent. Too often, the management and retention aspect for new hires is overlooked by employers. If this sounds familiar, you may have an incomplete veteran recruitment process on your hands. To substantially make valuable hires and acquire quality talent, you will need to have a more holistic approach, including tracking new hires beyond the initial onboarding. Here are a few metrics that will help you determine how successful your veteran hiring program is:

1. Track Hiring Success Data
2. Measure the Quality of New Veteran Hires
3. Analyze Performance Data
4. Gather Information on Employee Retention

Let’s take a closer look at these below.

Track Hiring Success Data

Tracking specific hiring data related to hiring veterans can help you gauge the strengths and flaws in your veteran hiring program. There are several individual metrics that you can examine to gain insight, both collectively and singly. These metrics include the following:

• The number of veterans hired during a quantifiable period of time.
• The percentage of veterans hired during that time, relative to the total number of hires.
• The open roles that are filled by veterans during that time.
• Recognition from third parties, including positive publicity and awards.
• The success veterans enjoy upon hire by your organization.

Of course, any metric that measures hiring success is worthy of note. On their own, however, these metrics don’t afford an accurate picture of your organization’s hiring program. You also need data that qualifies how well veterans perform in their assigned roles. You may need to consider retention levels as well, to get a clearer picture of the long-term organizational impact of hiring veterans.

Also Read: Hiring Veterans Brings Skill, Value, and Tax Credits

Measure the Quality of New Veteran Hires

Every hiring manager and employer aspires to add talented performers to their workforce. Top performers consistently achieve targets and drive revenue and profit alike. Your hiring policy shouldn’t focus on sourcing veteran candidates alone, but on sourcing and placing the best quality candidates overall. This will have a greater impact on the organization, propelling teams to excel and achieve their objectives.

Analyze Performance Data

When examining the success of a veteran hiring policy, too many employers overlook the performance of veteran hires. Tracking a veteran hire beyond the initial onboarding is essential for several very good reasons. However, in many cases, an employer may not have a performance measurement system in place that is appropriate for gauging the strengths of veteran employee performance. According to most credible research, such as this SHRM research, a large majority of employers feel veteran employees perform better in the workplace than non-veterans.

In the absence of metrics to measure veteran performance, you will likely need to create new criteria to measure productivity. This might include conducting surveys based on your definition of “quality work” measured against the achievement of specific goals or objectives for the period in question. Survey your veteran talent pool to gain information on how they adhere to company performance standards.

Gather Information on Employee Retention

You could have the best hiring and onboarding processes in the industry, but if your employee retention rates are low, recruitment efforts quickly go to waste. Employee turnover is one of the biggest concerns for hiring managers. It represents a massive line-item expense for every business. Employee turnover also results in bottlenecks, slowdowns, and a loss of continuity upon the departure of veteran employees.

On the whole, according to the SHRM research discussed above, hiring veterans tends to reduce employee turnover considerably. Veterans generally outlast their civilian counterparts, their median length of employment being two-and-a-half years. That said, you will need to assess veteran retention in specific roles, compared to civilians in similar roles in order to determine the strength of your hiring process in terms of retaining veteran talent.