Customer success story

Tackling talent scarcity for a global manufacturing giant

Supporting one of Guidant Global’s long-standing manufacturing clients to keep pace with unprecedented demand by transforming attraction strategies, improving the candidate journey and opening the door to a broader range of talent.

Talk to our team View results

Impact at a glance

A long-standing workforce partnership transformed through creative talent marketing. Driving volume hiring, female representation and a more inclusive route to market for manufacturing roles.

3,360

Total placements delivered

329

Women hired into roles

500+

Clicks from one two-week Facebook campaign

10%

Of women hired became permanent staff

40%

Of all campaign clicks from women

Programme impact: Dramatically increased female representation while supporting high-volume temporary hiring for production line operations.

ManufacturingClient sector

Global brandLong-standing client

£4.1bnCompany revenue

15,000+Employees

GlobalRegion supported

3,000+Temporary workers required

The Situation

Keeping pace with a full order book and unprecedented demand for world-class industrial machinery products.

A long-standing workforce partnership

One of Guidant Global’s long-standing and biggest UK clients is a manufacturer and global brand who needed to keep pace with a full order book and unprecedented demand for its world-class industrial machinery products.

Transforming the employer proposition

Over a 12 month period, Guidant Global was asked to transform them into an employer of choice through the development and refinement of their contingent employee value proposition and hire more than 3,000 temporary workers to support their production line operations.

A competitive local labour market

A hugely competitive local employment market, coupled with Covid-19 related absences, Brexit realities, increasing salary pressures and an ageing population meant that Guidant Global’s talent marketing team had to employ new and creative ways of delivering the volume and quality of talent the client needed to keep operations on track.

Client profile

£4.1bn

The client is a global manufacturing brand with £4.1 billion in revenue and more than 15,000 employees.

Recruitment requirement

3,000+

Guidant Global was asked to help hire more than 3,000 temporary workers to support production line operations during a period of unprecedented demand.

The Challenge

Traditional talent pools were no longer delivering the results they once had.

Like most companies, the client struggled to attract talent in a post-Covid restrictions context. Guidant Global’s challenge was to help the client reposition their brand and open the doors to a broader range of talent, particularly with a view to encouraging more female hires.

Post-Covid talent attraction

The client struggled to attract talent in a post-Covid restrictions context, as many employers sought to rebuild workforce capacity at the same time.

Competition from other employers

The client faced competition from other manufacturers trying to get back to full steam, as well as other industries that had not previously been a threat.

Salary and labour market pressures

Brexit realities, increasing salary pressures and a hugely competitive local employment market created further pressure on attraction and hiring activity.

Traditional talent pools

Tried and tested methods of tapping into traditional talent pools were not delivering the volume and quality of talent the client needed.

Female representation

The client needed to reposition its brand and open the doors to a broader range of talent, with a particular focus on encouraging more female hires.

The Solution

A creative, integrated talent marketing strategy designed to transform the candidate application journey.

The expertise of Guidant Global’s dedicated talent marketing team was fundamental to the success of the client’s direct sourcing delivery model. Working in close partnership with the client and onsite team, the approach combined competitor research, female attraction, storytelling, PR, social media and chatbot-enabled application technology.

01 Research-led reward and benefits strategy +

Guidant Global conducted extensive competitor research and rate benchmarking to inform and guide the client’s reward and benefits strategy.

02 Female attraction and gender inclusion +

The team developed a female attraction strategy to drive gender inclusion within a traditionally male dominated industrial workforce, challenging perceptions by showcasing a diverse range of women at various stages of their potential career with the client.

03 Creative campaign landing pages +

Guidant Global improved the candidate application process through creative campaign landing pages, a streamlined chatbot-enabled application process, and new compelling onboarding and worker engagement materials.

04 Worker advocacy and storytelling +

A storytelling and worker advocacy approach helped drive positive perceptions of the employer brand in the local market. Stories and video content were hosted on a featured employer website page designed to position the client as an inclusive and welcoming employer.

05 Integrated PR and social media activity +

Guidant Global undertook public relations activity to reinforce positive messaging, coupled with extensive use of social media channels as part of a fully integrated recruitment marketing strategy.

06 Local partnerships and recruitment days +

The team worked in partnership with local third parties, including Job Centres, to drive awareness and hosted multiple recruitment days at the client’s premises.

07 Chatbot-enabled application journey +

To transform the candidate application journey, Guidant Global implemented chatbot technology from Leadoo at the front end of the application process, with different chat flows for different roles. This made the user journey smooth and simple while collecting the data recruiters needed to validate candidate eligibility.

08 Self-service assessment booking +

A self-service calendar was linked to the chatbot, allowing users who met the criteria to book an assessment date onsite, at a date and time that suited them. This offered greater flexibility to prospective hires and saved vital staff-hours for recruiters.

Results

The campaign delivered the high volume of contingent staff needed while building a stronger sense of inclusion and belonging.

Perhaps one of the most important things this campaign achieved was not simply that it delivered the high volume of contingent staff needed to achieve manufacturing targets, but that it tapped into the idea that the business success was the sum of all its parts and that every person on the production line had a valuable role to play in creating an iconic product.

3,360

Total placements

329

Women hired

10%

Women hired became permanent staff

500+

Clicks from one targeted campaign

40%

Of all clicks from women

High-volume hiring delivered

The campaign delivered 3,360 total placements, helping the client achieve manufacturing targets during a period of unprecedented demand.

Female representation increased

The total hire included 329 women out of 3,360 placements, with some going on to become permanent employees, including in senior leadership roles in assembly.

Targeted social campaign performance

In just one two-week campaign targeted at women on Facebook, Guidant Global generated over 500 clicks by carefully crafting language and imagery designed to appeal to women.

Belonging and teamwork brought to life

The campaign showcased the stories of workers and highlighted strong women forging careers in manufacturing, reinforcing that every person on the production line had a valuable role to play.

Opportunities for young people

The campaign highlighted opportunities for young people to join the business and begin their career journey in an environment where they could develop new skills and flourish.

Career changers supported

The campaign also put the spotlight on people changing careers later in life, showing that age needn’t be considered a barrier to retraining and starting over in a new industry.

With inclusion and belonging at its core, the campaign invited people to “take their place” and helped the client reach talent that had previously been much harder to attract.

Campaign impact

The Future

A transformed approach to attraction strategies, built around employee advocacy and storytelling.

The work on this campaign has transformed the way Guidant Global approaches attraction strategies for the client. Where previously the team relied more on traditional channels to drive traffic and applications with a job advert, the approach has now moved towards employee advocacy and storytelling to promote opportunities.

Showing roles through workers’ eyes

Guidant Global has seen the benefits of showcasing the stories of the workers who do these jobs and building an advertising narrative that allows prospective candidates to get a true understanding of a role through someone already doing that job.

An omni-channel route to market

Whether through blog content, video testimonials or promoting the scope of opportunities through PR content in local and national press, Guidant Global has created an omni-channel approach that has now become the route to market.

Continuing to reach women

While men still account for approximately 61% of all online campaign click throughs, it is encouraging to see that women, previously much harder to reach, now represent almost 40%.

“We have a long-standing relationship with Guidant and are always looking at innovative ways of working. The past 18 months have seen a transformation in the way we operate together, and we are now working closely on several recruitment campaigns. The result of this has been extraordinary and has been essential in ensuring our continued success.”

Resourcing Manager

Book a discovery call with
our workforce experts.

Talk to our team →

Solutions

Latest from Guidant Global

About