Recording a video on your PC webcam, or digital camcorder is fairly commonplace these days. It is therefore unsurprising that video is being much more widely used to help select candidates for a job vacancy. However, can using video to avoid unnecessary travel for face to face interviews really claim to help with reducing carbon emissions?
When considering this question, it might be best to look at the way candidates have traditionally been screened and selected before video technology became widely available. Most recruitment campaigns follow a basic structure. A long list of applicants is compiled. A screening exercise is then undertaken to discard those who are unsuitable. Leading to a shortlist of the best people being invited in for an interview.
Looking at this process, the amount of carbon saved will depend on the reduction of unnecessary journeys. How many journeys are saved will perhaps depend on how enthusiastically an organisation uses video in the hiring process. Using videos within initial screening process can certainly help save unnecessary journeys. It could even create a better pool of shortlisted candidates.
Videos can then be reviewed by multiple campaign contributors whenever it is convenient. This can make it easier for more people at the hiring organisation to provide better, more informed opinions on each of the candidates.
In theory, the more information decision makers can access about each candidate, the better the shortlist will be. This will inevitably result in fewer journeys to interview, as those deemed unsuitable will be excluded before this stage. Using video to replace the face-to-face interviews will reduce travel, but many hiring managers may consider this a step too far. Perhaps where distances are too great to make face to face interviews practical, or where the seniority of the position does not necessarily warrant a full interview, then video conference interviews can help with the final decision.
However, will a video conference ever be able to give the interviewer the same insight into the candidate as a face to face meeting? That is perhaps a topic for a different discussion.
In summary, along with other techniques to help select of the best candidates, video can play an important part in the recruitment process and may well reduce wasted travel time. The carbon saved from reducing interview journeys always has to be somewhat offset by the increased electricity used to store the videos on computer servers. On the whole though, I think we can claim that video technology does do something to reduce carbon emissions.
This article is brought to you by Interview Coordinator (www.interviewcoordinator.com). Interview Coordinator is designed as a centralised applicant tracking system for use by hiring managers and all the participating campaign collaborators. Along with a multitude of other features, the system uses online video to help save time and costs by streamlining the recruitment process. Users pay on a “per campaign’ basis and the system is currently available on a 60 day FREE trial.
For further press information, call Stuart Collins on 01793-250093
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