How Great Southern Bank hires better talent

Great Southern Bank is Australia’s leading customer-owned bank*. Rebranding from CUA or Credit Union Australia in 2021. 

The Talent Acquisition team at Great Southern Bank had an increase in vacancies and a 60% decrease in the volume of applications—but still had 5,000 applications to sift through in the past 12 months. This meant that they had to have the ability to respond quickly to applications, provide an excellent candidate experience and be as agile as possible.

Balancing speed and experience

Great Southern Bank began looking at how technology could improve their time-to-hire and still give candidates a great experience—while not over-complicating the process for hiring managers. They also wanted to increase the quality of candidates they were engaging with and give time back to busy managers, as they had noticed an increase in the number of interviews needed to fill each position. 

Competencies for success

Great Southern Bank selected HireVue video interviewing and assessment solutions to help the recruitment team better assess and identify talent when making hiring decisions. Partnering with HireVue’s Industrial Organisational (IO) Psychologists, Great Southern Bank highlighted the competencies needed to be successful in their Customer Contact Centre, Sales, Retail and Corporate roles. Assessments were then created for each job role, allowing recruiters and hiring managers to dig deeper into the candidates’ competencies and abilities, beyond simply looking at their CV.  

After a CV screen of all candidates that applied, successful individuals are given the opportunity to complete a HireVue OnDemand Assessment in their own time. Hiring managers are then able to review and watch the candidates’ responses, with the addition of competency and cognitive reports, at a time that suits them. This information is used to make an evaluation on which candidates proceed to the next round of interviews with hiring managers. 

Success that can scale

“Since going live with HireVue in June 2020 across our business, our average time-to-hire has reduced from over 40 days to 23 days. This achievement is even more impressive given we filled double the number of roles than the previous year. Without HireVue as a platform we simply would not have been able to handle the role volume that we experienced after Covid. The reduction in our time-to-hire has allowed us to remain competitive in a very tight job market. We have also seen a large reduction in the time that the Talent Acquisition team spends screening candidates. With the use of HireVue we have been able to create an almost 60% reduction in the time spent screening candidates across Sales and Corporate roles, whilst maintaining a strong candidate satisfaction score throughout the process.” 

Helen Brady, Talent Acquisition Specialist.

In the 2022 financial year, 38% of candidates completed their HireVue assessment outside of business hours, making the recruitment process more accessible to candidates. Over the last 12 months, Great Southern Bank has taken active steps to improve candidate experience. They’ve added welcome and closing videos, along with more video content of the recruitment team asking interview questions, which has helped produce a candidate satisfaction score (CSAT) of 87%.  

Great Southern Bank also wanted to increase engagement with hiring managers in the initial stages of the recruitment process. By including hiring managers in the review of HireVue OnDemand video screens, they have been able to generate a reduction in the number of interviews needed to fill each position as they are now bringing a higher calibre of candidates into their first round of interviews. 

“Leading a team of nearly 50 people can be challenging in itself, add to the mix recruiting and you have quite the conundrum. What HireVue gives me is time back in my day which can be dedicated to potential candidates rather than sifting through all applicants unnecessarily.”

George Glaveski, Credit Manager at Great Southern Bank. 

“I love HireVue as it allows us to get a sense of the candidates before inviting them along to an interview. We can easily gain an indication of their experience and how they respond to situations to determine if they’re a good fit for the role. It ensures that we only go to the interview stage for high quality candidates, making the interviews that we do have more meaningful.”

Jennifer Moore, Financial Assistance Manager at Great Southern Bank

The Future

Great Southern Bank has plans to integrate HireVue with their applicant tracking system (ATS). This will allow candidates to be invited to take part in a HireVue via their ATS, removing the duplication of work and further streamline the process.

*Awarded Canstar’s Customer-Owned Bank of the Year, 2022

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