Successful First Year for NHS Online Recruitment

As the NHS Careers spring campaign starts up Jobsite are pleased to announce that the NHS online recruitment service, at www.jobs.nhs.uk has successfully completed its first year of operation, becoming one of the busiest job sites in the UK. With over 30,000 jobs advertised in 2004, attracting over 3.4 million visits and 235,600 applications, the service has exceeded expectations. NHS employers have found the service easy to use and extremely effective in sourcing candidates, with particularly encouraging results for ëhard to recruití jobs.

Since being launched by Minister of State for Health, John Hutton on 1 December 2003 the service has seen tremendous growth. Following a successful pilot by a group of 46 employers the service, provided under contract by Methods Consulting and Jobsite, has experienced rapid uptake with over 400 out of 650 NHS employers using it.

Keith Potts, Jobsite managing director, comments: ìThe NHS site has grown to become a significant recruitment site in just its first year, as recognized by John Hutton today. With over 3,400 jobs advertised each day attracting around 24,000 visits, weíre excited by the level of performance itís experiencing. In advertising vacancies and providing the tools to support recruitment, the service has had many encouraging comments from the NHS. Iím really pleased with the success of the site and the way that the Department of Health, Methods and Jobsite team are providing real benefits to the NHS.î

Although still growing in its use by NHS employers, in the last quarter a total of 1.36 million visits to the website by job seekers were recorded, with 14,000 jobs advertised and 115,000 applications received. With regard to those ëhard to recruití jobs, one acute hospitals trust in the north has found: We have seen as a result of placing our vacancies on the NHS Jobs site, that not only are more people looking at our vacancies, but the number of applicants has steeply risen too. With one vacancy for a biomedical scientist, which we expected to be difficult to fill, we received a large number of good applications from around the country, whereas previously we would only have gotten one or two, if that. With the NHS Jobs site the netís much wider. The last User Satisfaction survey revealed that 95% of employer users are ësatisfiedí or ëhighly satisfiedí with the service and the quality of candidates.

One applicant now working in a North London trust could not believe her success with the site: When I was relocating from the West Midlands to London, I used the NHS Jobs site to apply for jobs as a PA before I actually made the move. I am over 55 and wasnít certain I would be able to find a new job without my age working against me. Using the online system, I {applied for} 12 jobs and was offered nine interviews across London. Eventually I only attended the first two, and I was offered both jobs! I am so pleased that I could continue to work in the NHS and know that the NHS values the diversity of its workforce. The site helped to make my move a whole lot easier.

Another trust had 9 radiography vacancies and were all set to go abroad when the HR Director persuaded them to advertise on the new NHS Jobs site. The advert was so successful that they have recruited 5 UK trained radiographers and 4 non-UK trained radiographers who they are supporting to get full accreditation.

Crucial in underpinning the NHS workforce strategy and NHS Plan targets, the job site has reinforced the NHS as a model employer. It widens access to NHS employment and provides a more efficient, cost effective means of advertising jobs. Money saved on advertising spend can be utilised locally to improve NHS services to the community. HR Departments can use the service to modernise and improve recruitment practice, providing services which meet expectations of the NHS as a modern employer and providing workforce information to support planning locally and nationally.

The service continues to be improved to reflect strategic initiatives and usersí best practice feedback. Recently work has been completed on integration with the new NHS Electronic Staff Record (ESR) system. The ESR system will provide key human resource management and payroll tools to most NHS organisations once it is rolled out across the NHS during the next few years. The online recruitment service is intended to act as a recruitment ëfront-endí, accepting job vacancy details from ESR and providing application information back to ESR.

Another automated interface provided is the data feed of jobs through to the Jobcentre Plus service, where they are made available to desk terminals and kiosks in Jobcentres. As a result Jobcentre Plus staff and visitors have access to many of the vacancies displayed on the NHS online service, helping to widen access to NHS jobs and career opportunities.