As a premier provider of healthcare management products and services, McKesson Corporation relies on innovation and responsiveness to maintain leadership in the healthcare industry. In early 2003, McKesson Information Solutions (MIS) began a software product initiative requiring top technical talent.

"The success of the product development initiative depended largely on our ability to quickly identify and hire the right developers," says Laurie Wheeler, the company's Director of Talent Acquisition. "The project involves internal teams across the U.S. as well as outsourced service providers. It became apparent as the search for developers unfolded that we needed a way to speed up the process. That's when we turned to an assessment solution to accelerate recruitment."

Provided by online assessment leader, Brainbench, the solution included online assessments in key skills for the jobs being filled, including seven full-time J2EE Software Engineers and three strategic Senior Database Architects. "We sought a way to keep up with an extremely fast-paced ramp-up to a large project," says Wheeler. "The assessment solution not only kept us in front of our needs, but in the process reduced our recruiting man-hour costs for the project by more than $400,000."

Recruiters Identify Area for Improvement and Move Quickly to Implement a Solution

For MIS, the most pressing need involved streamlining an extremely thorough recruiting process. "Through our existing process of networking, internal and external recruiting, and screening and interviewing, we were spending an enormous amount of time uncovering a true measurement of each candidate's skill level," Wheeler explains. "This process not only involved hours of recruiting time, but also hours of developers' time in 'teching out' candidates verbally." "We needed a way to validate candidate skills with an objective assessment that did not require recruiter interaction," she says.

"We needed an assessment platform that is easy to use, covers a broad range of subject areas, provides quick results, and delivers high-quality tests. Brainbench gave us all these things. In addition, the company provided the support to adjust and implement the solution for our needs."

The MIS recruiting team worked closely with the company's VP of Development to streamline the recruiting process. "Having a VP level decision-maker involved early in the process was a great help in securing buy-in for the solution," says Wheeler. "When we presented our plan to other key decision-makers, they gave their support, and we were able to move forward quickly. Gaining buy-in is crucial in a large organization such as ours."

Assessment Solution Fits Into Existing Recruiting Process

Of significant importance to MIS was the need to validate the assessments in the Brainbench recruiting solution. The engineers already on staff took the tests to verify their effectiveness and to create a "benchmark" for measuring candidate test results. Brainbench online assessments were then implemented in the recruiting process.

"Candidates would be screened via phone and their resumes reviewed by the VP," explains Wheeler. "If there seemed to be a fit, a test was administered either locally in the Alpharetta (Georgia) office or remotely. Scores were received immediately and the decision to schedule a formal interview with the VP and the team was made. This method saved significant time and expense for HR and for the Development Team, who had previously required additional involvement in the skills validation process now covered by the Brainbench system."

Streamlined Process Reduces Time to Hire from 55+ Hours to 20 Hours

For McKesson, the initial program has delivered dramatic improvements in the recruiting process. "The biggest difference is the reduction in time-to-hire," says Wheeler. "Previously, the average involvement of recruiting and other staff in the hiring process ranged from 55 hours up to 73 hours. That would include the recruiter, hiring manager, and development team: all needed to fill one position. After implementing the assessment solution for the MIS team, we were able to cut this average down to 20 hours."

"Our cost per hire has always been competitive and did not significantly decline after we started using Brainbench," says Wheeler. "However, days-to-fill improved and we have anecdotal evidence that quality of hire improved, though we'd like to develop metrics on this as the program expands. 90-day retention rates were 98 percentalso a strong result. Considering the average salary for those involved in the recruiting process, we saved approximately $423,000 in employee time to fill eight positions in the MIS project."

McKesson Explores Expansion of Assessment Solution

Having accelerated recruitment for its MIS organization, McKesson is exploring other opportunities for using Brainbench to improve recruitment or aid in employee development. "There is a broad range of assessments in the system," Wheeler explains, "so we've been able to use the system for assessing the skills of Project Management candidates, as well as for our Internal Information Systems organization."

It was the impact of the MIS project that gave Wheeler the jump-start she needed to improve the recruiting process. "The MIS recruiting project gave us the proof we need that online assessment delivers business impactcutting our time-to-hire in half," she says. "The recruiters love the tool, and the candidates knew that we were very serious about the selection and hiring process of our team. This makes McKesson look good. Needless to say, we're pleased with the result."

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