A complete guide of Employee Referral Program 2019

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Employee Referral Program - A Complete Guide for
2019
The employee referral program has become one of
the most popular hiring strategies in recent
times. It is similar to a friend recommending you
a movie or television series to watch over the
weekend, but in this case, it's a candidate being
referred for a job position in your company. It
is important to have a well-structured employee
referral program to get the most productive
outcomes. What is the Employee Referral
Program? The employee referral program is a
program where new employees are hired based on
referrals by a candidate from the organization.
A good referral program gets the best employee
for the job and makes the existing employee feel
valued.
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What are the Pros of the employee referral
program? Improving the quality of hire The
employee referral program is considered an
internal method for finding job candidates. Your
existing employees know what qualities your
company needs in their employee so the employee
referrals most of the time make a much better
match than candidates coming from other
sources. Improves employee retention It is a
known fact those employees who match
organizational culture, norms and values better
will also stay longer with the company. The
candidates who come through referrals know what
the company needs out of them and also how the
company operates. This makes them feel right at
home from the very beginning. Saves time This
program saves times for the employers as to learn
about the company from your current employees,
are familiar with the hiring process and
on-boarding. Also, contacting them is easier.
This speeds up the hiring process. Saves
money If you opt for referrals from your
employees, you can eliminate some other costly
sources such as job boards, paid advertisements
etc.. Improves Employer Brand Usually, before
applying for a job position, people tend to seek
an employee's opinion to gain true knowledge
about the company and so when you implement an
employee referral program, your employees
automatically build brand image in the market.
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What is the Cons employee referral
program? Discrimination Charges If a company
excessively uses an employee referral program, it
could lead to discrimination charges from
rejected candidates in the long run. So, the
company should strike the right balance between
referrals and other sources. Lack of ideas The
employee referral program might lead the new
employee stick along with the existing employee
and this may lead to a lack of independent, or
innovative ideas. The disillusionment of the
referral program Strict guidelines for the bonus
out for the referrals may lead the employees into
disillusioned about the whole process which, in
turn, can lead to the discontent of the
employees. Getting alienated from other
staff When you are hiring someone through
reference, they are likely to hang-in together,
thus raising the risk of getting alienated from
other team members.
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How to set up an employee referral program? The
following are the steps to implement the employee
referral program for your enterprise. Plan The
very first step to setting up an employee
referral program is to thoroughly plan. You must
understand your hiring needs like what positions
you need to fill, what is the needed candidate
persona, etc. Also, set goals like in what
duration you want to hire new employees to
improve the quality of job applicants, etc.
Allocate all the resources and designate
different positions for setting up the
program. Design After planning, automate the
process by using modern and specialized HR tools
like an application tracking system, email
templates. Also, make sure to set rules and
decide rewards prior to launching the program.
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Promote Launch the employee referral program and
promote it through promotion campings and
referrals parties. Maintain Once the program
is launched, it is important to maintain it in a
proper manner. The employees should be
appreciated and every time a new idea should be
brought on board to keep it fresh. Also, it is
important to evaluate the results and improve
tactics to get the best out of the employee
referral program.

• How to make a referral program effective?
• By now we have clearly established how useful
  employee referral program, but it does not give
  desired outcomes if it is not effective. This
  problem can be solved by keeping the following
  pointers in mind.
• Keep employees updated about new vacancies
• Acknowledge good referrals
• Offer good monetary, as well as non-monetary
  incentives
• Enhance user experience
• Experiment with referral tactics
• Examples of the successful employee referral
  program
• Some of the most successful employee referral
  programs have been Fiverr's gamification method
  where they add a competition among the employees
  by offering points for sharing jobs and
  referrals like a game leaderboard.
• Another great program was by none other than
  google where they simply ask questions to their
  employees like who is the best designer or coder
  they know!

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Intel took a step up in the game by getting
referrals and bringing diversity in the company
at the same time. They offered a double bonus
for the successful employment of women or
minorities by referrals. Digital Ocean
structured its a program where they awarded the
referring employee with 3,500 and made a
charitable donation of 1,500 on the employees
behalf. In this manner, they made the employee
feel valued and contributed to a good
cause. Hewlett Packard kept it simple and
effective by giving recognition to the employees
for their efforts and celebrating them
publicly. Another honourable mention is
Distillery. They personalised the employee
referral bonus as per the employees likings.
So, if an employee has a hobby of collecting
action figures and they want a particular one,
they get it as a reward. Why Employee Referral
Rewards are important? Employee referral rewards
and bonuses are important for a successful
employee referral program. Often, there are
employees that refer better than others, and
their work should be rewarded.

• Best Employee Referral Reward Ideas
• Everybody loves being rewarded. Some of the ideas
  for referral rewards are
• Give days off as a reward
• Give bonus
• Give a small gift even if the referred person
  doesnt get hired
• Sponsor lunch for the new hire and the referrer
• Fund cause of the employees choice
• Plan a holiday

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• Gift Vouchers
• Corporate gift basket
• Create personalized stationery
• Gift for their pets
• Certificate of appreciation
• Recognition on social media
• Handwritten note

• What could be potential challenges when you
  execute an Employee Referral Program?
• When you plan an employee referral program, there
  are somethings that can lead to its failure. To
  avoid this, we bring you some potential
  challenges that you may need to overcome.
• Employees are not well informed about the
  employee referral program
• Employees are unable to track the referrals
• Employees face difficulty while submitting
  referrals
• Once the referrals are submitted, they dont hear
  about it from the company
• The process is long and tedious so employees
  prefer not to refer it
• The rewards are not exciting enough
• Lack of motivation to refer candidates
• Important Statistics related to the employee
  referral program
• No business decision should be taken without
  analysing its statistics so here are some figures
  about the employee referral program.
• The employee referral program has 82 return on
  investment (ROI).
• It can save companies 3000 or more per hire.
• It completes the hiring process approximately 55
  faster.

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• Retention of the referred employee has been seen
  to be 42 more than the employees from the job
  boards.
• This produces 25 more profit to the company.

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• What are the proven email templates to promote
  your Employee Referral Program?
• It is important to keep your employees well
  informed about the employee referral program to
  make it successful. When you send an email about
  the program, make sure to include the following
  information in the mail
• Job description for the open position
• Most important requirements
• Main roles and responsibilities
• Team and the department of work
• How employees should refer candidates
• What information about referrals are need
• How long does the process take
• How does the bonus/reward program work
• Why referrals are important
• How can software help to roll-out the Employee
  Referral Program?
• Technology and software can help you better the
  employee referral program
• Maintain your employee database
• Applicant tracking or recruiting software can
  help you to manage your database of employees
  well within the system. You can add or remove
  employees as and when it is required.

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One-Click Sharing This feature helps to spread
the word about a job posting like no other. With
one click, the employees can post about the job
position on their social media platform without
going through the long process. Referral
Tracking Referral tracking software helps the
employees keep in the loop about the referrals
and automate the perfect communication
process. The Employee Referral Software System
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