Physical recruitment the smart way: here are the best practices

The pressure has eased, and now it is easier to find a sufficient number of blue-collar workers in Hungary than last year. Zoltán Varga of Magyar Suzuki Zrt. in Esztergom, which employs 3,200 people, and Mihály Nagy, the EMEA regional HR director of Dana Hungary, a manufacturer of automotive parts with 1,200 employees at four sites in Győr, agreed. Zoltán Varga noted that wages have been increased significantly in recent years and employees are looking for stable employers. Another factor that may be contributing to the lower willingness to switch is that employees are reading and hearing news that opportunities are narrowing at other companies, which is making them wary.

Winning recruitment channels

Agi Nyeste, regional HR director of Danish-owned JYSK, a home furnishings multi with 101 stores in Hungary, reported a drop in turnover. The company, which employs 810 people, currently has a ratio of 21.5 percent, lower than the retail sector average.

JYSK hires 130 employees a year. Ági Nyeste said that most applicants come from job portals(23%), the second most candidates are attracted by the company careers site (16%), and third on this list is employee referrals (15%). HR managers from all three companies noted that employee referrals are the most effective, with Suzuki currently filling vacancies only through referrals. Since 2017, they have received 3,200 applicants through this channel, which is exactly the same as their current headcount. Dana's Mihály Nagy added that 20 percent of new recruits come by recommendation, while for technician positions the figure is already 30 percent.

Off-line tools have not disappeared from the recruitment toolbox either, and in small towns, face-to-face recruitment days are effective, when you can screen and interview people very intensively in a day. Ági Nyeste said that up to 80 candidates can be screened in one day.

Nyeste Ági

In recent years, recruitment from third countries has been on the rise due to increasingly severe labour shortages. Thousands of guest workers have arrived from the Far East, mainly for the domestic manufacturing sector. Suzuki and Dana Hungary have also taken advantage of this source. Suzuki received guest workers from India and the Philippines, while Dana received guest workers from the Philippines. Zoltán Varga (Magyar Suzuki) said that they started recruiting from India in 2017, as their parent company has several factories there, and started recruiting Filipinos from 2021. "We interviewed everyone personally in India and the Philippines with our production director. They're working, they have a 0 percent turnover rate. In the peak period, 300 people were working in Esztergom at a time, now with the expiry of the three-year contracts and the stabilisation of the Hungarian job market, the number has dropped to 170." The situation is similar at Dana, with both companies below 10 percent and now on hiatus.

This is the secret to successful recruitment

Agi Nyeste said that the key to successful recruitment is speed. In their company, it is not HR but the managers who search and select new recruits in cooperation with the area manager. "We ask store managers to look at the advertisement every two days and contact candidates immediately after the screening. We only post the ad if the manager has the capacity and is not on leave," says the HR director. After the first screening, there is a video interview, followed by a face-to-face interview with the regional manager. A personality questionnaire is also part of the process - for them, soft skills and reference checks are very important. "We have a time-to-hire of 34 days from opening to offer, 28-30 would be ideal, but that's not bad either, we're close to it."

Fast recruitment is useless if it is not backed up by a thoroughly developed, multi-legged onboarding system. "In most cases, it takes two weeks to decide whether a new colleague is suitable for the job of cameraman," says Zoltán Varga. At Suzuki, new recruits learn the job on a test production line for two to three weeks and then go live. "For painters, we use an upside-down camera to teach the movements, and we fill the spray guns with water to simulate movement and weight. Colleagues watch the movements with a mentor, using a training gun, to get the routine down on the production line in real life."

Varga Zoltán

At JYSK, some of the new recruits are trained in a mentor store. This is where those who start their onboarding between 1 week-1 month in a newly opening store or where many new colleagues start at the same time. The others will learn in the store where they will work. The onboarding material is also available as e-learning on mobile phones, and the onboarding is facilitated by a buddy who is not the employee's direct supervisor. HR also keeps an eye on onboarding: after two to three weeks, they call the employee to see how they are feeling, where the process is, and after 1 month, the newcomer sits down to talk to the store manager.

Career path and training

Companies are struggling on the blue-collar front with the draining power of foreign countries. A creative and unique programme was launched four years ago by Dana Hungary. Many people from the Győr region left with industrial experience to work in Germany and Austria, reducing the available workforce. Why not take advantage of this? Dana has created a foreign posting programme for blue-collar workers. Workers could go to the group's factories in Western Europe for six months in a year and earn the local wage rate as a full member of the team. Moreover, it was not a one-off opportunity, but could be repeated several times. "The programme is a huge success. Hundreds of colleagues have worked in our factories in Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and Italy. Some have taken advantage of the opportunity three times in four years. Almost all of them came back, their English skills improved by one level, they worked in a modern technological environment, 30% of them continued their work in a higher position," said Mihály Nagy. The programme has reduced staff turnover and attracted more candidates, as word has spread that it is possible to work abroad within the group, which also means less risk.

When Mihály Nagy was asked if it was harder for a car manufacturer in Győr to do business with Audi, he replied that not at all. In fact, he said, Audi's presence and involvement in education has raised the level of knowledge available to young people, which benefits all companies. In addition, besides the German work culture dominating the region, Dana is a company with an American culture, which attracts other groups of employees. How is a company with an American culture different?" we asked. "It's a strongly performance-based work culture. If you perform better, you get extra recognition, which can be a bonus, promotion, training support. If you're good, determined and want to learn, you get maximum support to do so. Not only can you get promoted within a factory, but you can also get a job as a foreman in another factory, for example," says Mihály Nagy.

Mihály Nagy

Also an important tool in retention is the internal career path. Suzuki has launched the Suzuki Maintenance Academy, which is largely aimed at operators who, after successfully completing an intensive 3-6 month training course, can start on the maintenance career path. They learn a new trade on a full-time apprenticeship contract, at the end of which they can work in a new position under the guidance of senior technicians. The need has arisen because of the increasing number of specialised machines and technologies, and the need to be able to repair them.

How much a manufacturing company's operations are changing with technological advances and automation is shown by Suzuki's figures. In the past, their factory employed 700 welders. Today, the same work is done by 130 workers and thousands of welding robots. And they have been able to redeploy the workers they have freed up to other departments, which of course requires retraining.

Career paths can also be taken in retail. At JYSK, salespeople can start as assistant store managers and then progress to store managers and area managers. Appointments are linked to targets, which the company is meeting. At least 70 of deputy managers and 80% of managers come from within. There are also a good number of examples of students who start working for them in the summer becoming permanent employees.

All three HR directors stressed the importance of training middle managers. Dana's training programme is designed to bring managers from the four sites together to share their own good practices and learn from each other.

And that certain wage

When looking at the big picture, the most important consideration for people in manual work when taking a job is the salary they can earn, followed by the work environment and the stability of the employer. Ági Nyeste (JYSK) nuances this by saying that for Generation Z, salary is not the first priority, but direct management comes first, training second and pay third.

Companies are dealing with compliance with the EU's Betetransparency Directive. At Suzuki and Dana, colleagues know what salary band will be available with a step up. Dana also benchmarks all positions on the Hungarian market annually, based on an internationally accepted job evaluation standard.

RecruiTECH BLUE will be held on 25 September

Three HR directors will be speakers at recruiTECH BLUE, the leading conference for blue-collar recruitment, on 25 September. With around 40 programmes and more than 50 speakers, organisers are preparing to address the hot topics of the industry. "The event will address the transformation that is currently taking place: the impact of near-production automation, the transformation of the labour market, skills shortages at operator and skilled worker level with many company practices. Wage parity, understanding the economic environment, is an inevitable topic. The HR profession is expected to improve efficiency through process improvement, which is why we bring you a recent research result on improving the quality of operator selection and revving up referral systems", we learnt from recruitment expert Gábor Toldi, the conference's main organiser.