Holiday Stationstores Offers Improved Hiring to Corporate and Franchise Locations

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Headquartered in Bloomington, Minnesota, Holiday Stationstores is a recognized leader in the convenience store industry with 329 corporate-owned stores and 109 franchise stores located throughout 12 states. The company strives to offer a different kind of convenience shopping with bigger stores, wider aisles, a large selection of ready to eat food products, state of the art car washes, and most important, friendly employees. Their mission is to create a loyal customer base with great customer service, to be an employer of choice, and to be a good neighbor.

The business challenge

To consistently provide great customer service to every customer in every location, for both corporate and franchise locations, Holiday Stationstores needed a reliable method to find and hire quality people — every time. With a widely distributed hiring model, Holiday was interested in creating more consistency in the store’s hiring process as well as improving the flow of new hire paperwork. Their paper-based applications were time consuming for both job seekers and managers, and compliance with pre- and post-hire procedures was challenging, not to mention the amount and expense of paper being generated.

A plan for change

So Holiday began looking for an automated hiring and selection vendor for their hourly employees with a few things in mind:

• 1. Automated hiring
  To increase the flow of applicants, the company wanted to offer job seekers online applications. They also wanted the ability to pool applicants within given geographic regions, allowing managers to draw from available talent within their areas. And company leaders needed recruiting reports that gave them insight into regional and store-level challenges and successes.
• 2. Improving compliance and consistency
  Because their paper-based assessment required store-level administration, all applicants were required to go on site for screening causing stores to miss out on some candidates. This process also left compliance in the hands of the store managers, who had the ability to hire applicants that scored poorly on the assessment — something an automated system could better control. Holiday’s interest in a paperless new-hire process was driven by an excess of late, incomplete, incorrect, or missing new hire paperwork. In addition, the company had recently become eligible for valuable government tax credits, such as WOTC. Holiday wanted to take advantage of the credits and needed a system for administering such a program.
• 3. Paperless workflow
  Another reason to find a paperless solution was the cost of paper applications and all the other new hire paperwork. Holiday wanted a solution that allowed managers to source, screen, hire, and onboard applicants without generating expenses related to paper-based hiring.
• 4. Background Check Integration
  Integrating a third-party background check vendor with the system would also be another time saving initiative for Holiday.

An improved hiring process

It didn't take long to find a vendor who offered the functionality that Holiday was looking for — they ultimately chose Kronos' Workforce Acquisition™ and implemented the solution at all 328 corporate stores simultaneously. "We gained buy-in from our store manager group because of the improved processes, and they were excited to share applicants through the automated pooling system," says Darin Averill, Manager of Training and Recruiting for Holiday Stationstores. The system has made Holiday’s managers' lives easier. "Keeping track of applications electronically instead of saving paper applications is huge — our managers probably don't even remember what a challenge that was — then trying to find the paper application when you need it...," says Averill. "Allowing managers to search through qualified candidates, review screening information, use recommended follow up questions, applicant pooling — the list goes on and on with improved processes and efficiencies."

Online application attracts Generation X and Y job seekers

With Workforce Acquisition Holiday candidates can now apply online. "Two years ago," says Averill, "only 20 percent of our applicants applied online. Last year that jumped to 40 percent; and this year more than 60 percent of total applicants apply online. Having an online solution has positioned us very well to capture the Generation X and Y applicants who now start their job search on their computers. We find that even Baby Boomers and the Mature Generation are using the Internet as a starting point for finding a job."

Increased applicant flow and pooling

Applicant flow has increased and applicant pooling allows managers within a certain radius to share access to job seekers. "Many managers depend on applicant pooling — in the bigger cities, it's essential for providing quality applicants during times of need." Staffing new stores is also easier. The company "turns on" the web application for a new store about a month before it's scheduled to open, allowing them to build an applicant pool in advance and open new stores faster and more efficiently.

Reports identify localized and company-wide hiring issues

Recruiting reports help save payroll dollars and identify localized talent shortages and/or management problems. Company leaders can apply resources where they are needed, increasing applicant flow and/or assisting managers who lack either the time or the training to find the applicants they need within the existing talent pool. Reporting also helps identify times and days that are best for recruiting efforts on site.

Increased compliance and less paper

Holiday added Kronos Onboarding to further reduce paperwork and assist in compliance by automatically populating Federal and state forms, such as I-9s, with information from the applicant's file. Providing a positive onboarding experience for new hires is often the first opportunity to present a favorable exposure to the company culture. Automated handling of forms, without the need to re-key data already supplied during the application process, not only helps new employees get integrated and begin work more quickly, but reduces costs and ensures compliance with regulatory requirements. With the addition of Kronos Onboarding, Holiday has already seen an improvement in compliance of new hire workflows because forms are automatically generated for managers. Also within the onboarding process, store managers can now click a button to initiate a background check on the candidate prior to hire. They've reduced paper, printing, postage, and storage costs while saving labor hours for both managers and applicants. The ability to electronically sign forms is also a plus as now store managers do not have to hold paperwork for signatures.

Leveraging the corporate solution at franchise locations

The Holiday Franchise Program creates the opportunity to share in the brand recognition and marketing success experienced by Holiday. "Since Holiday started promoting the use of Workforce Acquisition to their franchise locations, those using the system have found they have a significant hiring advantage because of the online application and applicant pooling with corporate stores," Averill says. "If a franchisee doesn't have Kronos or another method of capturing online applicants, they're missing out on 60 percent of potential applicants plus the entire applicant pool shared within our Kronos system."

Holiday also uses third party job boards to help find applicants. "When an applicant applies for a job on the Holiday website or within Careerbuilder or Yahoo Hot Jobs, they are directed into Kronos to apply. We encourage franchise customers to take advantage of our third party job boards, but even if they don't, having an account with Kronos will generate applicants within the markets where we run ads because franchise stores are listed as a choice to job seekers when applying within the Kronos system."

"Franchisees that have signed on with Kronos have immediately benefited from the online application plus they now have access to applicant pooling between stores — both corporate and franchise. In addition, many of them didn't have a screening tool in place before Kronos, so the additional benefit of the pre-screening and assessment questions is extremely useful," says Averill. Franchise managers can now review the results of the prescreening and assessment questions online, and make decisions on who they interview without talking to every candidate, which saves them time.

Branding

Branding is important for Holiday Stationstores, not only for their corporate and franchise stores but for attracting applicants as well. Workforce Acquisition allows Holiday to build and configure an applicant experience that resembles their web site. The technology allows the company to market a cohesive corporate image and present a seamless experience to potential applicants. Presenting a positive image to potential employees through their application process is an important way to attract, win, and retain high quality talent.

Next steps

Holiday Stationstores expects the Kronos system to help them continue to improve and streamline the hiring process, attracting more and better applicants though the online application, and helping managers choose the right person for the right job. They plan to use more in-depth reporting to help identify and address local and regional hiring issues, and to identify where applicants heard about Holiday so they can direct resources to the most successful sourcing channels. Holiday also plans to continue to encourage their franchise stores to take advantage of the Workforce Acquisition solution so they can benefit from the consistent processes and increased applicant pool realized by corporate locations.

Holiday Stationstores management knows that attracting and hiring quality applicants has a direct impact on company profits. "Poor hiring decisions affect the whole company," Averill says. "Investing in a hiring solution to ensure we employ the highest quality people available is the right thing to do."

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