AUG 2009: CAFOD will be using Bond Talent

CAFOD (Catholic Agency for Overseas Development) will be using a new IT software system to support its recruitment drives. The software, known as Bond Talent – online recruitment & talent management software – from stock market-listed Bond International Software, is an online recruitment web portal which will enable the organisation to  save up to 1,000 hours of administrative time per year.

Coomy Ogbewele, HR Information Manager at CAFOD, says, “A large amount of our recruitment is run through manual processes, which are intrinsically time-consuming. We are spending as much as eleven hours setting up each vacancy and contacting candidates, and the shortlisting can then take another two to three hours to sift through the thirty to forty applications we would receive for each vacancy.”

In 2008 CAFOD recruited for 97 vacancies. Using the Bond Talent system, the organisation will be able to automate many of the processes, especially the transfer of information to and from job boards, and between internal HR systems. Based on last year’s recruitment figures, CAFOD can expect to save up to 1,000 hours of administrative time over the whole year, leaving the Human Resources department more time to devote to CAFOD staff.

Bond Talent is a specialist application for the global recruitment and talent management markets which has been designed to greatly reduce hiring costs and to enhance the strategic capability of in-house resourcing teams. The system is user-friendly and very flexible allowing for reduced paperwork and improved efficiency. This gives key recruitment staff more time to concentrate on developmental rather than administrative tasks.

As a humanitarian organisation, CAFOD also needs to be able to source and deploy additional resources with little or no notice should a crisis develop. CAFOD currently have a talent pool but it is looked after on a largely manual basis, which is particularly hard to maintain and keep up-to date when needing to work quickly and accurately.

Ogbewele also welcomes the fact that the new system will be compatible with what CAFOD already uses. “One of Bond Talent’s key advantages was that we could integrate the recruitment software with our pre-existing HR software, therefore creating a true end-to-end talent management process. We will now be able to advertise a position, manage the applications, create a shortlist, hire and then process the successful candidate(s) directly into our HR system, all without any duplication of data entry,” Ogbewele adds.

Tim Richards, Managing Director of Bond International Software, comments, “CAFOD is a global organisation with very particular needs and demands. Bond Talent’s flexibility makes it ideally placed to fit in with CAFOD’s existing processes, as it can be deployed quickly, and it is a web-based solution that will enable the organisation to rapidly source additional and pre-vetted talent should the need arise.”