HM Treasury: Building Inclusion into the Early Careers Candidate Experience

Situation

Every year His Majesty’s Treasury (HMT) recruits up to 150 graduates for their Graduate Policy Adviser program, offering the chance to shape policies that affect a nation. A popular proposition, they sought PeopleScout’s help to identify the very best candidates from almost 2,500 applications. While well-subscribed, delivering a satisfactory candidate journey had historically proved to be a challenge, and they were keen for our help to improve the application experience.

A key objective was to attract a more diverse range of candidates, reflecting the the UK population they serve. Specifically, they wanted to engage a wider socio-economic, gender, ethnic and disability community. Understanding—and addressing—any adverse impacts on these groups was essential.

Solution

Our goal was to shift the perception that HMT roles are primarily financial when, in fact, communication and analytical skills are the most important abilities. Understanding this helped us to broaden the sweep of our attraction strategy while also developing a strategy to target specific talent groups.

We reviewed all of HMT’s assessment materials to establish their fairness and to ensure they represented best practice. We also monitored every stage of the recruitment process for any adverse impact.

We established a structured schedule of nurture emails, regularly updating candidates on their application status. Our recruitment team supported candidates throughout their entire recruitment journey.

We also applied a reasonable adjustment process, making sure that every candidate with a disability-related request was personally contacted to assess their requirements. For example, a disabled candidate was unable to complete the online test, so we worked with the test provider to replicate the evaluation in Microsoft Excel, and allowed the candidate to complete the test at our offices in London. The candidate was successful and progressed to the next stage.

“The attraction campaign generated 49% of all applications and increased applications from key target audiences—particularly women, those from underrepresented groups and state schools.”

Results

All hiring targets were achieved. The attraction campaign generated 49% of all applications and increased applications from key target audiences—particularly women, those from underrepresented groups and state schools.

HMT was thrilled with the results—so much so that they have asked us to take on further campaigns.