Can This Person Apply for This Job?

Sarnia-Lambton, Ontario’s Bluewater Health has tailored its talent acquisition system to comply with the collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) of several unions, including the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) CBA.

Union hiring limits

For instance, SEIU’s CBA contains the following articles:

• Article 11.10 “Successful applicants and newly hired employees will not be permitted to apply for job postings or any subsequent vacancies for a period of six (6) months, unless otherwise mutually agreed or an opportunity arises which allows the employee to change his or her permanent status”
• Article 11.11, “an employee who has filled a temporary vacancy will not be entitled to apply for another temporary vacancy for a period of 2 years…”

Handling union rules using multiple systems

Conditions like these come from successfully negotiated agreements. However, making sure they’re followed can be burdensome to the people responsible.

For instance, an applicant list for a Bluewater Health position can contain 20 names. Michelle Robertson, a human resources associate at the Sarnia-Lambton, Ontario area healthcare facility, would have to manually cross-reference each name against each person’s file to ensure each person is eligible for the job. Her go-to tools? “I had my spreadsheet, but I would also check the HRIS to make sure I didn’t miss anything,” Robertson recalls. If she didn’t find the right dates in the HRIS, she moved to her paper files. Once she had the date, she had to do the mental math to confirm eligibility. “I was constantly double-checking.”

Handling union rules using one applicant tracking system

Since switching to recruitment management system Njoyn, Robertson uses a customized screening report that provides eligibility employment status for all employees: full-time, part-time, contract and casual.

“This report for prescreening answers contains fields showing who is eligible and not,” Robertson explains. “I can flag them for managers.”

“Njoyn calculates eligibility so I don’t have to,” Robertson adds. “It was so manual before. I would have to check every single person. Now the information just pops up!”

This is part 5 of our 7 part in depth and expanded case study of how Njoyn integrates and provides solutions for Bluewater Health. Check out our previous blog: Applicant Tracking Made Easy to read part 4. If your ready to read on, click here for part 6: Letting Applicants Down Gently, and if you would like to learn more about Njoyn you can contact us here.