Achieving Touchless Hiring for IDFC First Bank - a Leading Indian Bank

Discover how IDFC First Bank leveraged PMaps Assessments to identify top performers with an accuracy rate of 85%. Our case study showcases the results of using PMaps Sales and Managerial Sales Assessments, highlighting the key competencies that distinguish high performers from low performers in sales and managerial roles.

Learn how these assessments can revolutionize your talent acquisition process and help you make informed hiring decisions.

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The Organization

IDFC First Bank is a leading private-sector bank in India. It was formed by merging IDFC Bank and Capital First in 2015. The bank has gained the trust of millions of customers trust through a customer-first approach and innovation.

They have a workforce of 10,000+ employees and 600+ branches and digital channels. The bank invests heavily in technology to enhance customer experience and promote financial inclusion. They have a market cap of over 4.18 billion USD.

The Challenge

IDFC First Bank experienced difficulties while hiring. These included long offline interviews, biased selection, and poor hires.

The bank wanted to improve its recruitment process and make it touchless. They looked for a platform that could help them in recruiting. This platform would make the process of offline interviews easier, while also ensuring unbiased candidate selection.

They sought a solution to filter out unfit candidates. This solution would select suitable candidates based on their scores in assessments. It could also align them for the next stage of evaluation if needed.

Lengthy Offline Interviews

Conducting offline interviews resulted in poor hires for IDFC First Bank. The bank used to rely on traditional interviewing methods. This led to them hiring people without the appropriate skills to fit in with their corporate culture.

Longer Hiring Time

The offline interview process used by IDFC First Bank resulted in long hiring periods. The process was demanding both in terms of time and money. It called for a great deal of resources, such as the availability of the hiring team and candidates.

Lack of Objective Evaluation and Potential Biases

IDFC First Bank faced hiring challenges due to a lack of an objective evaluation process. Manual evaluation processes can be prone to bias, which adds to the difficulty. The bank was cautious about the abilities of new employees. This was because the evaluation process had been resulting in disappointing outcomes for a long time. 

Poor Sales Results

The challenges with IDFC First Bank's recruitment process resulted in the entry of unfit candidates in sales jobs with poor sales performance.

Recruiting efficiency to improve sales process:

The bank was seeking a tool to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of its hiring process. Their previous offline interview process was inefficient as it resulted in bad hires and poor performance. The bank wanted to develop a better tool for making hiring decisions. This tool would provide an unbiased evaluation and help speed up the process.

The Process

The bank identified the challenges with its offline interview process, which led to bad hires and poor performance in the sales job. They wanted a solution that would help them reduce the hiring time and improve the quality of their hires. PMaps proposed to use its Sales Test to make objective decisions.

PMaps customized the Sales Aptitude Test Design, a pre-employment assessment, to align with the bank's requirements. This was based on the key competencies identified for successful Sales Executives and Sales Leaders. Hence, a firmly established global sales framework was set up by PMaps to ensure that it was consistent with industry standards.

Upon execution of the assessment, it enabled the bank to filter candidates into three buckets – Unfit, Cautiously Recommended, and Fit. 

• Unfit candidates who scored below the industry benchmark would be rejected solely based on their scores. 
• Fit candidates, who scored above the benchmark in every competency, would be selected directly. 
• Cautiously recommended candidates, who scored average, would require a second round of evaluatuion before being selected.

The Solution

PMaps suggested two assessment designs for the bank's outbound sales positions at captive centers.

PMaps Sales Assessment 

The assessment design consisted of PMaps Teles Sales Behavior, Spoken Language capabilities, Sales skills test – Solutioning, and Applied Domain questions. The total number of questions in the assessment was 64. The average time taken to complete the test by the candidates during the pilot exercise was 19 minutes and 50 seconds.

The online sales assessment was a combination of visual, auditory, and textual questions.

The Sales Personality Test measured the right orientation of the candidate to excel in a sales role. It measured sales competencies such as Perspective Taking, Positivity, Ambiversion, and Workplace Motivation.

The Sales Skills Test – Solutioning section measured the candidates' abilities to comprehend the information given by the client. It also assessed the candidates' capacities to understand the client's information and devise solutions to their queries or worries.

PMaps Sales Management  Assessment

The assessment for sales leaders consisted of PMaps Sales Manager Assessment test, Solutioning, and Sales ability assessment – Domain questions, totaling 51 questions. On average, candidates completed the test in 30 minutes, answering a mix of visual and auditory questions that measured active listening, and textual questions.

The PMaps Sales Management Assessment evaluated candidates' leadership abilities, measuring personal and social competencies to manage themselves and others effectively. This assessment evaluated the participants' aptitude for success in a sales role. It measured personality type and competencies like Perspective Taking, Positivity, Ambiversion, and Workplace Motivation.

The sales skills assessment – Solutioning section evaluated the comprehension skills of sales reps. It assessed their ability to understand client information. It also measured the sales talent's ability to provide practical solutions to their concerns or queries. It also measured the candidate's vocabulary, grammar, and fluency to assess their communication skills.

The Domain section of the assessment evaluated the candidate's understanding and communication of the product for effective sales. This included their knowledge of sales material and their ability to answer various questions.