How SRG Transformed Early Careers Recruitment for a Leading Global Biopharma Company

The Situation: SRG’s Early Careers partnership with a leading Global Biopharma Company 

SRG are proud to have worked in partnership with one of the world’s leading Biopharma companies since early 2015, providing support for their UK Industrial Placement and end-to-end Early Careers programmes across all their UK sites, including nine manufacturing sites, a global R&D site and the company’s corporate headquarters. 

The company approached SRG to assist them in centralising the recruitment process for early careers talent. Historically it had been the HR team at each site coordinating the Early Talent programme independently and there was no shared process or way of working.  

In 2021, the partnership was further developed to meet growing early careers requirements, with SRG providing a full RPO and Talent Partner service that fully embeds SRG’s early careers experience and expertise within the client’s own early talent team.  

Through this fully integrated, fully managed, and connected RPO programme, which includes a dedicated, fully embedded Talent Partner who is present onsite and virtually when required, SRG are challenged to find and place the very best undergraduates on a Fixed Term Contract within the Biopharma company.  

The Solution: SRG’s full RPO and Talent Partner service 

Building on the experience and knowledge gained through our existing partnership, SRG developed an RPO and Talent Partner service for an end-to-end approach to the organisation’s early careers talent requirements. A service that allows SRG to not only work with their expert teams, but as part of them too.  

SRG’s dedicated Early Careers team, understanding the requirements of the client, their company’s values, and the way their people work, are embedded within the biopharma company’s own Early Talent Team, supporting them through the entire early talent recruitment process – from identifying their talent gaps and how to fill them to on-boarding successful candidates.  

In line with the client’s requirements, and the goals of SRG’s dedicated RPO and Talent Partner service, the responsibilities of our integrated Talent Partner and Early Careers Talent experts include: 

• Interacting with Key Stakeholders to gather job details and volumes for each campaign. 
• Managing the full job advertisement process from sign off through to job posting at go live. 
• Managing the online application process, with up to 12,000 applicants per recruitment campaign. 
• Candidate communication management using all methods including video meetings, ensuring all communication is in line with the organisation’s communication style and Tone of Voice.  
• Supporting candidates through online testing stage. 
• Managing the completed applications and progressing the applicant to the next stage of the process. 
• Screening applications for successful candidates. 
• Creating and presenting a shortlist of suitable candidates to Hiring Managers in line with pre-agreed benchmarks. 
• Organising and facilitating candidate attendance to assessment centres and interviews. 
• Ownership of Assessor Training ahead of candidate assessment centres. 
• Managing the offer and rejection process including feedback conversations.  
• Completing on-boarding and Pre-Employment Screening process. 
• Reporting on the statistics and data throughout the recruitment campaign and producing a pipeline report detailing the volumes or applications at each stage of the process, along with diversity monitoring. 

The Results: Early Careers Solutions in Action at Global Biopharma Company 

Having worked with them in the early careers space since 2015, the SRG Early Talent team understands, and embodies the client’s values themselves. 

While the way we have worked with this industry-leading company has evolved over the years, our team have drawn on our recruitment expertise in the wider scientific market to create innovative solutions to support different ways of working that benefit the overall programme. We are also equipped for agility, and can flex and scale with changing requirements, while creating a streamlined and positive journey for a high volume of applicants. 

With the Early Careers Strategy and RPO Service in place, SRG has taken the lead on the delivery and continued development of this client’s Early Talent programme, heading up a project management structure – which included stakeholders from both companies – that focuses on efficiency, quality, and cost effectiveness – whilst still ensuring needs are met and a best-in-class solution is achieved.  

The implementation of a dedicated SRG team has maximised engagement and buy-in from stakeholders; and led to the implementation of new supporting technologies and methods. 

Programme Stats: 

• Over 12,000 applicants managed each year 
• Circa 300 candidates placed every year 
• Working across 4 business areas of the global biopharma company 
• Supporting 7 UK sites 

Testimonial

“We always see huge enthusiasm from the Early Talent team at SRG to support new partnerships and initiatives, such as the 10,000 Interns programmes. At short notice, the team stepped in to help us screen and match candidates with opportunities provided by the business, allowing us to place over forty people into internships this summer. 

The insight provided by the team also allows us to understand the diversity of our pipeline right through the process, without having to wait for an end of campaign review after the fact – this allows us to take action to address challenges upfront, rather than after the fact for the following year.  

It is the proactivity of the team that impresses me most – if we see low completion rates on an assessment, the team come prepared with a proposal to address it. We get the same commitment to getting it right as if the team were in-house. I also appreciate the focus put on customer experience; the team are always going the extra mile to make candidates’ and hiring managers’ journey as positive as they can be.”

Head of Early Talent Recruitment at a Global Biopharma Company 

Need expert help with your organisation’s Early Careers requirements? 

SRG’s Early Careers team have extensive, diverse experience working with leading STEM organisations, helping them to find, attract and hire the very best early talent available to help futureproof the workforce of tomorrow, today.  

Interested in finding out how our specialist solutions can meet your needs? Talk to our experts today