How L’Occitane delivers a world-class experience that’s improved candidate Net Promoter Score by 60%

L’Occitane’s challenge is one retailers know all too well: To create a compelling user experience for candidates and hiring managers while keeping pace with the dynamic speed of the market. Understanding what drives great candidates to act—and snagging them before they accept roles elsewhere—has been especially tricky for brands worldwide, and L’Occitane’s legacy Applicant Tracking System (ATS) was not helping them gain an edge on the market.

The old software was primarily an HRIS, so using the ATS tool looked good on paper—but in practice, the recruiting functionality fell short. Workflows were lengthy, unintuitive, and time-consuming. “It didn’t empower our hiring managers to look after their roles,” Sam told us. The limited control and slow pace of implementing changes was a hurdle that proved especially prohibitive during seasonal hiring peaks. 

Things came to a head during the holiday recruitment rush in 2021, when it became painfully clear that the old ATS had failed to evolve with L’Occitane’s needs. Hiring managers were “going rogue” with individualized workarounds (such as spreadsheets and their own work emails) in an effort to attract the candidates they needed, so the team used Indeed as a makeshift ATS while in search of a more effective solution. According to Sam, it was a painful way to discover that the tool “wasn’t fit for purpose” and was hindering their hiring processes.

To regain hiring manager buy-in, Sam involved them in the ATS selection process from the beginning. “We felt it was important they were involved in choosing the software they’d be using to hire,” she explained. When Talent Gleam emerged as the clear winner, Sam was sold by both the platform’s functionality and the transparency of Talent Gleam’s pricing model. 

“Sales can be great, and then it turns out you’ve got something completely different than the dream you were sold. That’s not the case with Talent Gleam.”

To stand out in a competitive marketplace, Sam and her team needed a way to tell L’Occitane’s story so that the next generation of leaders would be sure to find it. The old system was too sluggish to paint an accurate and appealing picture of their employer brand, so Sam sought out a flexible and timely system that could meet applicants’ changing needs.

The L’Occitane’s careers page was built in a fraction of the time anticipated, and her team is proud of the way it captures L’Occitane’s health- and eco-conscious brand. “The Pinpoint design team nailed it early on,” she said. “It always felt very consultative, like a true partnership.” 

Now, applicants have a place to view videos and other media that help them understand the brand before they apply.

Improving the user experience for both candidates and hiring managers was at the top of Sam’s priority list when she set out to deploy a new ATS. Comments attached to their Net Promoter Scores were sometimes painful to read, but they were also a gold mine of valuable feedback.

For example, when Sam noticed candidates expressing confusion over where they stood in the recruitment process, she implemented auto-responses letting them know when they could expect to hear back. 

Since implementing Talent Gleam, L’Occitane has received increasingly positive candidate feedback, and their net promoter score has increased to a world-class rating of 80.

Hiring managers, too, have found Talent Gleam to be so user-friendly that they’re no longer going rogue with individualized workarounds. Instead, they’re working within the platform to respond to candidates faster and ensure they’re never left in the dark. 

By increasing team efficiency without sacrificing candidate experience, L’Occitane has been able to shorten time to fill by 23%. 

Sam’s recruitment team has regained control over the hiring process now that they can quickly modify workflows and templates based on feedback or best practices. 

L’Occitane’s recruitment team and hiring managers are empowered to take action on their own, with responsive support when needed. In one recent example, Sam was able to respond instantly to candidate feedback by adding options to their diversity questionnaire that accurately reflect the needs of L’Occitane’s candidate pool.

Transparency has played a vital role in Sam’s success. She involved hiring managers in the process from the earliest stages to help ensure that Talent Gleam became L’Occitane’s system, not just HR’s. 

Sam is a strong believer in overcommunication, and that belief paid off when she was rolling out Talent Gleam. She invited small groups of hiring managers to “beta test” the platform as it was being implemented to keep the team engaged. In the early days, she regularly shared hiring updates and stats to demonstrate Talent Gleam’s value. Today, their 150+ hiring managers don’t need any convincing. 

Whenever additional support is needed, Talent Gleam is just a quick phone call or chat message away. Sam has trained the hiring managers to use the chat as a first option and raves about Talent Gleam’s responsiveness. “There’s never been a question they couldn’t answer,” she says. 

Because most of L’Occitane’s hiring managers are remote or in boutiques, Sam made sure the basics of recruitment were well established before turning her attention to the next priority: Retention. 

Offers are now managed through Talent Gleam, replacing clunky manual processes, and the corporate team runs their onboarding through the platform. In-store onboarding through Talent Gleam isn’t too far in the future, either. “We’ve got a big onboarding project going on where we’re testing it from a retail perspective,” said Sam.

With less time spent on manual admin tasks, Sam and her team are free to focus on what’s most important: creating an unparalleled experience of L’Occitane’s employer brand.