Lean Tackles State Hiring Processes

Dennis Van Patter, CDOT Communications Office

October 29, 2013 

Lean hiring process diagram

Lean Hiring Process 

Of all the business processes that could be examined using Lean principles, the state hiring process as administered by the Colorado Department of Transportation's (CDOT's) Human Resources may have been one of the most complex because of the intricate issues involved.

In September 2012, analyses showed that it took an average of 180 days, or half a year, to hire a new CDOT employee.  Going into the Lean process, everyone involved agreed that shortening that timeframe was essential as long as state and federal hiring guidelines and critical civil rights safeguards were not compromised.

There were many other needs, as well, such as documents for the first time how the process works and developing best practices to outline the required steps involved and to weed out any steps that were not necessary.

The project team was comprised almost equally of civil rights managers, human resources representatives, and ‘customers,’ who are CDOT employees who regularly interface with the hiring process as an end user – that is, a customer needs to fill a vacancy.  The week-long Rapid Improvement Event to kick off the process was held in September 2012.

The team developed an ambitious set of targeted outcomes, including reducing the hiring time to no more than 45-60 days, streamlining and shortening the announcement process, figuring out more far-reaching ways to announce openings and recruit rather than just relying on the state website.

Eight far-ranging inefficiencies in the process at that time were identified, as well as recommendations for improvement. 

Those recommendations were grouped into five implementation phases, as shown below:

Phase 1- Develop standardization and control over the hiring process;

Phase 2 – Develop a standardized toolkit to help the process be more efficient;

Phase 3 – Speed up the process of the hiring manager before the personnel change request is received;

Phase 4 – Regionalize recruiting efforts; and

Phase 5 – Next steps; evaluating process bottlenecks and streamlining the onboarding process.

Currently, the first two phases have been implemented.  Phases 3 and 4 are in the implementation process; Phase 5 is awaiting implementation.

By April 2013, the hiring process timeframe had been reduced to an average of 64 days, in no small part because 51 steps deemed unnecessary were eliminated.   One of the future opportunities being considered is the placement of a human resources liaison within each region who could handle much of the hiring process workload locally.

What They’re Saying

“We are continuing to improve the hiring process.  When the process began, the Lean team reported average hiring time for TM-Is at approximately 180 days.  Throughout the year we have improved processes to the point that the average hiring time for any position is 46 calendar days from PCR to referral.  Our goal this year is to further reduce the process to 50 days or less from PCR to hiring offer.”  - Dan Myers, CDOT Senior Human Resources Director.

“This new process has saved us many business days, starting from the beginning of the hiring process to the end result of having qualified applicants actively working.  We had two vacancies that were filled in 39 business days.  This process does work!” – Mary Dugan, CDOT Region 2 Civil Rights Manager.

Project Personnel

Project Sponsors

Sponsor Coalition

Project Team