Case Study - Victorian Government Agency Graduate Program Review

Overview

PBC was engaged by a Victorian government agency to conduct a review of their graduate attraction, recruitment, selection, development and retention processes. The agency had recently developed a new strategic direction and were also aiming to improve gender diversity across the organisation. The aim of the review was to determine how well the agency’s graduate program aligned with the organisational strategy.

Approach

PBC worked closely with the agency to determine their vision for the review and to gain an understanding of their aims. Based on our conversations with the client, PBC was able to identify a range of data collection methods that would provide the best reflection of the graduate program at this time. To determine the degree of alignment between processes and the corporate strategy, PBC employed four main methods of data collection:

1. Review of documentation – PBC partnered with the agency to gain access to documents relevant to the graduate program and reviewed these to assess their alignment with the organisational strategy.
2. Subject Matter Expert (SME) interviews – PBC developed and conducted interviews with a number of the agency’s SMEs in graduate recruitment and development to gain a deeper level of insight into the graduate program and to gauge perceptions within the organisation
3. Focus groups – PBC developed and conducted focus groups with a range of stakeholders within the organisation to further develop our understanding of the graduate program and gain another perspective on the themes raised in the interviews
4. Pulse survey – PBC designed and conducted a pulse survey with a cross section of stakeholders within the graduate program to gain insight from a larger sample and to have a source of comparison for other data collection methods.

We then analysed and aggregated the data collected to gain an overall picture of the organisation’s graduate program. From this data analysis, PBC was able to identify a range of key themes, strengths and opportunities for the organisation.

Outcome

From the data collected PBC developed a comprehensive report that was presented to the client. The report identified the areas where the agency was performing well and recommendations for further improvement. We were able to provide the organisation with a range of recommendations for not only aligning their graduate program more closely with the organisational strategy, but also for wider agency alignment. Using a range of data collection methods also allowed PBC to develop recommendations that were both tailored to the agency and considered the issues that were relevant to the sector that the organisation was operating within.