Interview with MCH Strategic Data

By Nathan Shackles

MCH Strategic Data is a data company that provides databases for institutions such as healthcare, education, religion and government.  Recently I chatted with Brenda Viets, the HR director at MCH who was responsible for selecting their Applicant Tracking System.

Hi Brenda.  Tell us about your role at MCH.

Brenda: I oversee our HR committee, which works with the typical HR stuff: benefits, employee moral issues, any kind of thing that comes up HR-wise. 

How do you use ApplicantStack?

Brenda: Well, part of my role is to maintain all of our hiring processes.  I’ve been doing this for a couple of years as the HR director, but it’s been kind of crazy because we’ve never had an online application.  People would email and request them and I would have to send PDFs over all the time and it just got to be a real hassle.  So I got to thinking, all these companies have online applications so it can’t be that hard to do it.  So I searched for a product and found ApplicantStack and started using it.  We just really needed to get that online application to our website so we can see if it would make a difference

Has it made a difference?

Brenda: It’s been very, very helpful and it saves me a LOT of time.  And our applicant count is definitely up.  Now, to be honest, I’m not sure it’s all due to having the online application, because with the economy the way it is I would expect to have more applicants, so it’s hard to measure.  But my thought is that if you make it easier for people to apply you’re going to get more applicants.  So I think some of [the increase] is due to having the online application.

What was your process before you used ApplicantStack?

Brenda: We have affirmative action requirements because we have a government contract, and in the beginning we had to even number our applications.  So I would have to scan in an application for everyone who applied and send it to them.  In time it got a little better and I would just save a PDF of the application on my desktop and I would send it out per request, but I still had to send it out every time somebody wanted an application. 

And what is your process now with ApplicantStack?

Brenda: Now, with ApplicantStack, I don’t have to do all that.  I get notified from the system when somebody has applied.  I still have to log it for our affirmative action but I don’t have to send something out to every applicant.  And the other thing is a lot of applicants would call and ask us what jobs we have available.  Previously I would literally go through each one of the positions over the phone, or email a list to them.  Now I just direct them to our website where they can see all our postings and then can even apply online.  So it’s been very helpful for us.  And the managers love it because they get everything at once, whereas before they would frequently get the application and resume separately.

What kind of jobs do you post through ApplicantStack?

Brenda: We post everything through ApplicantStack now.  Right now we have jobs posted for our IT, Sales, Marketing and Research departments, and its working great.  There was one position that I was a little leery of, because it was a lower level entry position and I wasn’t sure people would use the online application.  But I talked with the hiring manager and she was fine with trying it in the online system.  Well, since we posted the job online she’s had over 30 applications come through the online system and only 4 walk-ins.  So now all our jobs get posted online. 

Where do you post your jobs?

Brenda: We post to our website, to LinkedIn, Craigslist, Monster, and some on Careerbuilder.  We also post to KCBMA, which is a direct marketing association, and to colleges and universities.

Last question, just for fun. If you could have any job in the world, what would you want to do?

Brenda: You know, I really like what I do.  I did work in the medical insurance field before this job and the constant change was a major headache.  HR changes too but I’m very happy in this field.