How Jotform Approvals saved Kaisercraft $40,000 and automated hiring for over 100 stores

Have you ever spent more time answering emails and discussing the thing you need to do, instead of actually doing the thing you need to do? When it came to scheduling interviews, overcommunication was quickly becoming an issue for Kaisercraft.

Overcommunication leads to underproductivity

Ruby Moorhouse is the head of retail and HR at Kaisercraft, a family-owned Australian retail company that sells gifts, homewares, stationery, and arts and crafts supplies. Kaisercraft was originally founded in Geelong, Australia, in the early 2000s and has grown to over 100 retail stores across the continent.

When Moorhouse took over as head of retail and HR, all interviews for Kaisercraft’s 100-plus stores were scheduled manually. She had to go back and forth with the store manager, who went back and forth with the candidate over the phone, until they found a time that worked, and then Moorhouse would schedule the interview in Outlook.

Since Kaisercraft is a large chain, Moorhouse and her colleagues went through this process more than 100 times per week. As a team of three, Moorhouse and the rest of the HR team simply didn’t have the time to schedule interviews this way. It took their attention away from more important matters, like growing the business. The HR team knew there had to be an easier solution.

Scalable solutions for high volume HR

To automate and streamline the interview scheduling process, the HR team initially considered Microsoft Forms, which some colleagues were already using. But they realized that it wouldn’t work for their purposes.

The data got stuck in Excel and couldn’t readily be transformed into a workflow. With so many interviews to schedule, the HR team needed a form solution that could easily become a workflow.

That led Moorhouse to look into HR systems that could automate the hiring process, but cost was a barrier.

“We probably would have bought a whole recruitment system,” Moorhouse says. “That would have done 90 percent of what we’re doing.” But recruitment systems are surprisingly expensive, “around forty grand” according to Moorhouse. Paying $40,000 AUD annually to do only 90 percent of what they needed wasn’t the ideal solution either.

Moorhouse had used Jotform to conduct surveys at a previous job. It became clear pretty quickly that Jotform was the best option for Kaisercraft in terms of cost and flexibility.

Not only could Jotform Approvals help with accepting applications and scheduling interviews, but Jotform’s suite of products could also be used by a plethora of other Kaisercraft departments. So Moorhouse turned to Jotform Approvals to automate the company’s hiring processes.

Initially, Moorhouse and her teammate Bridget Dillon started simple, with a job application and a QR code in-store — allowing candidates to apply right from their phones.

Moorhouse and Dillon set up an approval flow for store managers so they can approve or deny a candidate. After the store manager approves the interview, the HR team will send another form so the candidate can schedule an interview with the hiring manager.

“It saves a lot of time.… We had like 40–50 emails going around about something so simple that could be consolidated.”

Hiring and beyond

Once Moorhouse and her HR teammates rolled out the new process with Approvals, they saw a decrease in drop-off rates for interview scheduling. Part of the reason was because candidates could now schedule interviews on their own time, instead of having to return a phone call.

“We found we were getting a huge dropout rate when calling them to book an interview. They might not be able to pick up the phone call at 9 a.m. on a Tuesday, but they might be able to fill out [a form] at 7 p.m. that night when we’re not in the office.”

Even though Kaisercraft started using Jotform in small ways, it quickly became a core application for the HR team. Moorhouse and Dillon are now Kaisercraft’s designated Jotform users. They even persuade their colleagues to create Jotforms for their various processes. When the HR team sees a non-Jotform form at Kaisercraft, they quickly correct their colleagues.

“If anything gets created outside of [Jotform], they come to us, or we go to them like, ‘Hey, this should be a Jotform because it’s so much easier to look at the data.’ ”

Kaisercraft’s use of Jotform has expanded to the company’s marketing, operations, and even its charitable donations.

After using Jotform for almost three years, it has become a core application for the HR team and the rest of Kaisercraft.

“You know how you turn on your computer, [and] you turn on your emails. Jotform is like that to me. I just always have it open and ready to go. Because most of the stuff that we do is through [Jotform],” Moorhouse says.

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