Candidate Engagement Manager - 12 Month Fixed-term Contract

Candidate Experience & Engagement Manager

12 Month Fixed-term Contract

Level 3: Assistant Director

Location: UK Wide

Hybrid working: Currently a minimum of 1 day per week in the office

Role Purpose

The Candidate Experience & Engagement Manager is responsible for leading the strategic design and delivery of a market-leading, technology-enabled candidate experience across EY’s talent acquisition lifecycle.

This role provides leadership of the Candidate Experience function, ensuring the consistent delivery of high-quality, personalised engagement for active and passive talent. The role combines operational oversight with strategic influence, driving innovation across CRM and ATS capabilities, embedding insight-led engagement approaches, and enabling scalable, efficient recruitment processes.

Working in close partnership with Recruitment, Employer Brand and Talent Intelligence, the role ensures candidate engagement strategies align to broader workforce objectives, strengthen talent pipelines and enhance EY’s employer brand in competitive markets.

Key Responsibilities

Leadership & Team Development

• Lead, coach and develop a high-performing Candidate Experience team, creating a culture of accountability, continuous improvement and collaboration
• Set clear performance expectations aligned to candidate experience outcomes, insight generation and operational excellence
• Drive capability uplift across the team, particularly in CRM/ATS usage, automation, data interpretation and strategic engagement approaches
• Foster an inclusive, high-trust environment that encourages innovation, ownership and knowledge sharing

Candidate Experience & Quality

• Own the end-to-end candidate experience framework, ensuring consistent, high-quality and brand-aligned interactions across all touchpoints
• Define and maintain standards for communication quality, responsiveness and personalisation
• Ensure a “candidate first” approach is embedded across all engagement activity, underpinned by empathy, insight and strong relationship management
• Drive continuous improvement of candidate journeys using feedback, engagement data and behavioural insights

Operational Excellence & Delivery

• Oversee and optimise candidate engagement workflows across CRM (Beamery) and ATS (SuccessFactors) platforms
• Ensure effective workload planning, capacity management and prioritisation across the team
• Maintain high standards of data quality, system usage and process compliance across all activity

Technology & Innovation (CRM/ATS)

• Act as a subject matter expert for CRM and ATS platforms, providing guidance, troubleshooting and best practice direction
• Drive the adoption and optimisation of CRM-led sourcing, automation and digital engagement tools
• Lead the testing, implementation and continuous improvement of new system capabilities and enhancements
• Champion the use of data, automation and AI-enabled solutions to improve efficiency, scalability and candidate engagement outcomes

Talent Insights & Stakeholder Partnership

• Partner with Recruitment, Employer Brand and Talent Intelligence teams to align engagement strategies, content and workflows
• Oversee the development of candidate behaviour, motivators and pipeline health
• Translate engagement data into actionable recommendations to inform candidate communications
• Act as a trusted advisor to stakeholders, influencing decisions through data-led insight and expertise

Continuous Improvement & Strategic Projects

• Identify opportunities to enhance candidate journeys, streamline processes and improve operational efficiency through data and insight
• Lead or sponsor strategic initiatives aligned to technology, process or candidate experience transformation
• Embed a test-and-learn approach across engagement activity to continuously refine and improve outcomes
• Drive innovation across candidate engagement approaches, including automation, content strategy and emerging technologies

Key Requirements

Experience

• Significant experience in candidate engagement, recruitment operations or sourcing within a complex organisation
• Demonstrated track record of leading CRM/ATS-led transformation and process optimisation
• Experience delivering scalable candidate engagement strategies and building talent pipelines
• Proven ability to influence senior stakeholders and operate as a trusted advisor

Skills & Capabilities

• Strong expertise in CRM and ATS platforms (e.g. Beamery, SuccessFactors) and associated workflows
• High level of data literacy, with the ability to interpret engagement metrics and translate into insight-led actions
• Excellent stakeholder management and communication skills, with the ability to challenge constructively
• Strong leadership capability, with experience developing and coaching high-performing teams
• Ability to balance strategic thinking with hands-on delivery and problem solving
• Continuous improvement mindset with a focus on efficiency, innovation and scalability including developing AI capabilities

Success Measures

• Delivery of a consistent, high-quality and brand-aligned candidate experience across all engagement channels
• Increased effectiveness of talent pipelines and engagement rates across CRM activity
• Adoption and optimisation of CRM/ATS capabilities, including automation and new technologies
• High-quality, actionable talent insights supporting recruitment and workforce planning decisions
• Demonstrable improvement in team capability, engagement and performance
• Strong stakeholder feedback and evidence of effective collaboration across functions