2025
YOUR YEAR IN HIRING
How big was this year, really?
Candidates who went from “You’re Invited” to “I’ll do it”
Vodafone candidates completed at least one Sova assessment.
Six figures of people who didn’t just apply, but engaged.
Where the work happened
What Vodafone
candidates actually did
on Sova
Out of the 121,565 completions, here’s what Vodafone candidates did on the Sova platform
Assessment
blended / personality / cognitive
60,783
~50% of all completions
Video Interview
strategic second lens
59,566
~49% of completions
VAC
including 36 Pearson assessments
1,216
~1% of completions
What this says about Vodafone’s hiring strategy
Almost half of all completions include video.
Vodafone’s hiring teams are not just assessing people as scores, They're seeing and hearing them at scale.
Assessments and video are equal citizens.
The balance between assessments and video signals a structured, multi-lens hiring model.
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VAC is tightly focused.
High-touch stages are reserved for the most serious candidates, exactly where recruiter time should be spent.
459
Completions in that single hour (aggregated across the year)
0.48%
of Vodafone’s yearly completions
When the magic happened
Vodafone’s peak hiring moment
That’s the moment when:
TA teams were juggling dashboards, hiring managers, and Slack messages.
Thousands of candidates were mid-assessment, wondering if they saw themselves more as a team player or as an independent worker.
Across all the Sova clients, the distribution is similar
Weekdays
~13–14k
completions
completions
Higher peaks
Tues/Weds
The power days for candidate activity
Friday afternoon
Everyone mentally off for the weekend already
Weekends
~10k
completions
completions
Lower peaks but more evenly spread
Sunday 4pm
Steady ~10k completions
the “okay, I’ll be productive before Monday” crowd
What this means for you:
Start the Week Strong
If your campaigns open or reminders go out early in the week, you’re perfectly aligned with candidate behaviour.
Be Ready When Activity Peaks
Support and comms should be staffed and ready around mid-week daytime – that’s when the hiring machine is busiest.
Candidate experience:
did they finish
what they started?
Once candidates start the assessment process, they tend to see it through.
Completion rate
Vodafone completion rate once candidates start: 84%
Global average across all Sova clients: 86%
Global average across all Sova clients: 86%
What this means:
The biggest drop-off happens before candidates begin the experience, and that’s not a problem to solve.
It suggests early self-selection: people who are not interested or ready opt out quickly. Those who do start are engaged enough to continue, and the vast majority of them finish.
In practice, this means Vodafone is spending time on candidates who are already committed.
It suggests early self-selection: people who are not interested or ready opt out quickly. Those who do start are engaged enough to continue, and the vast majority of them finish.
In practice, this means Vodafone is spending time on candidates who are already committed.
Who finished an assessment
Who did not finish an assessment
Time On Task: respecting candidates’ time
Vodafone average assessment time: 12.6 minutes.
Global Sova average: 19.8 minutes.
Global Sova average: 19.8 minutes.
This puts Vodafone in the “short, sharp and meaningful” zone, long enough to gather quality data, short enough not to feel like a second job.
Device habits
Once upon a time, applying for jobs was a desktop-only affair. Not anymore.
While desktop remains dominant, mobile usage has grown from under 2% in 2019 to nearly a third of all applications today.
Efficiency & time saved: the recruiter-time reality check
Using a conservative 15-minute manual screening call assumption:
121,565 candidates × 15 minutes =
1,823,475
minutes saved
that’s
30,391
recruiter hours saved
or around
15
full-time recruiter years reclaimed
And again, this ignores interviews, scoring, and VAC time. The real saving is significantly higher.
The takeaway
This was Vodafone’s year in hiring with Sova
Over 121,000 candidates didn’t just apply, they showed up. They completed the process and engaged with Vodafone’s roles around the world.
Hiring stayed focused, fair, and respectful of people’s time. Short, meaningful experiences meant candidates finished what they started, and recruiters spent their energy where it mattered.
And your recruiters reclaimed the equivalent of fifteen years of working time. Time no longer lost to admin or early screening, but reinvested in making recruitment feel human, even on a global scale.
Thank you!
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