MSCCN Salutes Kenexa Recruiter® BrassRing and Community Gateway:
Solution Enables Mission to Fulfill its Vision of Job Search, Placement and Applicant Tracking

For the spouses of men and women dedicated to serving our country, getting assigned to a new duty
station often creates many challenges. Not only does it require a search for new housing, it may also
mean looking for employment. Although on-site military transition programs prepare enlisted service
members and their spouses with career counseling and resume building, these programs focus on job
opportunities rather than job placement.

Because the military lifestyle requires frequent transfers—typically every three years—spouses who
arrive in a new location may find many organizations unwilling to employ them knowing there is a
finite span on their tenure. Recognizing the financial and emotional toll that recurring relocation has
on military spouses, their families and careers, Deb Kloeppel, wife of a serviceman, decided to help
families overcome potential income challenges and employment hurdles often accompany the military
lifestyle.

After founding the Military Spouse Corporate Career Network (MSCCN) in 2004 and establishing its
mission to serve as liaison between military installations, job applicants and corporate employers,
Kloeppel knew she needed to incorporate technology that would advance her vision. Receiving an
in-kind gift of state-of-the-art enterprise applicant tracking technology from Kenexa Government
Solutions, a leading provider of talent acquisition and retention solutions, Kloeppel has succeeded
in her efforts to help military families find gainful employment in corporate America.

The MSCCN is a first-of-its-kind nonprofit corporate direct-hire program dedicated to providing
career opportunities and job portability for military spouses, war wounded soldiers, caregivers and
veterans through a nationwide network of employers. Headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri, with
a virtual presence around the world, the MSCCN is the only military spouse site in the nation that
is not funded by the Department of Defense.

From the beginning, the MSCCN set out to distinguish itself from other military-facing non-profit
organizations, and was determined to provide services that military installations could use to help
families deal with income challenges and help military spouses be considered part of the viable
talent pool.

“We wanted to do more than just give out funds,” explained Kloeppel, who is also the organization’s
president. “We wanted a true solution that could set their life path of earning power. In the military
household, just as in a civilian household, if there are income challenges, everything is a struggle.
We wanted to help our military families alleviate the need for money by helping military spouses find
employment.”

Kloeppel searched for over a year to find the right technology to connect military installations with
corporate employers. Through one of the MSCCN’s five independent contractors, she secured a
meeting that introduced her to Kenexa Government Solutions and its enterprise applicant tracking
solution, Kenexa Recruiter® BrassRing. Immediately, Kloeppel knew the solution would enable
MSCCN to realize its vision of providing more than job opportunities, but job placement.

“Kenexa gave us a generous, in-kind gift of a ‘Cadillac of technology’ and the ability to track
applicants,” Kloeppel said. “To my knowledge, no other military employment endeavor, DOD funded
or not, offers applicant tracking.”

Kenexa Recruiter BrassRing allows organizations to reach candidates throughout the world. Part of
the solution includes Kenexa’s Community Gateway, which fosters a creative, collaborative and
interactive communicative community for recruiters and candidates. With four separate module
options, Community Gateway allows companies to attract more qualified candidates, integrate
more tightly with job boards and track potential candidates, allowing for more effective recruiting.

Implemented in Spring 2005, the MSCCN first focused on military installations and explained how
the organization could help. The Kenexa system enabled interested applicants to register, post
resumes, and apply to requisitions of interest to them. The MSCCN also established corporate
partners—companies that were military friendly and willing to hire spouses, war wounded soldiers
and veterans—and delivered access to the system to corporate recruiters who could search for
applicants whose skills met requirements for open positions.

“Working with Kenexa enables us to reach out to larger demographics,” said Trina Miller, Executive
Director of the MSCCN. “We are able to extend different types of employment opportunities not
just for independent contractors working for MSCCN, but for job seekers who might be in various
rural locations or overseas.”

To date, the organization has nearly 3,100 resumes in its system, and for a niche group such as
military spouses, that type of accumulation in a short period of time demonstrates strength in
numbers.

“Corporations that are military friendly know they are hiring spouses, war wounded soldiers and
veterans,” she continued. “Applicants used to move to a new community and have to identify
those corporations that would understand the military lifestyle. Now, these individuals have
access to companies with a proven reputation of catering to their unique needs.”

Recruiters are able to view resumes on Kenexa’s Community Gateway, make notes to applicant
profiles and contact applicants directly through the system. “The nice thing about the Kenexa
solution is that it doesn’t take a lot of time to get into the system and understand it,” added
Becky Brillon, Gateway Team Lead for the MSCCN. “Every employer we work with has a
different way to use our system and our services. We have to be mindful of Office of Federal
Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) guidelines for some of our employers. Others receive
60,000 resumes on their own web site everyday, and some organizations may only need to fill
one or two positions each year. However, they all seek the same outcome and Kenexa provides
the universal system that brings everything together.”

The Kenexa system provides a common area for the MSCCN, military installations and corporate
America to come together, share information in an efficient way and meet mutually beneficial
needs.

“The corporations are getting highly qualified, skilled job seekers who are ready to work, and
our job seekers are able to be introduced to positions in corporate America that they would
not have had access to previously,” said Miller. “We are able to demonstrate a return on
investment to our corporate employers that comes from our ability to document, track and
report what we are able to do for them. Through the Kenexa system, we can show how many
referrals were made, what the cost saving was and how many referrals were actually hired.
We are also able to generate internal reports so we can identify areas for improvement. We
can see what we did last month and how we can do it better.”

For recruiters, features such as candidate scoring and ranking help prove compatibility between
candidates and jobs, create an easy process to upload multiple requisitions and provide
automatic communication with candidates.

”Kenexa has thought of everything,” said Brillon. “For every feature, there’s a short cut or
another way to accomplish what you need to get done. The system is an efficiency tool that
saves so much time. The overnight auto filer lets me know which candidates applied and
those who match a new requisition making my job easier. I can look at them and send a
communication right from the Kenexa system. Not only does it improve communication with
candidates, but it documents it, too.”

For job applicants, the system enables MSCCN to serve as a life-long generational career
management partner. “One feature we have through Kenexa is the ability to generate e-mail
reminders a few years in advance to prompt our recruiters to make contact with individuals
when they are ready for a change of station and need new employment,” said Miller. “In the
future, we see stronger development of a career advancement team for applicants. Before
they do their permanent change of station, we want applicants to get back into the system
so we can help them find a new position in their next duty station.”

“Without Kenexa, it would really limit the ability that military spouses, war wounded soldiers
and veterans would have as far as accessing good corporate-level positions. Kenexa helps
these individuals obtain employment much quicker than they would on their own.”

Concludes Kloeppel, “From the beginning, we wanted the program to have a very long shelf
life and offer the value of life-long career management. When you look at service to your
country, Kenexa did something no one else stepped up to do. Kenexa told us, ‘put your
people in jobs.’ By giving us this in-kind service, ongoing support and technology, it has
enabled us to truly connect the military applicant to corporate direct hire placement
opportunities. Kenexa truly is the heart and soul of our operation.”