How NKT Improved Candidate Experience with SAP SuccessFactors Career Site Builder

How NKT Made SAP SuccessFactors Career Site Builder Work Harder

NKT worked with Effective People to revamp its SAP SuccessFactors Career Site Builder experience, improving the way candidates find jobs, understand open roles and move into the application process.

The project focused on the career site as the front door to recruitment. NKT already had strong employer-brand content on its corporate website, but the job search and job posting experience sat outside the standard Career Site Builder flow. That meant NKT could not fully benefit from standard SuccessFactors capabilities such as analytics, source tracking and enhanced job discovery.

By bringing job search and job postings back into Career Site Builder, NKT created a more seamless candidate journey, reduced technical complexity and built a stronger foundation for future recruitment transformation, including the planned move towards SmartRecruiters.

A career site is not just a website

A career site is often the first real handshake between a company and a candidate.

It is where a person decides whether a role feels relevant. Whether the company feels credible. Whether applying is worth the next ten minutes of their life.

For NKT, this mattered.

The company wanted to improve the candidate experience before moving further on its SmartRecruiters journey. Rather than treating recruitment technology as a back-office system change, NKT started with the visible part of the journey: the career site.

That decision shaped the whole project.

The challenge: a strong corporate career site, but a fragmented job journey

Before the project, NKT’s broader career content lived on the corporate website. Candidates could explore employer-brand content, benefits, frequently asked questions and other information about working at NKT.

The issue was not the quality of that content.

The issue was the connection between employer-brand content, job discovery and the application process.

Job search and job postings were hosted on the corporate website. When a candidate clicked to apply, they were redirected into the SuccessFactors application flow. From the candidate’s point of view, the journey could feel like moving between two different environments.

From a technical point of view, NKT was bypassing much of the value available in SAP SuccessFactors Career Site Builder.

That created practical limitations. NKT could not fully use standard SuccessFactors career-site capabilities such as source tracking, analytics, resume and skills-based job search, and features like Apply with LinkedIn. The setup also required integrations to fetch job information from SuccessFactors and display it on the corporate website.

Those integrations added complexity.

For example, a job could still appear on the corporate career site after it had already closed in SuccessFactors. A candidate might click apply, only to find that the role was no longer available.

Nobody wants that moment.

NKT wanted a smoother, more reliable candidate journey.

What did NKT want to achieve?

NKT wanted to make the career-site experience feel like one connected journey.

The corporate website would continue to do what it already did well: tell the broader employer-brand story. Career Site Builder would become the standard place for job search, job postings and the start of the application flow.

The goal was not to replace the corporate career site. The goal was to connect it better with SAP SuccessFactors.

Candidates should be able to move from career content to job search to application without feeling a break in the experience. They should be able to understand the role, understand the process and decide whether to apply without unnecessary friction.

That sounds simple.

It rarely is.

How Effective People Improved NKT’s SAP SuccessFactors Career Site

Effective People helped NKT deliver a revamped SAP SuccessFactors Career Site Builder experience focused on job search and job postings.

The solution used standard Career Site Builder functionality, supported by carefully selected custom components where the standard design options were not enough.

The project included:

• A redesigned job search and job posting experience in Career Site Builder

• A closer visual connection between the NKT corporate website and the Career Site Builder pages

• Standard SuccessFactors job discovery functionality, including filters and map-based job search

• Custom job posting components to support candidate decision-making

• A tailored experience for internal and external candidates

• English and German language support

• Mobile, tablet and desktop testing

• Browser testing across different candidate scenarios

• Admin training so NKT could maintain key parts of the solution after go-live

The result was a more standard, more maintainable setup that allowed NKT to get more value from SAP SuccessFactors.

What changed for candidates?

The new Career Site Builder experience makes it easier for candidates to find relevant jobs and understand what happens after they apply.

One example is the “back to search results” function.

A candidate can filter jobs, open a posting and then return to the same filtered search results. The site remembers the search context. To the candidate, it feels natural. Behind the scenes, it required a custom component.

That is the kind of detail that defines good candidate experience.

The job posting pages also became more useful. NKT and Effective People added content designed to help candidates make a better-informed decision before applying.

This included:

• A “what to expect when you apply” section

• Benefit-related content

• Employee testimonial content, including video

• Frequently asked questions embedded directly in the job posting

The testimonial component was designed so candidates could see different employee stories across visits. The FAQ section was embedded in the job posting, helping candidates find relevant information without leaving the page.

The job posting became more than a job description.

It became a decision point with context.

Why internal candidates mattered too

One of the strongest parts of NKT’s approach was the attention given to internal candidates.

Career-site projects often focus mainly on external applicants. NKT chose to treat internal candidates with the same care.

The new setup supports different content depending on whether the visitor is an internal or external candidate. For example, the FAQ content can be tailored to the audience.

That matters because internal candidates do not always need the same information as external candidates. They may already know the company, but they may need clarity on process, mobility, expectations or how internal applications are handled.

NKT did not leave that experience to chance.

How the project reduced technical complexity

Before the revamp, NKT relied on integrations between SuccessFactors and the corporate website to display job information.

The new setup reduced that dependency.

By using Career Site Builder for job search and job postings, NKT moved closer to the standard SuccessFactors model. That means less integration maintenance and fewer timing gaps between where jobs are managed and where candidates see them.

The practical benefit is simple: if a candidate sees a job in the Career Site Builder search experience, the role is available to apply for.

That is a small sentence with a big impact.

Balancing standard functionality and custom design

SAP SuccessFactors Career Site Builder is designed so non-developers can create and manage career-site pages. That is one of its strengths.

It also has design limitations.

NKT wanted a modern candidate experience that reflected its brand and removed friction from the journey. Effective People therefore introduced a balanced level of custom HTML, CSS and JavaScript to improve specific parts of the experience.

This was done carefully.

Custom code can create better experiences, but it also requires governance. Future SAP releases can affect page structures, which means customised components should be tested during release cycles.

Effective People and NKT discussed these trade-offs openly and built the solution with maintainability in mind. For example, coded FAQ components were structured so NKT administrators could update the questions and answers without needing developers for every content change.

The project was not about customising for the sake of it.

It was about using the right amount of customisation to create a better candidate experience.

Why this matters for future SmartRecruiters readiness

This is first and foremost a SAP SuccessFactors Career Site Builder story.

SmartRecruiters matters because of where NKT’s recruitment transformation is heading next.

With SAP bringing SmartRecruiters into the recruitment landscape, organisations using SuccessFactors need to think carefully about the candidate-facing foundation. A future ATS implementation should not be treated as a purely technical change. Candidates experience the journey, not the system architecture.

By improving Career Site Builder first, NKT created a stronger front end for recruitment. The career site can later support the transition towards SmartRecruiters without forcing the organisation to solve candidate experience and ATS change at the same time.

That is the strategic value of the project.

NKT improved what candidates see today while preparing for what recruitment technology will need tomorrow.

Project timeline

The project was originally planned conservatively for four months.

NKT and Effective People completed the work in approximately two to three months, going live about one month earlier than planned.

That pace was possible because NKT had a clear vision and made decisions quickly. Career-site projects often require input from talent acquisition, marketing, IT and other stakeholders. NKT was well aligned internally, which helped the project move forward without unnecessary delay.

Results: A More Connected and Reliable Candidate Experience

The new Career Site Builder experience gives NKT a more connected and reliable candidate journey.

Candidates can now move more naturally from employer-brand content into job search and application. Job postings include richer information. Internal and external candidates receive more relevant content. The experience has been tested across languages, devices and browsers.

NKT has also reduced the technical complexity involved in displaying jobs on the corporate website.

Early feedback from the client has been positive. Because the launch was recent at the time of the interview, long-term metrics such as application volume, conversion, candidate drop-off, application quality and engagement still need to be collected and validated.

That distinction matters.

The project should not be measured only by whether application numbers increase. A better candidate experience may also lead to better-aligned applications because candidates understand the role, process and company more clearly before they apply.

What can other talent acquisition leaders learn from NKT?

NKT’s approach offers a useful lesson for talent acquisition leaders using SAP SuccessFactors.

You can expect more from Career Site Builder.

The standard tool has limitations, especially from a design perspective. But with the right governance, careful customisation and a strong understanding of the candidate journey, it can support a much better experience than many organisations assume.

NKT did not treat the career site as decoration.

The team treated it as recruitment infrastructure.

That mindset made the difference.

A candidate does not care which system powers the page. They care whether the role is easy to find, whether the content is useful and whether the next step feels clear.

NKT made that experience better.

Key takeaway

NKT’s career-site revamp shows how SAP SuccessFactors Career Site Builder can become a stronger front door to recruitment when candidate experience, employer brand and technology are designed together.

The project improved the current candidate journey while creating a more standard and future-ready foundation for recruitment transformation.

For organisations preparing for SmartRecruiters, that is a smart place to start.