Powerback Converts 55% of Employee Referrals into Hires with Hellora: Filling Roles in 16.4 Days and Retaining 86%

The Problem

Powerback's referral program relied on manual checks across disconnected systems, and frontline therapists had no easy way to refer candidates or track their referrals

Powerback competes for therapists in some of the tightest clinical labor markets in the country, and California is among its hardest to fill. Most of its 9,000+ employees work in patient-facing roles, and more than half are PRN, so very few of them sit at a computer during the day.

Referrals were one of Powerback's best potential sources of clinical talent, but the way the program ran made them hard to scale:

Manual eligibility checks. Multiple teams verified referral and bonus eligibility across disconnected systems.

Constant status questions. Employees had no mobile access and no way to see where their referral or bonus stood. They had to ask, and TA and HR answered every inquiry by hand.

Reliance on contract staff. With too few referrals coming in, Powerback leaned heavily on purchased services to cover open needs. That spend was one of its largest and fastest-growing labor costs.

Solution with Hellora

Powerback launched Hellora on top of iCIMS and UKG, giving frontline employees a text-based way to refer and giving the TA team fully automated tracking

Employees can now refer a candidate by text in seconds, with no app or login, or through a desktop portal if they prefer. Every referral flows into iCIMS automatically, and application statuses sync back. Employees get real-time updates on where their referral stands and when their bonus is coming. Eligibility checks and payroll reporting run automatically against UKG, which replaced the manual work across systems.

To build awareness, Hellora supported Powerback with rollout communications, branded banners, posters, and referral cards for its facilities, and targeted text campaigns that let the TA team push hard-to-fill roles – such as therapists in California – to the employees most likely to know a good candidate.

The Results

Since launching Hellora, Powerback has hired 58.8% of referred applicants, filled those roles in 16.4 days on average, and kept 86% of referral hires on staff

Employees made 327 referrals, and 306 of those candidates applied – a 93.6% referral-to-application rate, compared with the typical 7–10%.

Of the 306 applicants, 180 were hired – a 58.8% application-to-hire rate, compared with an industry average of 2%.

Referral hires also moved quickly. The average time from application to hire for referrals was 16.4 days, compared with a 54-day benchmark – more than three times faster, or about five weeks saved per hire.

And referral hires are staying. Of the 154 who have started, 133 are still active – 86% retention, or 13.6% turnover, compared with the 50% benchmark.