Filling the talent gap with innovative recruitment strategies

An Accenture survey of 1,088 U.S. workers and unemployed citizens tells the story: The majority of workers surveyed (55%) report that they are under pressure to develop additional skills to succeed in their current and future jobs. But only 21% say they have acquired new skills through formal, company-provided training during the past five years; only 6% have participated in training through podcasts and other informal mechanisms.

While employees take the responsibility to develop their own skills, they’re not getting good guidance from employers about exactly which skills would be most beneficial. As a result, they tend to focus narrowly on technology skills, the Accenture survey reports. Few people have updated other in-demand skills such as problem-solving or analytics.

The Accenture study highlights that there are a number of important innovations in the recruiting and hiring fields that can make it easier to find top-performing, skilled talent on a global basis, quickly and more cheaply. Recent company expernce suggests a number of ways to take advantage of these new techniques

1. Use social media platforms to find talent yourself

Instead of relying on expensive headhunters or job postings, many organizations are moving toward identifying the ideal candidates through social media sites such as LinkedIn or Taleo Talent Exchange, and then contacting those people directly, often with customized employment offers.

When gaming company Red 5 Studios was struggling to compete with large technology companies for skilled developers, for example, it didn’t post a job opening at all. Instead, it identified a list of ideal candidates, learned what it could about each, and then created individualized employment pitches that were recorded on iPods sent to candidates in attention-grabbing Russian-doll-style nested boxes

1. 2. Identify and filter people by looking beyond what’s listed on their résumés

Numerous studies have found that screening people by looking for key words on a résumé is not an effective way to predict performance. Such an approach can also lead companies to cast their nets too narrowly, missing potential top performers.

New startups are emerging to help companies alter that approach inexpensively, teaching them how to use competency, skills or cultural fit assessments on the front end of the screening process to supplement the initial, résumé-based screening.

Other companies, including Google, are broadening their search for skilled people by screening candidates based on the quality of their work or their personal biography—not only where they went to school or what work experiences they’ve had.

The company might, for instance, ask a series of detailed biographical questions shown to be statistically correlated with top performance at the company: Have you ever set a world record in anything? Have you ever started a club? What Internet mailing lists do you subscribe to? Google also stages work competitions (for software coding, for example), with the winner getting the open position.

Accenture envisions new Internet companies that will work much like a dating service. This would enable closer matches between job candidates and companies, through profiles that contain such information (properly protected and secured) as samples of actual work, assessment scores, answers to biographical questions, competition results, pre-recorded videos with answers to common behavioral interview questions, work motivators and interests, geographic preferences and more.

3. Forge relationships with potential employees before you need them

When 3D design software company Autodesk was having trouble finding skilled candidates, it realized that it needed to proactively build relationships with potential hires on an ongoing basis.

Explains Matthew Jeffery, head of talent acquisition, “It’s all about opening up a conversation to create a talent pipeline. This doesn’t mean just posting your jobs on Facebook; it means revealing your culture, how people are having fun, what the jobs are really like, even the silly things that go on in your office. It’s about being authentic and transparent, and engaging your own employees to be a brand ambassador in a human way, and helping build emotional connections.”

By actively engaging in conversations with candidates, Autodesk built a Facebook community of more than 150,000 members in just 12 months, creating an active and interested talent pool to draw from when the company is ready. Candidate relationship databases that work much like customer relationship marketing databases can also help a company send periodic tailored information to interested parties, creating ongoing relationships a company can tap into when opportunities arise.

4. Hire from alternative talent pools

Increasingly, companies are finding innovative, off-the-beaten-track ways to find skilled people. One way of achieving this is to target selected industries with a surplus of workers.

In the United States, for example, healthcare companies have worked to retrain displaced autoworkers. Entergy Corp., a US energy company, targets ex-military personnel to fill positions as varied as repair technicians and nuclear engineers. JetBlue Airways staffed its reservations department with mostly stay-at-home workers who can take reservations while still caring for their households.

Organizations are also increasingly targeting workers in different geographic regions, including countries where the companies are not headquartered, where there is a surplus of talent in specific skill sets.

4. Partner with schools to help develop the skills you need

An often gaping disconnect between what a student learns in school and the needs of employers contributes significantly to the global skills crisis. But today, leading companies are working with universities, community colleges and trade schools to develop a pipeline of people to recruit years before they need them.

For example, HCL Technologies, an Indian-based global technology services company, has entered into collaborative partnerships with 25 top engineering colleges in India. Managers at HCL review the curriculum and offer input to the colleges, which then tweak and revise the courses as needed to meet the company’s requirements. HCL also works as a member of the national consortium of IT companies called NASSCOM (National Association of Software and Services Companies), helping to define and communicate the skills required in the industry, including the levels of supply and demand for those skills.

What are you doing to help with filling the talent gap?

Seth Godin: If you’re an average worker, you’re going straight to the bottom…

The way we do business is changing fast and in order to keep up, your entire mentality about work has to change just as quickly.

Unfortunately, most people aren’t adapting fast enough to this change in the workplace, says marketing guru Seth Godin in an interview with the Canadian talk show “George Stroumboulopoulos Tonight” (via Pragmatic Capitalism).

According to the founder of Squidoo.com and author or 13 books, the current “recession is a forever recession” because it’s the end of the industrial age, which also means the end of the average worker.

“For 80 years, you got a job, you did what you were told and you retired,” says the former vice president of direct marketing at Yahoo! People are raised on this idea that if they pay their taxes and do what they’re told, there’s some kind of safety net, or pension plan that’s waiting for them. But the days when people were able to get above average pay for average work are over.

If you’re the average person out there doing average work, there’s going to be someone else out there doing the exact same thing as you, but cheaper. Now that the industrial economy is over, you should forget about doing things just because it’s assigned to you, or “never mind the race to the top, you’ll be racing to the bottom.”

However, if you’re different somehow and have made yourself unique, people will find you and pay you more, Godin says.

Instead of waiting around for someone to tell you that you matter, take your career into your own hands. In other words, don’t wait for someone else to pick you and pick yourself! If you have a book, you don’t need a publisher to approve you, you can publish it yourself. It’s no longer about waiting for some big corporation to choose you. We’ve arrived at an age where you choose yourself.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/if-youre-an-average-worker-in-this-forever-recession-youre-going-straight-to-the-bottom-2012-1#ixzz1k0fhh7Pu

Multicultural Leadership Starts from Within

In yesterday’s HBR blog:

The world is getting smaller. As new technologies in social media, transportation, and telecommunications bring us closer together, it’s more critical than ever for organizations to recruit, develop, and retain multicultural leaders who can skillfully navigate both the opportunities and challenges of a more connected world.

Multicultural leadership involves deep immersion within different cultures to understand their values and specific context. This immersion unlocks insight into how to best reach customers, inspire employees, and drive organizational performance in geographies outside one’s “home base.” Only through knowing other cultures deeply can a manager effectively connect the dots between them and highlight meaningful differences between cultures that impact business strategy.

When executed well, the results are astonishing. For example, Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) built a leading 40% share of the Chinese fast food market through patiently tailoring its product offering to local tastes and building a strong team of local managers. Other consumer-focused companies such as IKEA and Starbucks are following in KFC’s footsteps, but the learning curve is both steep and long. And fortunes can reverse quickly if managers don’t progress their multicultural understanding as markets continue to evolve. Note the recent stumbles in China of French grocer Carrefour, which had previously dominated other supermarket retailers in the country. Indeed, multicultural organizational capabilities are becoming as significant a source of competitive advantage as other core elements of business strategy.

Though multicultural leadership is mostly associated with multinational corporations (MNCs) — an understandable phenomenon given the inherent cross-cultural challenges MNCs face in expanding outside their home countries — these principles also have a lot to offer “national companies,” companies with limited presence outside a particular country or subregion. Given the enormous cultural diversity within many countries’ own borders, taking a more deliberate approach to sourcing and developing talent across socioeconomic class, religion, academic field, and other backgrounds could be highly productive in driving product and service innovation.

Moreover, the increasing war for talent across borders suggests that national companies will need to do more to attract and retain the most promising talent for their existing operations, much less prepare for eventual expansion abroad with all the multicultural capabilities that such a strategy will require.

In order to build that multicultural and transnational talent, managers need to structure programs within their companies that expose promising talent to new geographies and cultures. Given the personal challenges of picking up and moving halfway around the world, such programs may need to draw on new technologies and models that allow more flexibility in cross-cultural collaboration.

So what can managers do to contribute their part?

1. Focus recruiting efforts to bring diverse, multicultural candidates into the company. This might include adjusting employer branding messages, diversifying recruiting talent sources, or even adjusting selection criteria to reward multicultural experience and leadership capability. It may also entail hiring experts such as cultural anthropologists who can support a more targeted exploration of a specific culture.
2. Make multicultural experiences an explicit part of career path conversations and performance reviews so that young managers can begin to treat view multicultural skill development more seriously.
3. Build multicultural elements into management training programs, either by adjusting existing curricula or developing new materials. Launch structured mobility programs that bring rising managers to different cultures and geographies on both short-term projects and medium-term rotations. This will ensure that multicultural leadership development is embedded throughout an organization’s talent management processes.
4. Integrate multicultural insights into business decisions and strategy. After all, the above interventions mean little if managers do not actively harness the insights that only multicultural leaders can bring to the table.

In an increasingly global age, the capacity of organizations to build multicultural and transnational leaders will be a critical competitive advantage. Is your organization prepared?

JEVAN SOO

Jevan Soo is a management and human capital consultant in Boston. He formerly managed McKinsey & Company’s Asia-Pacific recruiting across twelve countries. Follow him on Twitter @jevansoo.

What you get is what you give, Gen Y Recruitment

Gen Y is particularly sensitive to Corporate Social Responsability. Learn in this article, posted on TalentMinded, how you can make this work for your brand as an employer.

With special thanks to Autumn McReynolds for great content!

Showcase Community Involvement: A Recruitment Marketing Lesson in Giving Back

January 3rd, 2012

When competing for talent in a tough market, intangibles like company culture can help give you the edge when it comes to recruiting and retaining the best. A recent study from Deloitte found that 61% of Millennials who rarely or never volunteer consider a company’s commitment to the community when choosing an employer.

While there’s traditional community involvement and providing new ways for employees to volunteer, social giving projects create a unique opportunity to give back, showcase your company’s dedication to the community and grow your talent network at the same time.

Decide What Matters

Flipping their motto “Chase What matters” to “Decide What Matters,” Chase’s Community Giving program recently gave $3 million in charitable donations to over 100 charities – all based on votes. The highest-voted charity received $250,000 for their cause, and the other top 99 also received funds.

Recruitment Marketing Lesson in Giving Back

While your organization might not have the resources to donate millions of dollars, you can still find ways to creatively leverage your existing community involvement through social media and other recruitment marketing techniques. Another great example of giving back via social media is SCA’s Red Cross campaign, which donated 1 Euro to the Red Cross for each new fan gained throughout the month of November.

Chase’s Community Giving campaign also exemplifies lesson number nine from our consumer to recruitment marketing campaign lessons – making content sharable. Because different charities and their supporters were awarded funds based on their number of votes, Chase made it easy to share, “like” and comment on favorites.

By following their lead and giving back to the community, potential employees are more likely to consider you an employer of choice. And remember, don’t be shy about sharing charity and volunteer opportunities with your talent community. You can post photos and testimonials on your corporate careers site or Facebook careers page for more visibility.

https://adserver.adtechus.com/adiframe/3.0/5310.1/2192278/0/16/ADTECH;cookie=info;kvwb=i;

Tags: Amanda Cornish, campaign, Chase, Decide What Matters, recruitment marketing

Author: Mandy Cornish

Mandy Cornish graduated with a degree in journalism and when that didn’t pan out (surprise, surprise), she found a new home in social media marketing. She also works to create unique events throughout Chicago with her company, Booth25. Connect with Mandy on Twitter @setsko or at linkedin.com/in/amandacornish.

Event Information: Harnessing the Global Talent Pool to Accelerate Innovation

Event Information: Harnessing the Global Talent Pool to Accelerate Innovation

As more industries become commoditized and innovation becomes more of a focus, organizations are being forced to move beyond a talent ownership mindset to a talent attraction and engagement mindset.

In this webinar, we will explore how organizations can utilize open innovation and crowdsourcing resources as an essential talent management strategy to harness the growing numbers of retired scientists, unemployed experts, and underemployed talent around the world to generate ideas, solve problems, and further the goals of the business. The webinar will also explore how individuals can bolster their incomes and credentials by participating in open competitive challenges.

Three things you’ll learn:

1. Why having an external talent network strategy is becoming increasingly important
2. How leading organization manage their open innovation and crowdsourcing efforts
3. Strategies for attracting and engaging talent to your organization’s innovation efforts

Le social recruitment, une opportunité plus qu’une menace pour les job boards

http://www.blog-pour-emploi.com/2011/11/25/jobboards-social-recruitment/

La fin des job boards serait proche. C’est en tout cas ce qui est régulièrement annoncé lors d’événements dédiés au recrutement 2.0, dans les conversations informelles d’une microsphère d’initiés, sur des blogs d’experts, au hasard de live tweets… L’écosystème du recrutement est en pleine ébullition. Tant mieux. De là à enterrer certains de ses acteurs au prétexte que de nouveaux venus ne peuvent que tuer leurs prédécesseurs, c’est faire bien peu de cas de l’intérêt de la coexistence de modèles différents et de leur évolution.

-

À quoi ressemble aujourd’hui l’écosystème du recrutement ? À un large champ investi par différents types d’acteurs : les intermédiaires du recrutement (cabinets de recrutement, chasseurs de tête, agences d’intérim), les sites emploi ou job boards, les réseaux sociaux. En parallèle, on voit apparaître les RPO (Recruitment Process Outsourcing), services qui consistent à externaliser le processus de recrutement d’une entreprise. La révolution en cours, on la doit aux social medias, ils ont remis en question bien des pratiques notamment celles du recrutement. Et, comme le souligne Bruno Brémond, directeur général de Monster Europe du Sud et Benelux, leur valeur ajoutée réside dans leur « capacité àmettre pour la première fois la force du réseau au centre du processus de recrutement ». Ils questionnent les usages, « bousculent le recrutement à la papa et si des acteurs doivent aujourd’hui s’adapter à la nouvelle donne 2.0, c’est d’abord les intermédiaires du recrutement, à eux de justifier leurs honoraires », pointe Laurent Brouat, directeur associé de Link Humans, cabinet de conseil en recrutement et RH 2.0.

-

Dans ce marché qui se restructure et où des effets d’annonces nourrissent le débat (les job boards vont donc mourir et le CV est déjà enterré bien qu’il vive encore…), « personne ne devrait disparaître, mais le changement de positionnement est un passage obligé », observe Vincent Rostaing, fondateur du cabinet Le Cairn 4 IT. Personne ne devrait disparaître parce la complémentarité des acteurs est réelle. Personne ne devrait disparaître parce que le social recruitment appartient à tout le monde : intermédiaires du recrutement, entreprises, individus, tous peuvent s’en emparer et développer qui, de nouveaux services, qui, de nouveaux comportements pour s’adapter aux enjeux actuels et futurs. Car il s’agit autant d’outiller la relation, et les job boards s’y emploient autant que les autres acteurs investis dans une démarche de social recruitment (création d’applications, animation de communautés et de conversations, partage d’informations et d’expériences…), que de modifier certains réflexes. Le social recruitment est une attitude avant d’être un process et les Nostradamus du troisième millénaire semblent ne pas remarquer qu’ils stigmatisent des pratiques qui sont aussi les leurs. Combien de recruteurs 2.0 publiant leurs flux d’offres d’emploi sur les réseaux sociaux, combien sourçant des candidats sur ces réseaux de la même façon qu’il le ferait sur une CVthèque, c’est-à-dire en effectuant une recherche par mots clés dans une base de données ? Combien prêts à donner du temps au temps car jamais une relation ne se nouera en un clic ? « La sociabilisation est en hausse sur les réseaux, les gens actualisent leurs profils, partagent davantage », remarque Laurent Brouat. Pour autant, est-elle le fait d’une majorité ? Pour de nouveaux actifs, combien de profils encore dormants ? Pour tels métiers, telles industries concernés, combien seront toujours absents, des réseaux comme des sites emploi, et pour lesquels il faudra mettre en œuvre des pratiques qui échappent à quelque modélisation que ce soit ?

-

C’est de capacité à créer du lien dont il est question quand on parle de social recruitment/recrutement 2.0. Et quand on inventera de nouveaux noms pour le désigner — et le marketer —, peu importe qu’on parle de recrutement agile ou de Social CRM (Social Relationship Management), ce qui comptera à l’avenir c’est d’ « être capable d’envisager la personne sous différents types de relation : un candidat peut-être également un client, un prescripteur, un fournisseur, un actionnaire, etc. », comme l’entrevoit Vincent Rostaing en regardant plus loin que la tendance actuelle. Et ce qui compte depuis toujours, c’est comment candidats et entreprises arrivent à se rencontrer et à faire coïncider leurs besoins. Trouver un candidat, trouver un job est rarement le résultat d’un seul type d’action. « Lorsqu’ils sont complémentaires, les usages s’additionnent, ils ne se soustraient pas, […] voilà pourquoi malgré les Cassandres, le social recruitment ne tuera jamais les job boards », affirme Bruno Brémond. Voilà pourquoi les réseaux sociaux, tel l’éperon, stimulent les sites emploi.