With Talent Acquisition and HR teams on the front line of addressing ongoing talent challenges within organisations, the focus is very much on finding the people they need who have the right blend of skills and capabilities. However engagement and retention are also high on the corporate agenda, meaning that the people we hire need to also be able to embrace and embody our business culture and values. Finding the right talent isn’t just about reviewing CVs and conducting interview s and assessments — it’s also about uncovering deeper insights into candidates’ backgrounds and behaviours.

I recently had an interesting podcast conversation with Ben Mones, CEO of online screening platform Fama Technologies, about the significance of digital screening – and particularly social media screening – as a crucial element of modern hiring practices. I think the topic is particularly prominent in light of current global and political instabilities, and the unusually large number of elections taking place globally this year.

Ben’s journey into social media screening began with a stark realisation: traditional hiring processes, no matter how rigorous, sometimes fall short of revealing critical information about candidates. He shared an anecdote about hiring a seemingly promising candidate who turned out to be a liability due to inappropriate behaviour – something that they discovered post-hire. This experience served as a catalyst for Ben to research more into the world of online screening, ultimately leading to the creation of Fama Technologies.

The core of Fama’s approach lies in fusing advanced AI technology with comprehensive data analysis. AI algorithms extract valuable insights from the vast sea of social media content. By leveraging techniques such as sentiment analysis and concept clustering, hiring teams can gain a deeper understanding of candidates’ behaviour and character traits, enabling better informed hiring decisions.

Of paramount importance though is balancing the benefits of digital screening with respect for candidates’ privacy rights. Evolving legislative frameworks, particularly in regions like the EU, mean compliance with data protection regulations such as GDPR is crucial when hiring teams are accessing and analysing relevant data. They need to be able to balance privacy concerns with the need for comprehensive screening.

For organisations adopting digital screening, all practices need to be aligned with core company values and business objectives, and clear screening criteria also need to be defined and tailored to each organisation’s unique culture and risk factors. And their values – whether looking for fraud, ensuring employee and customer safety, or identifying any potential intolerant behaviour or attitudes.

And transparency in how decisions are made, processes audited to eliminate bias, and conclusions arrived at, are key.

However whilst I believe AI-powered screening tools can provide valuable insights, they should only – and with caution – complement the expertise and intuition of hiring managers and leaders, not overshadow them. With the increasing prevalence of AI the hiring landscape is evolving fast, and will continue to evolve, so embracing a more analytical and innovative approach to screening will ultimately become essential for building creative, diverse and inclusive high-performing teams.

It may be early days for this type of background screening but with an increasing focus on culture fit – and the need for employees to reflect and embody organisational culture – I suspect it will become increasingly prevalent over the next few years.

You can listen to my full conversation with Ben Mones in this episode of HR Means Business.

(This post originally was originally posted on my weekly HR Means Business newsletter – subscribe today and get weekly updates on my research, thinking and podcast chats)

It’s fairly common for the HR and TA communities to spend the first few weeks of a New Year focused on analysing and forecasting the emerging trends we expect to see play out in the world of work over the coming 12 months, and early 2024 has been no exception. It’s looking like the dynamic landscape of work is set to witness significant transformations.

Recently I had a great podcast chat with Neil Pickering, Senior Manager of HR Innovation at UKG (Ultimate Kronos Group), and we talked about the key trends we expected to see over the upcoming. We identified these four main themes for 2024:

1. The Year of Trust: Redefining Employee-Employer Relationships

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, employee preferences regarding when, where, and how they work have undergone a radical shift. Whilst my own research from 2018 indicated that these trends already existed, the Covid pandemic definitely accelerated them. The focus in 2024 has now shifted to redefining the employee-employer relationship, with the overarching theme being trust – Neil’s research indicating that employees are seeking increased trust in their employers and organisations.

This is underscored by a growing emphasis on personalisation of the employee experience. Multi-generational workforces are now the norm, and individual priorities – especially regarding mental health and well-being – are taking centre stage. The challenge lies in delivering unique and personalised experiences tailored to each employee’s needs.

Some of this can be achieved by encouraging more regular manager/employee check-ins, empowering our people to provide feedback, and enabling self-service wellbeing options to help create a more personalised work experience.

2. From Buying and Borrowing to Building and Mining

Our second key trend revolved around talent strategies, which we see shifting from traditional hiring practices to a more holistic approach. Organisations are moving beyond simply buying or borrowing external talent and instead focusing on building and mining talent within their existing workforce. This approach involves identifying and utilszing the skills, capabilities, ambitions, and passions of their current employees.

Our workforces are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of growth opportunities, and expecting organisations to enable their personal and professional development. Part of this will include identifying individual passions outside of work and aligning them with organiational needs and priorities.

We see a need for genuine employee resource groups, and transparent communication channels to encourage employees to share their interests to help facilitate a collaborative, growth-oriented environment.

3. AI, Personalisation, and the Future of Workforce Management

During our conversation Neil highlights the growing role of AI in shaping the future of workforce management. The focus is shifting from process-oriented approaches to outcomes, with generative AI streamlining complex processes behind the scenes. This shift enables employees to experience positive outcomes without getting bogged down by intricate procedures.

Processes like self-scheduling, shift swapping, and accessing information about policies such as leave entitlement, will become seamless with the integration of AI, allowing organisations to prioritise outcomes, ensuring employees can navigate administrative tasks effortlessly, which will lead to increased productivity and an enhanced employee experience.

4. ESG Reality Check: Transparency, Trust, and Employee Expectations

The final major trend we covered was the increased prominence of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) initiatives in the corporate landscape. With the EU introducing the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) in 2024, organisations will be under increased scrutiny to deliver on their ESG promises. This trend won’t only be influenced by external factors (such as financial markets and regulatory requirements) but also driven by internal expectations from employees and consumers.

The emerging workforce are likely to become active participants in holding their organisations accountable for their social commitments. Businesses will have to be transparent about the outcomes of their ESG initiatives and swiftly address any shortcomings. Authenticity is paramount – we believe employees and consumers will increasingly be looking for tangible proof of an organisation’s commitment to social responsibility.

The world of work in 2024 is poised for some transformative shifts, emphasising trust, personalisation, talent development, AI integration, and ESG initiatives. To thrive in this evolving business landscape all organisations have to display authenticity and a genuine commitment to employee wellbeing. The key to a successful future for businesses in 2024 and beyond lies in embracing change, fostering transparency, and building resilient, adaptive workplaces.

In today’s rapidly evolving job landscape, the interview process remains a crucial element in the hiring cycle. However, traditional interviews are often riddled with challenges, leading to mismatches between candidate performance and actual job capabilities. 

In a recent HR Means Business podcast I had a conversation with Stephane Rivard, CEO of Hiring Branch, a company offering skills based hiring assessments, and our discussion centred on the need to overhaul the way we approach the interview process to enable a shift towards more practical evaluation methods.

We covered 4 key points:

• Shift Towards Work-Simulated Assessments: This represents a move away from traditional Q&A style interviews towards work-simulated assessments. This approach allows candidates to actively perform tasks related to the job they’re applying for, helping to provide a more accurate evaluation of their abilities. Leveraging AI to gauge how candidates express themselves, especially focusing on essential soft and robot-proof skills, is at the core of this framework for job success.

• Identification of ‘Soft’ Skills: ‘Soft’ skills – which I prefer to call ‘Robot-proof’ skills as soft implies they are easy to master when, in fact, they are quite hard to perfect – are increasingly recognised as pivotal for job success, especially in customer-facing roles. These skills encompass fluency, building rapport, active listening, empathy, and probing abilities, among others. Many organisations are beginning to prioritise these competencies, as they can have a significant impact on employee performance.

• Challenges with Traditional Interviews: Our conversation covered the limitations of conventional interviews, which too often rely on structured questions that fail to reveal the real person behind the candidate. Human biases, whether conscious or unconscious, significantly influence interview outcomes. Moreover, candidates can often provide misleading information during interviews, leading to a mismatch between their interview performance and actual job performance.

• Customisation and Bias Elimination: The approach advocated by Stephane Rivard in our chat seeks to eliminate biases by focusing solely on candidates’ skills and capabilities. By customising assessments to specific roles, businesses can delve deeper and evaluate candidates on higher-level skills, ensuring a better match for the job requirements.

Work-simulated assessments can be particularly significant as they are able to provide a more accurate overview of a candidate’s potential. This approach, utilising AI to measure crucial soft skills, can address the shortcomings of traditional interviews that often fail to uncover the real attributes of candidates.

Robot-proof (soft) skills such as fluency, empathy, active listening, and probing abilities are key components driving job success, especially in customer-facing roles. For these positions, conventional interviews usually prove less effective, often fall prey to human biases and inaccurate representations or explanations by candidates.

We also touched on the customisation of assessments based on specific job roles, which enables a deeper evaluation of the higher-level skills required. Elimination of biases is key to this so that evaluation is purely done candidates’ skill sets.

Overall, Stephane makes a strong case for needing a paradigm shift in the interview process. By incorporating work-simulated assessments, organisations can better identify candidates whose skills align with job requirements, leading to improved performance and reduced biases in the hiring process.

Here’s the podcast…hope you enjoy the conversation….

https://mervynn.podbean.com/e/rethinking-interviews/

Employee turnover is on the rise. Whilst many analysts and commentators regarded trends such as ‘Great Resignation’ and ‘Great Reshuffle’ to be reactions to how the Covid-19 pandemic had offered employees the potential to find alternative ways of working, research regularly shows that a stubbornly high proportion of workers remain open to exploring different opportunities. After several months of stability in the UK job-to-job resignations data, the latest figures show resignations are increasing again. For all organisations, addressing Employee Retention remains a priority.

US research from 2021 showed the top reasons employees gave for changing jobs as being low pay, lack of opportunities for advancement and feeling disrespected at work. If we are to engage and retain the talent we need then we must understand what they want from work, the opportunities, and the experience. For example, most research I have seen and been involved with has consistently shown that the number one reason why someone will join a business, and stay, is if they believe they have the opportunity to grow, develop and learn new skills. 

In our most recent book, Digital Talent, co-author Matt Alder and I explored what our talent looks for, which is vital if we want to attract and retain them. Firstly, they have Intellectual Curiosity. They know their roles – and the skills they will need – are changing and evolving and they want real-time access to the knowledge and learning that will help them develop and meet new business challenges. Hence the need to have growth and development opportunities.

Workers want agency

Secondly, they want agency in how, when and where they work. This isn’t purely a post-Covid development – in 2017 we surveyed 14,000 jobseekers across Europe and found over a quarter saying that opportunities to work from home would make them choose one company over another, whilst for 61% the opportunity to work flexible hours would be most important in choosing their next role. Interest in remote, flexible and hybrid approaches to working is something that has been growing in importance for several years and is now a key consideration.

Thirdly, engagement and opportunity. The best-selling author on relationships Esther Perel addressed a senior HR audience at the Workhuman conference in San Diego earlier this year and told them “We used to leave our jobs because the factory closed. Today, we leave jobs because we aren’t being recognised”. Rather than looking for stability employees now prioritise different things such as how they are treated, the opportunities that may be available, and the connections they build with colleagues and management. We all want to be recognised for who we are and what we can achieve.

If organisations are to embrace a culture of retention, they need to look at the experiences they offer their people and the opportunities they can give them. The starting point is to create a culture of support and enablement. Traditional structures have typically relied on a leadership approach of management and direction, in which they were reviewed (often historically) and had their performance and career growth ‘managed’. Our employees are now more interested in the opportunities created for them, the connections they make, how they are supported in their mental, intellectual, and financial wellbeing, and the access they have to learning and knowledge to enable their progression. 

A large part of this support comes from evolving workplace technology which can give people access to the knowledge they need, as and when necessary, as well as to create a culture of internal mobility, in which employees feel they are able to move within an organisation to improve their knowledge and skills. Within organisations we have seen retention improve through the creation of ‘Career Experience’ managers, who oversee our people right across their journey with the business, helping to improve engagement, wellbeing, and retention.

Management and leadership

The vital role that management and leadership can play is to help create an exceptional employee experience in which people feel supported and able to achieve their best work. This style of compassionate and supportive leadership is often hard to deliver in a results-driven business so senior leadership need to look at how managers are hired, promoted, and rewarded. 

For example, one common mistake leaders can often make is to reward managers for having high performing teams rather than for producing high performing teams. This approach often leads to favouritism and creates a culture in which managers try to hold on to their top performers which can result in them leaving if they feel blocked from other opportunities within the organisation. Instead, managers should be rewarded for producing high performing teams in which individuals feel they have opportunities to progress elsewhere within the organisation.

There are three key actions that leaders can start taking to improve the employee experience with their businesses and help foster a culture of retention:

1. To understand the ‘moments that matter’ to their people, and to try and maximise them. These are often referred to as micro-experiences – the daily interactions our people have with leadership, technology, clients, and each other, some lasting only seconds, but which cumulatively create their perception of happiness, contentment, and engagement with the business. Use every opportunity to create a positive experience. 
2. Personalisation. For our people, work is often more about the experience than the process, and how they can achieve their personal and career goals. Their consumer experiences are hyper targeted, and we need to personalise their employee experiences to help support them in their own growth and development.
3. The Power of Recognition. Whether it’s simply a ‘thank you’ or a ‘you’ve done well’ there is much research to show that cultures of recognition help create the kind of environment that leads to retention. Latest research from Workhuman shows that simple regular recognition can make employees 5 times less likely to leave, and 5 times more likely to see growth opportunities.

(A version of this post originally appeared on HR World)

“We used to leave our jobs because the factory closed. Today, we leave jobs because we aren’t being recognised”

Ester Perel, the best selling author on modern relationships, was an interesting choice of keynote speaker for the opening day of Workhuman Live 2023. Her research puts her in a good position to look our wider relationships, including the ones we have with work. She told us that we used to leave marriages because we wanted to be happy – now we leave them because we believe we could be happier. She then continued on to the world of work with the quote at the start. 

There has been a change in how, when, where, and why we work. Previously we would have stayed with an organisation for most of our careers, but now we don’t just look for stability, but for different things such as how we are treated, the opportunities that may be available, the connections we build with colleagues and management. Most research that I have seen in recent years has shown that the top reason for joining – and staying – with an organisation is having the opportunity to to grow, develop and learn new skills. We want to be recognised for who we are and what we can achieve. Connection is important, with Ester telling us how relational energy is crucial to unleashing the potential within everyone inside an organisation.

The themes of Workhuman Live 2023 were very much around humanity, energy and respect. Workhuman CEO Eric Mosley opened the conference by talking about bringing humanity back to the workplace. Their research showed almost half of our workforces (43%) feel invisible, unseen, and feel like they don’t matter. Simple regular recognition can make employees 5 times less likely to leave, and 5 times more likely to see growth opportunities. Regular recognition can cut employee turnover in half. Humanity in the workplace also helps improve wellbeing, mental health and resilience. We need to let people bring ‘who they are’ to work and not expect them to leave it at the door.

Recognition also impacts the giver, not just the receiver. Research showed that those who had given recognition in the previous 2 months were more likely to love their job, recommend their company to others, be highly engaged and say they have a positive work experience. After the period of change and uncertainty for individuals and businesses that has followed the Covid pandemic and current global cost of living concerns, it is the stability that leadership can bring which many need. It was concerning to see research that found 43% of employees feeling invisible at work – employees who don’t feel seen, feel like they don’t matter.

Energy was also at the forefront. Speaker Geoff McDonald told us: “Your people aren’t the most important asset.  The energy of your people is your most important asset. We cannot be energised without being healthy, physically and mentally, so why isn’t wellbeing a strategic priority?”. Whilst author Simon Alexander Ong asked us: “Why are you holding your most important meetings on Mondays when we know energy won’t be as high that day?”.

Maybe HR teams can provide the answer – although one of my favourite event quotes, from HR legend Steve Browne, sounded an appropriate word of warning – “If people say “I have to go to HR” you are not part of the company. You’re outside the company”

The Workhuman conference itself was as enlightening, motivating and through provoking as ever. And this year I was also able to record 2 podcast interviews in my ‘HR Means Business’ series to dive deeper into the research and analysis around the power of recognition.

What Experience Are Our Employees Getting at Work?

For the last 15 years, Workhuman have produced research on the Evolution of Work. This year I was able to chat with Senior Research & People Data Analyst Isha Vicaria about the latest findings. 

The key points in our conversation are:

• Importance of recognising employee work preferences
• Finding flow when mixing office & remote locations
• The value of Employee Resource Groups
• The need for psychological safety at work
• Being human at work
• Managing stress

https://www.podbean.com/ew/pb-5wsn8-13f2034

Helping Business Leaders to Understand the Power of Recognition

Sometimes one of the most difficult parts of implementing recognition programmes is to get full leadership buy in. For my second podcast I spoke with practice leader Brenda Pohlman about the best way to achieve this. 

The key points from our conversation are:

• How technology can erode the personal
• Why recognition needs its own currency
• The problem with cash awards
• Specificity of recognition messages
• Creating recognition experiences
• Detail matters for real engagement

https://www.podbean.com/ew/pb-c5n3n-13f9455

Hope you enjoy the conversations. There was a committed, energetic, knowledgeable and downright fun group of bloggers, analysts and influencers at Workhuman Live 2023 – not least from the Humareso team! – so make sure you also check out:

Visibility and Intention: Talking about #WHLive2023 (Humareso)

Workhuman Live 2023 Recap (Humareso)

Workhuman Live 2023 Recap (Sarah Morgan)