Tag: HR

The Talent Challenges for HR

Attracting, hiring, developing and retaining the right people has always been a crucial part of any organisation’s success. The methods of doing so successfully, however, are evolving fast.

With growing skills gaps, uncertain trading conditions and rapid changes in technology driving new preferences and expectations in consumer behaviour, businesses need agile, curious and committed workforces. Our current and future employees have expectations of a more seamless and immersive experience when they apply for a role or join a new business. They also now have more choices over where they work and how they work, and look for companies that will offer them the opportunity to grow, develop and reach their potential.

For the HR profession the technological developments, behavioural changes and shifts in expectations and preferences that are impacting how businesses operate and grow, present unique challenges. The workplace analysts who believe that all processes should be redesigned to accommodate and attract Millennials have a powerful voice in both the digital business media and at industry conferences, yet the HR team that looks around their companies will see a more varied mix of people and interests to be catered for.

Workforces are embracing similar influences, but at a different pace and in a variety of ways. Not all employees want company-issued technology that requires them to check e-mails 24/7, or to have a constant digital presence. The modern HR team has to cater for all expectations and preferences, in a way that is both diverse and inclusive, and enables all employees to deliver their best work.

92% of workers say that technology affects their satisfaction at work, yet HR are not always part of the conversations around the digitisation process. That has to change fast. The ubiquity and speed of digitisation does however drive a need for approaches that are more relevant to how employees live, and this means recognising the importance of experience and regular communication; creating work experiences that reflect their aspirations.

The Employee Experience is now a competitive advantage, so HR teams need to balance the needs of the business today with potential changes in the future, helping to create an environment and culture in which people want to work and feel empowered and supported to give their best.

To meet the challenges posed, and make the most of opportunities created, every business needs to find and hire the talent that is right for them. That is, people with a spirit of curiosity and flexibility, who possess the skills, attitude, capabilities and potential to help organisations grow and evolve.

The word ‘talent’ is a much overused and misused word in the modern labour market normally implying a high skilled, high potential candidate who is in some way special. That definition needs to change. It drives poor recruitment practice, with hiring businesses trying to chase a candidate who ticks many boxes and appears ready made for their vacancy. These matches rarely exist, nor are the likely to be successful.

In a world where new jobs often require skills that have not been hired before, that definition also fails to take into account the many ways that employees can develop and use their initiative and capabilities to help companies meet business challenges. Most successful specialist hires step in to a role that will stretch them and help them grow and realise potential. Everyone has talent. It is finding the people right for the business and the role, irrespective of background and work trajectory, that organisations need to focus on.

Recruitment is not a one-way street and the dynamic has shifted. Candidates can tell a lot about a business from the way they go about recruiting, so a gladiatorial process full of challenges and hurdles, is unlikely to engage them, unless it accurately reflects the type of business you are and the culture they can expect when they join.

Historically there was little that job applicants could find out about what life was actually like inside the business they were applying to work for. It wasn’t until the first few days in the job that they really got a feel for culture and structure. This has changed. The company is now selling itself to the candidate they want to hire as much as the candidate is to them.

The way in which we attract, hire, develop and retain people, the HR processes and interventions along the way, will be a defining factor in how businesses succeed. The outcome is as important to individuals as the process that delivers it, while social and digital channels, powered by the constant presence of mobile, provide a real-time commentary on both the process and perception of the outcome. They want to be encouraged and treated fairly. And they want to be themselves at work.

It is the journey by which they are found, selected, oriented and developed, which needs to be reimagined for the workforce of today and tomorrow. There is now also a transparency around current thinking and best practices, and reporting of the various attempts that businesses make to introduce new working arrangements and structures that can help shed light on how others are facing similar challenges. HR professionals can embrace clear and fresh thinking, and learn from industry peers and colleagues.

Ultimately, this transparency means that workers in every company have access to what other businesses are doing. If they like what they see elsewhere, the chances are they’ll expect it where they are; or else may go out and find it for themselves. Effectiveness of the employee experience is both a business’ competitive advantage, and also the yardstick by which HR teams will be judged.

My co-authored book Exceptional Talent has been published by Kogan Page. In the book myself and Matt Alder explore how changes in technology, communication, and employee preferences are impacting the talent journey, offering practical advice on how to build •effective recruitment and talent management strategies to meet the needs of today, while also helping businesses plan and prepare for the challenges of the future.

5 Ways to Deal With Skill Mismatches

72% of Directors and business leaders are worried about their skills pipeline. Permanent candidate availability is at an all time low. Skills gaps are reaching crisis proportions. 740,000 more people with digital skills will be needed in the workforce this year alone. Half of recent graduates are working in non-graduate jobs. 66% of engineering graduates don’t work in engineering. 1 in 4 vacancies are going unfilled.

Barely a week goes by without statistics like these being used to demonstrate an acute skill shortage. And for recruiters, there’s more. Time to hire is rising. Cost per hire increasing. Interview processes getting longer. Recruiters have more open requisitions than ever. Quality of hire is going unmeasured but, anecdotally, could be better. Productivity is affected.

What can be done? To rely on bringing in developed skills and finding the ready made, perfect fit candidate from outside isn’t the answer. Waiting for a magical piece of sourcing code to help identify candidates with perfect skill sets from across different platforms isn’t the answer either. Even if you could find them, how do you they would join you? What have you got to offer them?

Your vacancy isn’t always the holy grail for a job seeker. Sure, some of the positions you are trying to fill might present interesting challenges for them, but then so might other vacancies in other companies. Even if you had a steady stream of candidates, how many would come and work for you?

In times of heightened hiring challenges, you need to be a place where people want to work. If you’re not, then no amount of sourcing, searching, advertising and referring is going to produce successful results in the long term. Here’s what you need to be doing first…

Consult with hiring managers

You are the recruitment professional, and the labour market – where the skills are – is your specialist area. When you take a briefing from a hiring manager be armed with all the data and manage their expectations. Know what the market is like for candidates with the skills you need. Educate the hiring manager in where the candidates are, what the pool looks like. Use data from REC, FIRM, ONS, job boards and sites like Indeed and Broadbean to make your case and let them understand where there are candidate shortages and what roles create the most competition.

Don’t just accept a job description, particularly one that replicates what the last incumbent did, but rip it up and find out what the role really needs – skills, competencies, capabilities. Begin to build a profile of what you will be looking for and how to assess it. Re-design the role if needs be around the kind of skills and experience available and help the hiring manager to understand the candidates they will be getting.

And test the hiring manager. Can they sell the company or vacancy? Are they a credible interviewer? Candidates always say that the key interview is the one with the manager they’ll be working for, so what impression will they get?

Understand the internal market

Know the talent pool inside your organisation – what skills people have and who is ready for a new challenge and an internal move, or stretch assignment, to help with their development. Make sure your managers are talent producers, not talent hoarders, and encourage them to support employees with internal moves. Identify the people who could develop with some training or input, and convert those you have into the candidates you need. Remember, people want to work for an organisation that helps them grow, develop and realise their potential, so play your part in making the company a place where that happens.

Research the external market

Do you know what candidates look for when they change jobs? How to make your company and open roles attractive? Well find out! There’s plenty of content out there about what job seekers really want, or why not do your own research amongst candidates and people who have applied previously.

What three things are most important to them? Do you market your roles to show that your organisation can provide them with what they want? People with the skills you need might be out there but not responding to your messaging or not perceiving you as a place where they would want to work.

Leverage all the networks you can. Previous candidates, alumni, clients, customers, suppliers and collaborators all have a relationship with your organisation, and all of them have connections. Somewhere in those extended networks might be the person you need. Find a way to reach them and get your message across.

EVP & Employer Brand

What are you like to work for? How does the employee experience shape up? The way you hire, orientate, develop, engage and retain people counts. The way you treat people and support them in reaching their own goals and fulfilling their potential will mark you out as a great place to work. What is your external brand? Does it align with internal values? The early period of employment is when someone reaffirms their decision to join you. If you don’t have an experience that underlines they have made the right choice in joining you – they’ll leave.

Candidate Experience and Recruitment Process

Have you applied for your own jobs? Do you know what the experience is like? Take feedback from candidates going through your hiring process and act upon what you hear. And don’t just take feedback at the end as it will be affected by the outcome.

You can’t expect there to be a pool of skilled and work ready candidates waiting to jump through hoops, endure long absences of communication and non-existent feedback, and work their may through a selection and interview process resembling the labours of Hercules, just to join you. So ditch the gladiatorial approach to hiring.

Make it easy to apply. Give information and let people show you what they can do. The technology is there so why not let people take video interviews at a time to suit them. Find out how they can perform when they are relaxed, rather than trying to find the perfect fit by seeing how they react under pressure.

You can tell a lot about a company by the way they go about recruiting and enabling their people. Stop waiting for the perfect match to come along and start sending out the right messages about the kind of place you are for people who want to learn, grow, develop and reach their potential.

The New Talent Journey

 

The way that talent is attracted, hired, on-boarded, developed and retained is evolving. New technologies, changing attitudes to work and employment (from both employers and workers), heightened expectations and a growing transparency around how businesses operate have led to a re-imagining of the talent journey.

What was once a series of events is now an ongoing process, that begins before there is even an identified hiring need, and continues beyond the lifespan of an individual’s working involvement with an organisation.

First lets redefine what we mean by talent. This is probably one of the most overused, misused and misleading words in the modern labour market. Often used by HR and recruitment professionals to imply a high skilled, high potential candidate who is in some way special. This narrow definition leads to poor recruitment practice, with recruiters trying to chase the mythical candidate who ticks all their boxes and is ready made for their vacancy. These people rarely exist, and they are rarely needed.

We now have new jobs are being created, needing skills that haven’t been hired before. People grow in different ways, using initiative and developing their capabilities in line with what interests them and what they believe they would enjoy and be good at. If their jobs are under threat, they will often find new ways to use their talents. The most successful hires will be people who grow into a role, mould it around their capabilities. Growth mindsets and cultures of innovation require curiosity, courage and a restless spirit. These can be found in many people if they are afforded the right tools, a collaborative culture and time.

And of course there are many roles that might seem mundane and repetitive. Yet the people who do them are skilled. Talent is about the people who are right for the role, and right for the business, irrespective of background and trajectory. Talent is also about the hiring business itself, its vision, values, purpose and dynamics. Its offer to its employees, whether they are employed or provide their skills on a freelance or temporary basis.

And it is also about the way in which new people, and new capabilities, are bought into a business.

The new talent journey is an ongoing process incorporating many stages:

Attention – What is known about the business and the potential new hire. Information available. Reputation judged from online interactions and engagements. Before there is even a connection there is a perception over what a business is like, and how it treats its people and customers. And there is also an impression of the candidate.

Attraction – How you hire, what information you make available, how the role is marketed and what is offered. How you develop relationships and conversations with potential employees and collaborators.

Acquisition – Your recruitment process. Application, interviews, assessment, selection. How you communicate, the quality of feedback, when you offer, and the experience you give. This doesn’t sit in isolation but seamlessly evolves from attraction and forms the basis for…

On-boarding – Still waiting for a new hire’s first day before you give them the tools they need for the new role? Think again. The best companies are on-boarding people form the very start of the hiring process, giving them a seamless transition into the business. Paperwork? Already done online before they start. Induction? Its also happening online, probably through a portal, often from the time they accept the offer. First day experience? It’s a gift, a meeting, time with a senior leader. It’s not a few days’ wait for a new laptop and a login, sitting with a team who didn’t know you were starting.

Development – Lateral progression and opportunities for skill and capability enhancement, across teams, functions, divisions and borders. Performance evaluation is ongoing and coaching led. New hires don’t wait for a probation review after 3 months and an appraisal after a year, they want real time, constructive feedback on how they are performing and how they can improve.

Retention – Mutual attraction, the outcome of treating people well and giving them the tools and framework to succeed, develop and enjoy what they do. And if they want to move on – then retain their loyalty and advocacy, because they will be your best referrers of new people and customers, and they may well return in some capacity.

Attracting, acquiring, on-boarding, developing, engaging and retaining your people is an evolving, interlocking process that renews, reviews, reinvents and repurposes. It’s the way that the people you need connect and work with you, grow and develop, create and innovate, make their mark, laugh and collaborate, and its the solid bond you put in their hearts, keeping them very much part of your network of connectors, referrers and influencers.

Its the new talent journey.

(My book Exceptional Talent has recently been published by Kogan Page. In the book myself and co-author Matt Alder explore how changes in technology, communication, and employee preferences are impacting the talent journey. We offer practical advice on how to build •effective recruitment and talent management strategies to meet the needs of today, while also helping businesses plan and prepare for the challenges of the future.)

 

 

Employer Brand Challenges & Solutions

Employer branding has been a hot topic for some time. The perception of what a business would be like to work for is built from a number of interactions and sources, some within the organisation’s control and some outside of it. The issues around it are debated long and hard in the blogosphere, at conferences and on webinars and podcasts. Certain words always arise – e.g. authenticity, culture, talent, differentiation – almost to the point of becoming cliches and losing their meaning.

So what are the real challenges that businesses face?

I have recently worked in partnership with regular co-collaborator Matt Alder, and in conjunction with employer brand solution provider Papirfly, to research what’s really going on in the market. We conducted in-depth interviews with a number of talent acquisition leaders. We wanted to understand the issues that practitioners face on a daily basis, how they handle them, what content they turn to and which conversations they join.

Our research found that they all face a number of similar challenges regardless of the sector in which they operate. These Employer Brand challenges cover a broad range, from alignment with internal processes and the employment experience, to overcoming negative reputations and the best ways to utilise employee generated content. And in these data driven times the questions of measurement and validation are never far away.

You can read more about these, and potential solutions, in our Pulse Report – which can be downloaded by clicking on the image below – and also from listening to this podcast in which Matt discusses the research findings with Papirfly’s Client Director Sara Naveda

 

Papirfly’s Employer Branding Insight Report was produced by Two Heads Consulting, a research, insight and content collaboration between Mervyn Dinnen and Matt Alder

We’re All Recruiters Now…

The recruitment landscape has evolved rapidly in recent years. The process of attracting and hiring the talent that business needs has become ever more complex and multi-layered. Digital tools have enabled quicker and simpler applications – no longer dependant on time or location – and greatly increased the number of connections every job seeker has, putting them closer to recruiters and target companies. This raises applicant expectations for the recruitment process with new tools and technology speeding up the matching and selection.

Organisations can now be bolder and more targeted with their recruitment marketing, whilst the greater reach and visibility of information has created more transparency around the recruitment process. A company’s culture is exposed and this is becoming a selling point for potential employees. We now have access to a wider and more relevant range of data that helps to drive many hiring decisions. Many more recruiters work in-house, either as part of a broader HR team or closely aligned with it. Their major targets are to reduce both the time to hire and cost per hire which, given the increase in application numbers and selection tools, could help to create an instantaneous ‘swipe right, swipe left’ culture for CV matching.

So how has this impacted talent acquisition and what are the implications for the future?

We are all connected. Whether its through social networks, business relationships or previous interactions, there’s a likelihood that every business is already connected in some way to everyone they may ever need to hire. They have the networks and connections of current employees, alumni (a significant source of hire in the US) and their networks, suppliers and collaborators and their networks. There are also customers and clients, fans of the company Facebook page and followers of the company Twitter account. Previous job applicants who weren’t
 the right fit at the time may now have gained the necessary skills and experience.

The key is to understand these connections – where they are, their strength and relevance – how best to manage and leverage them, and assess cultural fit. This will require content to be produced – market intelligence and insights, product developments, ways to showcase the employee experience – and used by a recruitment team that understands marketing and the importance of culture.

The power of referrals is now better understood by organisations. There are platforms to help employees manage and keep in touch with their wider connections. Professional services firms offer large cash bonuses to their employees who can attract top talent to the firm from their own networks, whilst also finding ways to reward their internal influencers. For connections and networks to deliver real value then reputation and trust need to become part of the currency of recruiting, a form of ‘peer capital’. This will include recommendations from trusted sources and, for those who worked flexibly or across companies, a validated portfolio of projects and achievements.

Certification and validation have long been part of the service offering from third-party recruiters who, by using judgment and intuition, have selected the talent most suitable for the needs of their clients. However the make-up of the talent supply chain is fast changing as technology finds a new area to disrupt. For example, there are now apps connecting those looking for flexible work with companies who have on-demand staffing needs shaped by seasonal peaks and troughs. By matching on skills, availability and location this kind of hiring removes the need for interviewing – especially as the workers are pre-screened and checked. Meanwhile in Australia KPMG have a portal matching staff that have downtime between assignments with clients who need short term or interim accountancy help.

If talent is coming from a variety of sources, it is also being engaged in different ways. Whether as freelancers, flexible workers, or assignment and project collaborators, the talent pool is no longer just about current and future permanent employees, but reflects the wide range of skills, knowledge and expertise that can be called on at any time to supplement the capabilities of the current workforce. Many potential recruits coming across the radar of hiring companies may well have had a rich and varied mix of projects and assignments, not always gained from a permanent role.

Again it will be reputation and credible recommendations that recruiters will look for. Roles are evolving faster than many companies can develop their people – many of the positions to be filled in 2020 almost certainly don’t exist at present – so the ability to call on specialist skills at any time will be a crucial part of the recruiter’s toolkit for coping with urgent requirements. And in the evolving talent ecosystem that I’ve described the connections and knowledge networks of collaborators and freelancers are as important as everyone else’s. They are likely to be moving in and out of different organisations, building their capabilities, and will have worked with a wide range of talent.

Most of these shifts require a different approach to talent management so it’s no surprise to find that HR process is already evolving. Responsibility for personal, skill and career development now rests firmly with the individual employee and not the company or HR department. Performance and career management are no longer dealt with in annual appraisals nor based on school report style ratings; instead the current approach is for continuous dialogue between employee and manager, with flexible and transparent goals. At the same time development increasingly comes laterally through a range of projects and secondments, rather than through linear promotion. For staffing in 2020 this is likely to have created a blend of honed and skilled sector specialists alongside a broader range of multi-industry generalists.

In the future we will all be recruiters, and all be part of the solution. 
Our networks and spheres of influence will help attract new people 
and go some way to defining our importance to the organisation. The employment experience will be visible to outsiders through our personal experiences and how we share them. The organisation may ‘loan us’ to clients or collaborators who need short term help. And ultimately, we will be the ones responsible for developing our skills, increasing our knowledge base and acquiring and building on new experiences.

(This post was originally featured in a 2015 White Paper jointly produced by HR Zone and Cornerstone On Demand titled ‘Talent 2020 – What is the Future Talent Landscape’. You can download it here and read the other contributions from Rob Briner, Doug Shaw and Dr Tom Calvard)

Screen Shot 2016-01-18 at 22.44.04

4 Things Recruiters Should Do Differently

Recruitment is changing. The way that organisations attract, hire, onboard, engage, and retain the people they need may be a significant differentiator but increasingly also defines their ability to grow and succeed as a business. To facilitate this Talent Management is no longer purely about developing a group of early-identified potentials, but instead represents the route to developing and honing the range of skills and capabilities that will be needed to meet evolving commercial challenges.

However the role of HR develops, the need to acquire, develop and curate skills and knowledge will continue to be a key part. This acquisition and deployment will come through a mix of permanent, interim, freelance and collaborative employment models.

The issues facing hiring teams are well documented. Allegedly they keep CEOs and HRDs awake at night, and top the list of concerns on most business surveys. Moaning and worrying won’t solve the talent puzzle though. We need to look at how the wider recruitment ecosystem is shifting and maximise potential opportunities. Expecting to solve your own skills shortfall by hoping to grab someone else’s is no longer a viable option.

Here are four opportunities for smart recruiters to start doing things differently in 2016…

Turn Shortages into Opportunities

We know there’s a skills shortage. Everyone is struggling to find the specific skills they need. Or are they? No recruiter ever got fired because there was a skills shortage…but maybe this means that individual reasons for shortages don’t get scrutinised. Are recruiters and hiring managers being lazy and waiting for a fully formed candidate who ticks a dozen boxes? If your business capacity is really impaired by a lack of skills then it must be time to find another way to satisfy demand. Redefine the problem. What exactly are we short of? Maybe invest in training or apprenticeships. Look for someone with knowledge and capability close to what you need and invest in bridging that gap. Look at more collaborative ways to bring capability into the organisation whether through flexible workforce approaches or partnering with third parties. Start drilling down with hiring managers on their wish lists and filter out the absolute necessities from the nice-to-haves. Break down the unfillable roles into smaller parts and see if there is a way they can be done differently, using other employees or by hiring someone with a complementary skill set.

The opportunity is for recruiters to add real value and help solve their organisation’s problems, not to offer the same excuses and apportion blame elsewhere.

Collaboration Within the Ecosystem

Modern recruitment is an ecosystem and we are all part of the solution. Our networks grow continuously. For a business this includes employees, alumni, collaborators, suppliers, contractors, clients, customers, digital connections and influencers. Recruiters can use these networks, and their own. Everyday contacts – barista, uber driver, conference attendees, everyone in your yoga or pilates class, fellow commuters, social friends – can lead to even more contacts. There are third party staffing agencies and a plethora of labour providers. Manage these connections. Take care of how you exit employees, reject applicants, and engage and pay freelancers. Communicate and share the wider vision and the hiring needs.

The future for recruiters is also in third party collaboration. Working closely with agencies and other labour providers as partners and not purely as suppliers. Make the partnership part of the internal offering; bring their insights and wider knowledge of trends and availability in your sectors and disciplines into the business. Choose collaborators carefully though as there must be trust, on both sides. That crucial next hire could well judge you as much by how you find them as by the strength of the opportunity you offer.

Win The Ratings Battle

We’re in an experience economy. And a ratings economy. The people we are trying to find put faith in what other people think about us, and judge us on the type of experience they get. Personal trust and peer capital are crucial, and the best recruiters will know that every part of the hiring process has to be functioning just right. Delayed decisions, endless hoops, poor information, disinterested interviewers and a lack of communication and feedback should play no part in a 2016 hiring function, particularly one that is competing with other organisations for skills that are in short supply and high demand. But they still do. Despite the growth of review sites, and the transparency that social media affords for exposing lazy practice, many organisations are still offering job seekers a poor experience.

Smart recruiters should know that jobseekers increasingly judge companies by how they go about hiring their new people, and make sure that if an offer should be rejected, it won’t be because of the recruitment process.

Understand What Candidates Look For

Candidates aren’t just looking for an offer. They want to join an organisation that will invest in them and help enhance their skills, capabilities, knowledge and experiences. Across sectors, disciplines and borders. The offer is no longer just about a salary and a job title, but now also about future opportunities and HR processes. How will they be managed, the level of support, how will performance be assessed, how transparent are goals and feedback, what is the range of rewards, how good is the onboarding, and what is the potential for development? The chances are, if your business is falling down in those areas it may well be obvious from publicly available information.

Good recruiters know that candidates value honesty. They showcase what is good about the business, offer information about future potential and don’t try to cover over shortcomings.

There’s no need for excuses or to hide behind lazy assumptions. Recruitment may be changing but it is also exciting. There are new opportunities offering plenty of scope for the best to differentiate themselves, positively represent their organisations and add real value.

 

10 Emerging HR Trends

A lot of the HR and Recruitment commentary I see focuses on skills shortages and hiring difficulties, with concerns over attraction, retention and development. This often overlooks some of the many nuanced changes and developments in a number of HR processes that impact the day-to-day employment experience, all encouraging a shift in mindset and behaviours. Technology is often at the heart of these, either enabling and facilitating, or encouraging much of the evolution.

During the last twelve months or so I’ve written about many new recruitment and HR trends in reports and on other sites. These are 10 in particular that I think important:

  • Performance Management becoming a richer, more agile process focusing on continual development and coaching rather than annual reviews and school report style grades and assessments; moving from measurement to improvement
  • Leadership Development not restricted to early identified high potentials or specific job titles but becoming open to all employees with aspiration who can display influence and performance; individuals take responsibility for their own development
  • Talent Management less about linear progression and job titles and more about lateral moves and the gaining of a diverse range of skills, experiences and knowledge; progression isn’t only an upwards trajectory
  • Rewards becoming less about legacy entitlements and more about offering a varied and holistic package of initiatives and offerings that suit a range of employee preferences
  • Engagement at last being seen not as an initiative that a company does but an outcome of treating people right; commitment and loyalty earned
  • Retention becoming an ongoing process of continuous attraction with organisations using many channels to try and differentiate the way they are perceived externally and the way their purpose and values are defined internally
  • Most organisations now recognising that they are digital businesses that need employees and collaborators with digital skills and a digital mindset
  • Reactive recruitment now identified as a problem; skills are short and people have more options – the hiring process can’t wait until someone resigns, or worse leaves, before starting; there is a need for an ‘always be recruiting’ mindset
  • Leaders beginning to talk more about hiring for attitude and culture and not purely on past performance or against a checklist of perceived duties and achievements
  • Your workforce is no longer only the people on your permanent payroll; there is a rich mix of temps, freelancers, consultants, interims and collaborators that contribute to business processes and outputs, and their needs and expectations also have to be satisfied; they are potential advocates or detractors, same as everyone else connected with the business

There is much going on around the organisation that is both shaping these trends and creating new expectations. Employees don’t want to be overwhelmed and overburdened. They want technology that works, and makes their life easier not harder, and communication that is clear and concise, not filled with buzzwords and jargon.

Our businesses are now more transparent than they’ve ever been. Information is available freely and publicly on what we do and say, what our employees, alumni, collaborators and customers say. Internal processes are often laid bare without us realising. Our people are looking for an organisational soul, something that can encourage a sense of belonging and identification. And pride.

Speed is the new normal and leaders need to be change agents. Top down, autocratic, individualistic managers are losing their key staff. Employees want inclusion and collaboration, transparency and authenticity. The emerging trends that I’ve already mentioned, plus many more that are still evolving, require leaders who are agile and collaborative, able to offer constructive and insightful feedback…and take it too. Their goals are becoming visible to everyone in their team and they need to develop and mentor their people. Talent management is fluid so managers can no longer expect to always hold on to best performers looking for development elsewhere in the organisation. They need to be talent producers not talent hoarders.

Recruitment is becoming more driven by connectivity, reputation and culture. Information on individual experiences of your recruitment process – from the length of time to acknowledge an application through the interview questions you ask to the packages you offer – is publicly available on sites like Glassdoor. Companies need to embrace it and own it.

Your next hire could be a customer or someone in their personal networks, or from the networks of employees, alumni, collaborators and partners. People who leave are a great source of referrals, and may have gained new skills elsewhere so could return. We need to get better at exiting people from the business. Too often they are poorly managed out. Performance discussions become about the person and not the performance.

Whilst a number of businesses, particularly in the SME market, will not have embraced many of these changes as yet, the chances are they will. The transparency I mentioned earlier, coupled with the availability of information and insight on all of these topics, means that workers in all companies have access to what other businesses are doing. And if they like what they see elsewhere, then the chances are they’ll expect it where they are…or else may go out and find it for themselves.

HR and The Gig Economy

Nestled amongst a list of potential future C-Level roles in a recent Fast Company article was ‘Chief Freelance Relationship Officer’. Some groaned but this made perfect sense to me. According to the author:

“As companies continue to increase their dependence on freelance and contingent workers, many believe that the time will soon arise when an executive employee is tasked with maintaining and growing their partnerships and reputation within the freelance community”

This echoes something I wrote in a recent blog for JM Executive about HR and the employer brand:

“With growing numbers of interims and consultants working as contractors or freelancers for businesses it would be a mistake to assume that employer brand only relates to those who are permanently employed. Growing numbers of reviews on sites like Glassdoor come from people who have been contractors so the way that they are engaged and paid, with clear briefs and support where necessary, can also impact on how you are perceived as a place to work”

The recent Randstad Sourceright 2015 Talent Trends Report also identified the rise of the gig worker as an emerging trend. They reported 47% of HR leaders factoring in independent contractors as part of their talent acquisition strategy. Amongst their advice on how to manage these workers was the importance of engaging them:

“As an organisation utilising all types of labour, consider how your employer brand is perceived across your entire employee population. Remember to communicate your employee value proposition to all potential talent”

Whatever the reasons driving this shift, we’ve got more self-employed and freelancers working for organisations. Then there are also the gigsters, the casual help, the new wave of entrepreneurs and start-ups who fuel the sharing economy/collaborative economy/concierge economy or whatever we call it this week. All different types of workers with one thing in common – nobody employs them permanently yet their experiences of working within, or collaborating with, a business are becoming just as much of employer brand as that of regular employees.

This will grow. Increasing numbers of Uber style apps/platforms for employment are being launched and raising funds. Some are looking at general skills but a growing number are for very niche sectors. This ‘human cloud’ has recently been the subject of an in-depth FT piece. There are estimates of global spend through these platforms already over $3bn, though this could be understated as US leader Upwork estimates $1bn of payments through its site alone last year.

So once they are engaged to perform a duty, who has responsibility internally for the gigsters?

These kind of deals will often fall under the remit of procurement, though their drivers will often be cost and delivery deadlines.

For many companies it will be the hiring or project manager, who has a budget and specific delivery requirements.

It has implications for recruiters and agencies.

The recruiter and HR person in me concludes that if the Chief Freelance Relationship Officer is a role whose time has come, then it should be part of HR. In fact it’s probably part and parcel of what HR does, not separate. Its a role about curating skills, satisfying requirements and needs through the best available hiring channel. Freelancers are part of the wider employer brand ecosystem, their experiences reflecting the type of business you are to work for. The work they produce is ultimately part of the overall business output. The data they have access to, and add to, is subject to the same company privacies and regulations as permanent employees. And their employment status, often unclear and uncertain, is one that HR needs to understand – particularly if pay rates come under scrutiny.

Whilst the whole flexible/outsourced workforce seems a growing phenomenon it’s not necessarily a new one. As far back as 2001 this research paper on the challenges for HR in managing the outsourced workforce was published with this remit:

  • For most of the twentieth century, the number of tasks and levels in large organizations grew incrementally, adding new job and career opportunities to full-time employees. In recent years this pattern has fundamentally changed.
  • Global developments, both technological and economic, have led to many organizations cutting back their operations, closing facilities or outsourcing non-core activities to specialist providers.
  • As we move further into the twenty-first century, we can realistically expect that the need for cost reduction, speed and flexibility will become even greater, leading organizations to reduce the number of full-time employees.
  • As labour markets are becoming tighter and supply-driven, finding qualified staff will become more difficult and companies will increasingly have to depend on temporary staff and other types of non-permanent employees to meet their staffing requirements

In the US, the Freelancers Union offers a strong voice, with their #FreelanceIsntFree campaign getting some traction. Meanwhile there is a vibrant online network of project workers ready to share their experiences. Just as the new platforms enable companies to rate their freelance workers, so those workers have the same opportunity to rate those who engage them. Whether by user reviews on a site such as Glassdoor or user ratings through an app there is a growing two way transparency – with pay rates and timeframes likely to be in firing line.

Is business, and HR, ready to operate in a ratings economy?

(image from https://www.freelancersunion.org)

Getting to Grips With HR Analytics

If there’s one topic that has both dominated and divided the on-going conversations around HR over the last year or two, then its data. Specifically big data and what to do with it. We constantly seem to be told that HR doesn’t have the capability or know-how to properly leverage the opportunities that all these extra insights offer us. When I wrote about the topic last year I found a range of perceptions and misconceptions – from the size of the data to the complexity of technology, solution focus to looking beyond the quantitative – that cloud the conversations in detail and jargon.

Keen to understand more I went along to the recent HR & Workforce Analytics Innovation Summit and heard a range of speakers – from Coca Cola, Aviva, Nestle, Metropolitan Police, Unilever, Serious Fraud Office to name a few – share case studies and insights about how they had used analytics to drive business value and achieve results.

Here are some of the thing that stood out for me.

Getting the right people.

With a background as a recruiter I’m always looking at how we can get the hiring right. Certainly talent acquisition and performance are two areas with much to gain from deeper insights, and where there is already a lot of data available.

As with any specialist area it starts with scoping what you really need – “an HR analytics team needs to understand data and present it in a way that engages the business – they don’t need a background in HR”

We can have a tendency to compile a long shopping list of attributes, skills and experience that we want and then complain that we can’t find it. The key for analyst roles is to understand what you really need. Don’t look for a list of technology and software skills, but for someone who can understand problems and tell stories. Analysts are hot property at the moment so not easy to find – many presenters came not from an HR background but from one involving maths, statistics and analysis. HR generalists can get bogged down with data and detail whilst analysts can’t always present or tell stories so the best teams will blend a range of skills.

Once there is data and analysis then someone needs to be able to bring it to life, tell a compelling story that will engage stakeholders. More than one speaker observed that stakeholder management is a very hard skill to locate when recruiting in this area.

The concept of storytelling came through loud and clear during most presentations and is one that resonates with me, given the day job. How many HRDs look for separate people? Those to work with the data and those who will present the results? And how many look at the people they already have in their teams who could develop into a role like this with some help and training. One suggestion was to ‘steal’ someone from another business area – maybe the capability is already within the business, just not HR.

The key attributes were described by fellow event blogger David D’Souza as “The 4 N’s – Nosiness, Numeracy, Narrative, Networking“. But also remember that analysts need a career and personal development plan just like everyone else – they need scope to hone their skills.

Quick wins, simple wins, ask questions.

The clear message was to understand exactly what you want, and to be patient and realistic, starting with basics. Many teams have little or no budget, but however small it is there will need to be some budget to either hire or train the right person.

Think big, start slowly, and get in at the top! When you start make sure you meet the CEO and FD. Let them know what’s happening. Coca Cola’s Vanessa Varney told us “Get the basics right. Don’t rush to do the ‘sexy stuff’. Laying robust foundations is a must and can reap just as much reward“. She also stressed the need to get buy-in from leadership and the rest of HR and warned not to underestimate the cultural impact of embedding a data-mindset within the HR team.

The simplest way to then start is to find out what problems that business has that need answers, and that means asking questions not offering metrics. As Andrew Gamlyn said “the business don’t want metrics, they need answers to questions. Educate the business in a mindset of asking for answers to business questions instead of metrics from HR“. Understanding the real issues is key else you’ll just be defending data. One example involved data showing that the best performers were those whose previous job title matched their new ones – but was this a real measure of capability or really just a measure of recruiter or hiring manager behaviour?

“There is HR data everywhere in the organisation” said Hendrik Feddersen “understand how the business operates. Then engage with users, tell stories, use graphics”

And collaborate.

One of the most tweeted soundbites of the day was from Vanessa Varney “IT and HR must collaborate. There’s no way around it“. Although you need to lay ground rules as well. I chaired a panel that included Vanessa and Sally Dillon from Aviva, who took responsibility for FTEs from finance saying “You look after the £££, we own the FTEs“.

The quickest wins often seem to come from straightforward employee metrics. Absence, sickness, resignations and links to overtime, workplace pressure or even length of tenure of managers, the ‘people game-changers’ are all areas that provide valuable insights to the business – if the managers don’t like the data then they can fix the problem.

During Sally Dillon’s presentation she described the HR analytics role as “kill complexity, never rest, care more, create legacy” and reminded us that “we own definition, methodology and tools – we don’t own the data, the business leaders own the data“…

…whilst Vanessa Varney’s summary provided a useful round-up of many attendees’ takeaways…

Whose Employer Brand is it Anyway?

Back in December I went to the Employer Brand Management Conference, which I previewed in this post.

I have written about employer brand quite a few times for HR and recruitment audiences – its a hot topic that many practitioners seem to want to know more about – so it was surprising at that event to find in over 120 attendees there was no-one from either discipline. Maybe the word ‘brand’ signifies marketing and comms to some HR folk, but there is little doubt that they shouldn’t be ignoring it.

The number one priority for most HRDs is the attraction, retention and engagement of the employees and skills they need – the way you are perceived as an employer, the way you reach out to new hires, the way you manage and lead, the vision and purpose, all of this is in the large melting pot of what we call Employer Brand.

Is it a case of everyone thinking that someone has responsibility for employer brand but in reality nobody takes it? Recent research from Universum sheds some light on this.

 

60% of CEOs think that they own it and only 32% think its HR. Which is in contrast to those in the talent acquisition sector, with 58% of HR execs and 57% of recruiters thinking its HR’s responsibility. Marketing execs are even more confused with 39% saying HR, 40% the CEO, and 27% themselves.

Whoever has internal responsibility, they seem in little doubt that the immediate main objective is to fulfil short term recruitment needs and the longer term main objective is to secure long term recruitment needs.

Of course the reality is that if anyone ‘owns’ it then it’s the employees, as it’s their experiences that are most visible to outsiders. How their employment experience is impacted by development opportunities, reward, performance management, inclusive management and a positive hiring experience is where HR come in to play. And if HR are doing their job and creating a great working environment, then they should also want to know how that is being communicated. The art is to let employees be the storytellers through encouragement, not control.

However some of employer brand is inextricably linked to general brand perception. Employer branding didn’t start with the internet, and just as Google, Apple and Facebook are brands that newer entrants to the job market would like to work for, so companies such as Virgin, M&S, John Lewis, BBC and numerous consulting firms and advertising agencies have been aspirational employers in the past. Often these preferences are based on general brand awareness, not the employment experience.

Is it the wider implications of branding and brand messages that maybe HR and recruiters struggle with?

On April 21st I’ll be heading off to blog and tweet from the European Brand Conference in London, which again is being run by Transform Magazine. There are a number of presentations around branding – perceptions, reputation, tone, experiential – with sessions specifically looking at employer branding too. There is a diverse range of companies speaking, including Cancer Research UK, BT, Oxfam, Eurostar, Orange, Fairtrade, Oxford University and Starbucks.

If you want to hear more then there are a small number of tickets available and blog readers can get a 10% discount the code TRANSCONF10 when booking here.

So if you’re thinking of dipping a toe in the branding conversation then come and join me, I’m sure the water’s just fine.