By Katie Kuehner-Heber
Whether it’s questions around talent or tech, here’s how to know when it’s time to change strategies, and how to do it.
In today’s fast-changing workplace landscape, employers need to be increasingly flexible to attract and retain key talent. From hard-to-fill roles to mastering emerging technology, sometimes the best strategy is not singular, but being light on your feet, ready to switch things up.
Business demands constantly change. How are employers shifting gears to stay ahead?
In a down economy, there are not as many jobs, skills are shifting and many emerging job roles include an AI component. Shifting gears is necessary, and it requires building flexibility into the talent acquisition function.
Employers need to think differently about data. Many companies access data from many sources, but what they need is visibility and guidance on what to do with it to inform decisions. If you can integrate talent data from across the entire ecosystem of internal and external sources, you can quickly uncover hidden issues, determine the best path forward and foresee conditions ahead. Machine learning and predictive analytics lead to precise, actionable intelligence that informs effective planning.
Many employers are also expanding their candidate targeting and attraction capabilities. The focus is on creating a flexible, at-the-ready ecosystem of resources that can pivot swiftly as market conditions warrant. This approach can mean engaging a recruiting solution dedicated to a hiring project, reaching across industries for transferrable skills or opening roles up to both contingent and permanent talent pipelines to meet demand.
The talent function struggles to satisfy conflicting demands from the business. How do HR leaders “stop the noise?”
HR leaders face many business demands. Hiring managers raise alarms about open vacancies, unsatisfactory candidates, or low-performing hires. Those leaders are also expected to keep up with innovations, stay ahead of competitors and prepare for the future. At the same time, the C-Suite wants a solid strategy and measurable results.
Data removes emotion from the conversation. Use data to ask the right questions. If there is a hiring problem, where is the disconnect? Is one location or role skewing the whole process? Is the offer too low?
Are the right recruiting resources assigned to the task? Is a contingent worker or permanent hire best, and if contingent, what is the ideal bill rate? Is there one point in the candidate journey where applicants are held up or drop out?
Employers benefit from an approach that pinpoints problems and suggests specific solutions supported by a data integration and analytics platform.
Another way to stop the noise is with small wins. It could be an executive search placement, a project hiring effort where a few dozen hires are delivered on time or working with a procurement leader to identify and contain an uncontrolled cost. These wins are personal, and they create supportive allies for HR leaders.
Filling high-value and hard-to-fill roles can shape the credibility of HR and talent acquisition. How are leaders addressing those needs?
Hard-to-fill roles will always be a part of recruiting. Those roles may demand new skills, target professions in short supply, such as healthcare clinicians, or involve roles with all eyes on HR leaders to get it right. Whether you need a new VP of sales or 200 industrial workers to open a new facility, those high-value roles demand attention.
Seeing the challenges early is a significant advantage. When you identify the risk early, you can adjust strategies, bring in specialty recruiters or expand your sourcing. Challenging hires also involve broader strategies.
Is AI really changing the talent market, and if so, what should we do about it?
Talent acquisition functions rely on AI to manage high volumes of talent, distill enormous amounts of market research and automate communications to make the candidate’s journey easier. Candidates use tools like ChatGPT in the application process. This use of AI remains controversial, but accepting such tools will lead to improved application processes that enable companies to treat generative AI as the legitimate but imperfect business tool that it is.
The benefits of AI extend across industries, too. A Stanford study found that roughly 30 percent to 65 percent of decision-makers benefitted from cost reductions and revenue increases based on AI, with manufacturing at the top at 66 percent.
Digital acceleration, including AI, shows up in nearly half of companies’ three-year plans, according to a 2024 Mercer study, and redesigning work to incorporate AI and automation is number five out of 20 on the report’s HR priority list.
AI tools give employers more recruiting power than ever, but competitors have the same benefits. AI will be different a year from now. The same can be said for all parts of talent acquisition—the markets, the priorities and what it takes to secure high-value talent.
Stay focused on building change readiness into your talent acquisition function. Flexibility is a priority, and that ability to shift makes the difference when striving to meet your business and workforce goals.