Yes, we always talk about recruitment because that is what
we do, we are a recruitment partner. Even so, we still understand that the best
way for a firm to operate is to make the working environment, both literal and
metaphorical, as welcoming and open as possible in order to retain staff.
Retaining employees just makes sense. If you have invested
time and money in a new candidate and they are out of the door soon after, you
have spent precious resources and you have nothing to show for it.
Losing employees means losing part of your knowledge base
and it also means you are losing productivity. If your business has a revolving
door of staff, that does not make for a cohesive team. The atmosphere will be a
tense one, as, with each team member who leaves, their responsibilities fall on
the other members of the team. Resentment can set in. This is not a prime
situation for new hires to enter. It can become a vicious circle.
So what can be done about it? Well while markets can take
some of the blame and the generally accepted amount of turnover is under ten
percent, the main cause of turnover is job dissatisfaction.
To counter this, it takes effort but at the end of the day,
that effort is really worth it. It takes making steps to understand your workforce.
What are the pressure points? What are the annoyances in their roles? Do they
feel appreciated? Have you fostered an atmosphere where they can air their
grievances or problems without judgment?
Respect in the workplace is key. Nobody wants to be disrespected.
Pretty much everyone wants to come to work, do a good job and be rewarded in
terms of money and also in terms of gratitude. The gratitude thing is a two-way
street, as, when you give it, you get it back. A happy workplace is also a
healthy workplace. There are less sick days. And it all comes down to respect.
Respecting your workforce’s points of view and experience pays off many times
over.
As a continuation of that, allowing your staff to be
creative, share their ideas on how things can be done better and to vent
frustrations. What would you do if a team member had a business idea that
utilised things they learned at the company, or perhaps, the company’s
technology. Bad companies would either deny them further access to the tech or
bring in lawyers to maintain that the idea is the company’s because it was
originated on company time. A good company would enter into a partnership with
the employee, as long as the idea is good of course.
Companies can also incentivise the work in accordance with industry
standards, offer rewards and perks. These kinds of steps take little effort but
can demonstrate that the company is empathising with their staff in order to
make their company as enticing as possible.
The work-life balance must be respected. If your employees do not have time for leisure in their lives, some way to let off steam, there is a greater chance of burn-out. If a team member burns out, they are no good for your business, and they are no good for themselves either. This is where the responsibility of the company comes in. Just because you can work your employees to death, does not mean you should. The action that makes most business-sense is to allow your workers to have enough time to engage in activities outside of work, so that they do not feel like they have nothing else to live for. If you are made aware of staff who are overworked, they should be allowed some time off or at least a re-examination of their workload.
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It really adds up to treat your team like human beings
A business which conducts itself with purpose and
professionalism naturally elevates itself above the competition. A relentless
drive to increase in size in order to satisfy shareholders can serve to reduce
the people who work there to figures, robots even.
Whether a company chooses to take this route or not, will
define its future. Thankfully, more companies are adopting the path towards a
mission that is not just based on money, but on treating employees with
respect, acknowledging that they hold the keys to the future of the business.
Seeking meaning through actions is what humans do, and work
is no different. Yes, we all want to be sufficiently recompensed for our time,
and perks are nice to have too, but the realising of potential and a sense of
contributing meaningfully are major factors in the long-term mental well-being
of employees. Allowing workers to learn and grow means the good of the company
goes beyond fulfilling the goals of the business but can emerge out into the
society around it, benefitting those who may be outside of the immediate area
of influence.
When it comes to recruitment, it is easy to spot employers
who are engaged. It can be as simple as hiring managers replying to emails or
responding to candidate resumes in a timely fashion. For all the sound and fury
surrounding the search for new prospects to fill job roles, if what follows the
flurry of activity is the metaphorical sound of crickets, a specialist
recruitment partner starts to begin to understand why the hiring has been a long
drawn out process so far.
But just because an employer isn’t engaged with these issues
doesn’t mean they don’t want to be. It can be difficult asking for help when
you don’t really know what kind of help you need or how to go about starting
the process.
Finding support throughout this can be hard, if you are
starting from scratch, as an organisation has either made steps towards being
responsive and responsible, or it hasn’t. If it hasn’t, then it can feel like
an uphill struggle. All companies make noises about listening to their
employees but the difference between intending to do something and actually
going through with it, is huge.
Processes and systems need to be in place, and putting them
there takes time. Companies can and do change but change is often slow-paced.
Relationships can be complex and there may be a lot to unpack.
Having an experienced specialist recruitment expert onside
can help greatly. They will have experience of sorting the strategy for
onboarding new candidates within your sector, will possess knowledge of the
values shared by all of the different generations you may be recruiting and
they can promote your new way of doing things to the candidates as if they are
an external observer.
Within Data, AI and Cloud, it is important to view new
technology as a way to enhance the potential of your workforce rather than a
way of enslaving them to an omnipresent company presence. There will always be
doubters who misunderstand the aims, or those who are old-school who attempt to
mould what is happening to fit their standard worldview. Specialist recruitment
partners are outside and have a better overview of how things are going and
where things may be going wrong.
Responsive businesses will treat all the people in and
around the business with dignity, pays fairly, challenges and reassesses its
values in the face of criticism, develops an environment of accountability and nurturing
where people can thrive and will help the company thrive, in return.
Companies must adapt during these times. Showing
appreciation, encouragement and consideration is not a weakness. Getting fully
involved in the recruitment should not draw you away from your current
responsibilities. If you have the right help on your side, these problems will
not even be a concern anymore.
Curious about how Zenshin Talent can help your organisation? Contact us today for a no-strings conversation about your needs and our experience.
With recruiting budgets increasing and priorities shifting,
2022 looks set to be another wild ride.
Will the talent shortage continue? Will the demand continue
unabated? We thought we would look into the predicted trends for the year
ahead.
The drive to hire the very best during a time when all of
the obvious quality candidates have been snapped up, means that there is a
reassessment of what makes a prospect suitable. Qualifications that are
relevant but not necessarily degree level are now causing recruiters to
reprioritise what is really important. This may include years of experience and
the requisite soft skills, the latter being regarded as unimportant by most
recruiters in exchange for hard skills.
Diversity is also coming into focus as it has been found
that those who are underrepresented usually have great soft skills and the
diversity happens naturally when this is taken into account, so it is a win-win
for everyone to view recruiting like this. Add to that, the fact that those
without a degree are likely to remain with a company for a third longer than
those who do.
Diversity should always be an integral business strategy
component. DEI is important to job seekers and they expect to read about it on
job specs or hear about it during preliminary chats. Businesses should expect
to answer tough questions from candidates who are no longer accepting a little
bit of ill-thought out corporate text regarding this issue. They want to know
where the investment is going.
Of course, remote work or hybrid work are still going to be
a reality for a lot of workers in 2022. Amongst those seeking jobs, flexibility
is the emerging priority. More and more job ads are including the amount of
flexibility. With hybridity came fatigue, with workers struggling to adapt and
adaptation is now becoming a major focus. It has been a steep learning curve
and it will level off in the near future.
Data, AI, Cloud and IT demand will continue to be very much
in demand. Job vacancies are still rising and going unfilled. UK tech
investment was at £18bn during the middle of 2021 and that will remain.
Companies will, however, be ready for the uncertainty as opposed to the way
things were in 2020 and 2021. Long term planning is the name of the game now
and, as ever, it will be interesting to see where we are at the end of the
year.
Reskilling was something that was on few organisations’ radar
before the pandemic but it is now important due to factors such as power
swinging to the employees rather than the employers when it comes to the job
market, the need for more skills especially within IT, Data and digital realms
and the ethos of the new generations who want to stay with companies and make a
difference, seeing a focus on professional development as a step in the right
direction.
Companies benefit from lower turnover of staff, with those
who are committed and mobile within a company staying twice as long as those who
are not. This is a job for recruiters, whether internal or external recruitment
partners, and also HR, who need to find ways that make sense for internal
mobility.
Companies being genuine is something a lot of candidates are looking for. In response to the pandemic, candidates have reprioritised and are now no longer tolerating being seen as robots. In the past, businesses have been able to push this to the limit of acceptability and now there is pushback. Looking after an employees mental well-being was a hot button issue during the lockdowns and now we are out of lockdown, those employees are asking why they have tolerated this. Genuine care, attention and support show them that they are not just a number in a company.
Curious about how Zenshin Talent can help your organisation? Contact us today for a no-strings conversation about your needs and our experience.
One of the most important factors within a company’s
recruitment strategy is the idea of continuity. Continuity contributes greatly
to candidate trust and also makes the administrative side easier too. There is
no real reason for a business not to value continuity other than ignorance of
its importance.
Let’s assume that you have a PSL (preferred supplier list)
and you are farming out the task of tracking down the perfect candidate to
multiple recruiters. That would be a very good guess as the majority of companies
use this method, though not all have a PSL, electing to just contact recruiters
at random whenever the need arises. Specialist recruitment partners are a
pretty new concept so most have not even considered that as a possibility.
Now, nothing stops those multiple recruitment companies from
contacting the same prospects at the same, or similar times, in order to
attract them to the role. Having multiple recruiters working the same
candidates is a failure of your recruitment processes. Firstly, those recruiters
have wasted their time chasing the same person. Recruiters working on a no win,
no fee basis only have so many hours they will spend on a job role before
binning it off in favour of something that may offer a better chance of
payment, and if they are contacting individuals who have already expressed
interest or chosen not to go ahead with the opportunity, it can lead to a lack
of both recruiters and candidates. Secondly, to that candidate, your
organisation appear disorganised. There is no joined-up thinking going on, and
if that is the case, why would they desire to work with you?
As the market for quality candidates heats up, one of the
major factors in securing said candidate is speed. How fast can you find them,
how fast can you screen them and how fast can you secure them? Having more
recruiters on the case should by rights make the task quicker but that is
rarely the case.
Responsive employers are worth their weight in gold and a
few are working out that the way to overcome the stalling within their hiring
is not solely to throw larger money offers at the candidates, but to rethink
how they recruit.
If you were building a house, you would not use more than
one architect at the same time or a few sets of builders, hoping that some how
the plan would coalesce all by itself? In no other industry would this be
classed as normality, yet within recruitment, it is. Perhaps, until now, no one
has offered any alternative.
The frustration a candidate will feel being put forward for
a role, only to find out they are not a good fit, and then to have it happen
all over again, will sour them on your company. Multiple points of contact are
where miscommunication happens and where alienation can occur. There is no
excuse, in this day and age, for this to happen.
Exclusivity is a scary word for organisations looking for
recruiters. This topic comes up again and again. A hiring manager may know they
need to switch up the way they are doing something, for better results, but are
not sure how. Wary of making it so that they have no back-up, they ignore the
parts of their current strategy that are not working or that are causing
headaches.
The added continuity that specialist recruitment partners
bring to the table usually never crosses the mind of someone who is obsessed
with recruiting fast. The false economy of destroying continuity is not an
issue they wish to face. Yet face it they must.
The big question is: how far does it have to go, and how long does it have to go on, before the continuity issue is taken seriously? Next time you make soup in your kitchen, think about that old saying and decide whether you want to invite around a lot more cooks to try and get it done quicker, or if you are better off with just the one.
Curious about how Zenshin Talent can help your organisation? Contact us today for a no-strings conversation about your needs and our experience.
Encourage upskilling to make sure your employees can climb the ladder
Whilst the role of the recruiter has always been viewed as
one of seeking out and selecting candidates with the requisite hard skills
needed for the role they are tasked with filling, it should now also be seen as
the job of ascertaining which candidates have the requisite soft skills that
aid in their interpersonal communications and problem-solving.
This is essential now that working from home has become
normalised, in the wake of Covid-19. Teams need to communicate better and
managers need to be able to get to the bottom of problems at a distance from
their workforce. Productivity suffers otherwise.
The skills shortage is not just within the hard skills, it
is within soft skills too and upper echelon management are rightly concerned
about it. If you are desperately seeking the right candidate to unlock your
data project and, try as you might, you cannot find one, or find one who will
commit to your company, you don’t have many options open to you. The C-Suite
knows this and that is why around 80% of CEOs are stressing about it.
Offering opportunities and guarantees of upskilling to
prospective candidates is one way to win them over from a competitor’s offer.
Soft skills have now come to the fore more than they have in the recent past
and the impetus is on the honing of them, in order to prepare the workforce for
the next steps in their careers.
Invention, intuition, innovation and ingenuity are major
factors in the rising need for upskilling. Whereas the C-suite used to view
these attributes with indifference, with a pandemic that has not yet ended, the
benefits to a company’s health of collaboration and communication are now seen
as important. With that comes the desire to upskill the workforce.
Jobs that revolve around the understanding of technology and
a need for highly technical skills, are no longer immune to the need for
personal skills too. As projects grow larger and more complex, so do the teams,
which means that they must operate like well-oiled machines.
On top of all of this, the teams may be working at locations
in different cities, or even different continents, which means that
communication breakdowns will hugely inhibit a productive working environment.
Empathy must be present in those who are working in that environment.
Upskilling is already having an impact on recruitment.
Businesses are already starting to focus on whether a candidate has advanced
organisational skills, is friendly, thrives in difficult situations. Yes, these
are always on job specs, but now there seems to be a move towards profiles that
display this information as equal to the hard skills that are required.
Leadership qualities, emotional intelligence and resilience
are two other major soft skills needed to take these businesses into the future
and that also applies to current managers. Covid-19 has exposed a soft skills
gap within management, which needs to be filled quickly before it becomes a
real detriment to firms. The more diverse a company becomes, the more
management need to upskill to understand where employees are coming from.
A programme of upskilling within a company not only
strengthens the workers but it strengthens the company. Employees who have been
encouraged and helped to upskill are much more likely to respect that company
and to stay with that company. While upskilling costs money, it saves money in
the long run. Lower turnover, in turn, saves time and money on constantly
on-boarding staff. Upskilling builds confidence and leads to heightened
productivity too.
The paranoia that the C-suite execs have that they are just spending money to train the next company’s workforce must end. There is no evidence that that ever happens. Workers want to feel valued and respected and upskilling is a way both parties can win.
Curious about how Zenshin Talent can help your organisation? Contact us today for a no-strings conversation about your needs and our experience.
The biggest recent change within recruitment is the change
within the job market, switching from being employer-driven to
candidate-driven. Such a shift creates an imbalance, where in-demand hires can
demand more and get it, constantly moving around and leaving gaps that need to
be filled from an increasingly reduced pool of possible employees.
This creates a Gold Rush for candidates, especially ones who
are in niche sectors, such as data science, AI, etc. We have a situation now
where even junior candidates are changing jobs, roles and companies every 6
months, matched with large upgrades in their salaries as they do it.
This is having a strong impact which, in turn, is leading to
short term thinking. Short term planning in and of itself is not necessarily a
bad thing, but it must exist in relation to long term planning and should never
be driven by desperation.
What we do not want is collective insanity where businesses
are just throwing money around with wild abandon as that is really
unsustainable. Reaching the limit has to happen sooner or later and when that
happens there will be one hell of a hangover. In our previous post, we pointed
to a need to restrategise in terms of company image and interview policy.
All of this upheaval puts recruitment under the microscope
and that may not be a bad thing. For one thing, recruitment is changing as the
world is changing, but many companies have been too busy to understand or
recognise.
Firstly, recruiters should at this point be examining how
they have been running things. The standardised way of recruitment is, once an
assignment is won from a company, to spam candidates found on job boards with
emails and once they respond, send multiple resumes to the company and hope and
pray. If one particular mission is too time-consuming, the recruiter will
naturally focus in on others that are less time-consuming, or if it is too
niche, they switch to those that are less difficult to find candidates for.
Recruitment where no money is made until the recruiter finds that ‘magic
ticket’ is a rather unsustainable business model if we are being perfectly
honest. It is somewhat of a miracle that it has lasted this long.
Secondly, organisations should be reassessing their
relationships with, and understanding of, recruitment. There is a saying that
repeating the same actions and expecting different results is the very
definition of insanity, and that old saying just might be true.
The perception of recruiters is that they are only out to
make a fast buck. There are bad apples in every industry and recruitment is no
different. The reality is closer to those working within it and working hard.
Those who are working hard and have left behind the ‘spray and pray’ model are
creating proper consultancies where they
can leverage their experience and expertise to help companies they have a real
relationship with.
As the candidate market heats up, offers are going to be
lost. That is a fact of life. But because of exclusivity between organisation
and recruitment partner, they can keep up the momentum, which is important
during this gold rush. They can learn from that specific situation to improve
refine the search. Development is usually either arrested by clients having
multiple agencies working on a role, so short term failure caused them to
switch focus in hopes of getting the result, or by the agency running away from
the challenge because there is nothing keeping them there other than a verbal
agreement. If a dedicated recruitment partner has the mandate is to build a
team, the lessons they learned from the challenge leads to better results over
and over again.
Those who are ready to face the future with a realistic and calm outlook, will be the ones who have a bright future ahead of them.
Curious about how Zenshin Talent can help your organisation? Contact us today for a no-strings conversation about your needs and our experience.
