We've all heard about the terrible War for Talent we're facing. Predictions are that in many locales, there won't be enough available workers to fill the jobs. I say the problem is actually much worse than the predictions.... and it's already here. Before we ever get to the problem of not having enough people to fill the jobs, we are already deep into the problem of not having enough TALENTED people to fill key roles.
Now I'm no seer, but in my interview with the Cranky Middle Manager quite a while ago, I brought up the idea that it's not enough to have flow of candidates for your company's jobs... you need the best and brightest candidates if you want to be competitive, but do the math; not enough people to fill the roles in general AND hot competition fueling the hunt for the scarce "Fabulous 15%" equals a recruitment and business execution nightmare.
What can you do when faced with this situation? Well, you cannot change the environment, but you CAN change how you address it.
Having the talent your company needs to succeed requires a two-part strategy. Part one is based on ensuring that your company attracts it's fair share of REALLY TALENTED people. Even in a world where you are competing with companies like Google for great talent, there are ways to differentiate yourself to find, attract and engage talented people. The "buy it" approach to talent.
Part two focuses on finding and developing great talent within your walls by identifying internal talent through assessment, development and deployment techniques. The "build it" approach to talent.
I will remind you again (and again and again!) in this series, that neither talent acquisition (recruitment) or internal talent development alone alone will win the war, but in the right proportions - they can be a devastatingly effective weapon.
I normally blog once a week, but for this series, I will probably roll things out a WHOLE LOT faster..... stay tuned intrepid warrior....
Showing posts with label talent. Show all posts
Showing posts with label talent. Show all posts
Sunday, April 15, 2007
Saturday, March 10, 2007
The secret sauce of building your team - PART 3
Part 3 in the series on how to build your team focuses on three areas; establishing your hunting ground, choosing your weapons, and defining your tactics.
1. Defining your hunting ground -
In this step you define where you want to hunt for your talent - this "hunting ground" is going the place(s) where you think you are most likely to find the talent you need. For example, if in setting you laser focus on the target, you determine that an advanced degree in widgetology was the key requirement, you'd probably want to hunt in the schools that teach widgetology, or the national association of widgetologists. You should also define where you don't want to hunt - are there competitors, clients or partners you should not annoy by poaching their talent away?? Consider whether the types of folks you want belongs to a professional association, are alum of certain schools, or are bloggers. All these vehicles can be prime
2. Choosing your weapons -
No - I am not talking about guns (thought it would be fun to muse on that). I am referring to which of the various recruitment weapons you would like to employ; Networking, Employee Referral, job board search, niche advertising, diversity recruiting, research recruiting, contingent or retained search... or some combination of these or others. Knowing which weapon to use, as well as how and when to use it is more art than science, and this is one of those places where I have to refer to the counsel of your resident HR person. If, however you don't have one of those, remember this - Of all the weapons to use, Internal Transfers (Promotional or developmental assignments), Employee Referral and network hires tend to have the highest success rates, longest tenures... and are VERY inexpensive ways to go - you should always try to exhaust these two methods before moving on to the others.
3. Defining your tactics -
This is the simplest part of the equation, and the one we most frequently get wrong! The tactics I refer to are how you will actually attack the search. Key decisions like who will be involved in the interview process, how many interviews will be required, how long you let candidates wait, who communicates with them, how and how often.... all the key decisions on how you manage the candidates you search for.... I know that many of those points seem self-evident or perhaps a bit too nitty to focus on , but I can assure you - the tactics you employ in dealing with candidates can derail the best search process and leave you with no talent, no pipeline of candidates, and a bad organizational reputation to boot!
1. Defining your hunting ground -
In this step you define where you want to hunt for your talent - this "hunting ground" is going the place(s) where you think you are most likely to find the talent you need. For example, if in setting you laser focus on the target, you determine that an advanced degree in widgetology was the key requirement, you'd probably want to hunt in the schools that teach widgetology, or the national association of widgetologists. You should also define where you don't want to hunt - are there competitors, clients or partners you should not annoy by poaching their talent away?? Consider whether the types of folks you want belongs to a professional association, are alum of certain schools, or are bloggers. All these vehicles can be prime
2. Choosing your weapons -
No - I am not talking about guns (thought it would be fun to muse on that). I am referring to which of the various recruitment weapons you would like to employ; Networking, Employee Referral, job board search, niche advertising, diversity recruiting, research recruiting, contingent or retained search... or some combination of these or others. Knowing which weapon to use, as well as how and when to use it is more art than science, and this is one of those places where I have to refer to the counsel of your resident HR person. If, however you don't have one of those, remember this - Of all the weapons to use, Internal Transfers (Promotional or developmental assignments), Employee Referral and network hires tend to have the highest success rates, longest tenures... and are VERY inexpensive ways to go - you should always try to exhaust these two methods before moving on to the others.
3. Defining your tactics -
This is the simplest part of the equation, and the one we most frequently get wrong! The tactics I refer to are how you will actually attack the search. Key decisions like who will be involved in the interview process, how many interviews will be required, how long you let candidates wait, who communicates with them, how and how often.... all the key decisions on how you manage the candidates you search for.... I know that many of those points seem self-evident or perhaps a bit too nitty to focus on , but I can assure you - the tactics you employ in dealing with candidates can derail the best search process and leave you with no talent, no pipeline of candidates, and a bad organizational reputation to boot!
Sunday, March 04, 2007
The Secret Sauce of building your team - Part 2
Part 2 - Setting a laser focus on your target
Now that we have defined that we need to fill the position and the results we need this position to achieve, we can start setting our focus on the target of our recruitment efforts. Again, we're going to operate guerrilla -style here so we have to focus on working smart with the resources we have.
STEP 2 - Defining your target
Now that we have defined that we need to fill the position and the results we need this position to achieve, we can start setting our focus on the target of our recruitment efforts. Again, we're going to operate guerrilla -style here so we have to focus on working smart with the resources we have.
STEP 2 - Defining your target
- With a clear understanding of the results we need this position to achieve, look within the organization to see if anyone has accomplished such results - and think a little more broadly here; If we need someone to sell 50,000 widgets this quarter, and no one else in our company has sold that many widgets before, consider:
- Do we have someone who has sold an outstanding amount of a similar product?
- Do we have an expert on widget marketing who has sales skills?
- If we find someone who appears to be a good model, let's dissect them to see why they were successful. Exactly what is it that sets them apart from the crowd?
- Is there something about their training, background or development that helped them get where they are? If so, can we find others with similar talent by looking in the places where this person "grew up"?
- Do they belong to professional associations for widget sellers?
- Did they attend a college or other educational program that focuses on the widget sales profession?
- Recognizing that our world is imperfect, we have to plan for the fact that we may not find what we are looking for in our company. In fact, they could be working for our major widget competitor. We're not going to dig in deep on this point here, but competitive hiring (aka raiding the competition) is a real tactic and you better be aware of in terms of both your talent hunt, and protecting your valuable talent from being poached.
- With this clear picture of the DNA of a person who can do what you need done, do a sanity check on your view - get other managers and leaders to review your model. Do they find it accurate, reasonable and feasible? Do they have any ideas to add?
- Knowing the results you need and where folks capable of such results might come from, it's time to start staking out our hunting ground, our weapons and our tactics... and those points are what we will focus on next time.
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