Top four challenges in Talent Acquisition

Author: Rekha Nair

For all those who sit on the other side of the table other than HR, Talent acquisition is the most mundane, most easy and most taken for granted task.  No one spares a second thought to the Recruitment process in the Company, apart from HR and if you are lucky the Top management once in a while when the bottom line is affected and the Leaders point out to ‘manpower’ issues as the reason behind it. Yes, you heard it right, most of us in HR are aware of this and this is what we deal with every day, but we would rather sweep it under the carpet and not discuss about it, but problems has to be tackled and analyzed if not today then tomorrow , definitely.

As any HR professional who has handled or is handling ‘Talent acquisition’ shall tell you that  though it sounds to be the most simplest of and uncomplicated task, it is actually not so, it is a challenge every day, and the Company and the HR team along with the line managers has to be geared up to meet the challenges.  Some of the most common challenges which any HR manager who handles Talent acquisition shall enumerate are  as given below:-

1)      Quality Manpower : It is amazing, the number of Engineering and professional colleges that we have in our country are close to  6ooo when we put together both, but when we get down to the process of sourcing, screening, selecting, we are all the more amazed at the number of mismatch that we have to deal with.  If we specifically speak about the Campus recruitment, in order to overcome the mismatch, there has to be lot of industry and academia interaction and handholding to enable the colleges to come out with courses or course content which comes up to the needs and expectations of the organizations.

When we talk about lateral entries the biggest challenge is finding the right talent for the right job, your shortlisted, selected candidate might have cleared all the psychometric test, might have cleared all the rounds, all the technical questions must have been answered beautifully, however, when he gets down to working, within a month the Team manager and HR realizes that the whole exercise has been futile as he has everything going on paper but when it comes to delivering it is a big miss. The challenge is to find the right talent, the right attitude for the given job and for this HR fraternity has been struggling and experimenting, but to till date we are yet to come up with a fool proof method.

2)      Stability : This might sound old fashioned and out of league, but this is one of the biggest challenges  for every organization and for every HR Head , and  that is to retain the talent that you have brought in and who seems to be the right fit.  It is again not to be left to the HR department to make sure that once the candidate has joined he stays put for decent amount of time, apart from Induction, being your buddy and point of contact in the initial days.  HR needs all the efforts to be put in by the respective Departments also where he or she joins to make it comfortable and interesting and lucrative in terms of work for the employee to make him want to come back to the office every day.

3)      Transparency :  It is the prime responsibility and in fact should be driven by the Ethic code of every Company that the HR department shall be transparent about the salary, designation, role, responsibilities, rules , regulations, ethics, culture  etc. of the Company and every effort shall be made by the Company to cover all these aspects through the Induction program and the various training programs and sessions that the employee goes through upon his joining.  The HR department should take extra effort to gauge the understanding of the employees , it is a good idea to have ‘on board interview’, similar to the exit interview, after the Induction is over  so that HR is able to address the gaps in understanding of any issue by the employee.  

Transparency is applicable both ways as an employee is entitled to all the information about an organization and its systems and procedures whether it is with regard to compensation & benefits, Learning &Development, Rewards &Recognition similarly an organization is entitled to have correct information about the candidate with regard to his qualification, his past experience, his last salary drawn etc.  Most of the organizations have put checks and balances in place to be sure that the information provided to them is authentic, in spite of that the number of ‘discrepancies’ which are reported by verification consultants to the HR department is alarming, and it is a cause of concern as many candidates give incorrect information about their salaries and qualifications , more over they supplement it with fake certificates and references.

4)      Culture fit   :  Okay, let us assume that we have taken care of all the above, we have got a right fit candidate who has made up his mind to stay with us long term and is totally transparent about his credentials and all is well, but then comes the most important question, in spite of the knowledge and information passed on to him about the organization and his absorbing the same, there are many unwritten rules in the organization which he shall be able  to understand only in due course of time, which may confuse him or take him by surprise or might even make him highly uncomfortable, this usually happens when employees make a move across industries for example when a candidate who has throughout worked in Media industry changes over to the EPC sector , he sees a huge transformation staring at him.  Here HR has to play an important role , this has to be done proactively, taking into consideration this piece of information and then by way of assigning a buddy to him in the department, or putting him under a mentor for sometime or HR itself taking pains to continuously communicate with the employee with the intention of keeping him for good and let not all the efforts go in vain.  Of course, this needs equal cooperation and willingness and a genuine effort from the candidate as well to imbibe the changes and change to grow.

As detailed  above, the ‘Talent Acquisition’ team whom most of us hardly give a second look unless and until we have to forward a resume under the ‘referral scheme’, is actually strengthening the foundation of the organisation every day and making sure that while all the others concentrate aggressively on the bottom line and profit margin, they are giving their invaluable support in their own quiet and determined way

About Author

Rekha Nair

She holds over 16 years of experience,  primarily in Corporate HR and has handled the entire gamut of HR in a reputed IT company in the Corporate HR Division, for the last 7 plus years working as Chief Manager - HR  of Angelique International Ltd., a reputed EPC company from India. Posses a good experience in Talent Acquisition, Talent Management, R&R, Trainings, Employee Engagement, HR Audits  and HRIS. 

 

 

Top four outcomes of an Exit Interview!!

Author: Simran Oberoi

 

 

Exit Interviews are usually not perceived as pleasant interactions – some people view it as a venting exercise, some adopt an “advisory” approach of providing solutions to the issues they faced and a lot of people are usually indifferent!

So as an HR practitioner, it can be very frustrating to try and gather data or meaning from these discussions and try to link it to actual root causes for employee attrition. Have you ever thought of making a slightly different sort of list of what you want to achieve out of this discussion from an exiting employee? If yes, you are ahead of most others ! If not, here are some pointers which might help…and here I’d like to use my favorite sentence- this is an indicative list, not an exhaustive one !

 

1.  The most obvious - Reasons for leaving the firm. Of course, employees have a standard response to this that they come prepared with – but the onus is on you to make sure that you ask questions that make the employee give clear and specific answers instead of a whole lot of subjective information on what didn’t work well. Also, employees are hesitant to share negative feedback – whether it is due to the fear of confrontation or lack of belief that the feedback will have any  impact. You have a hugely challenging task of creating a sense of trust in an already-disillusioned employee !

 

2.  HR needs to find some answers, but it also needs to understand the thought process of an exiting employee…So probe sensitively about how the individual arrived at the decision to leave the firm. This will help you reach the core of the actual issue and manage attrition in a more focused manner.

 

3. Try to also collect the positives , the optimistic thoughts from such interviews even if those seem rare to come by – Perhaps names of supportive managers/peers, high potential team members and so on. Agreed that this could be very subjective and perception driven, but then so are a whole lot of other things related with people ! This information will come in handy to anticipate where your strength lies and how to anticipate any exits of key employees.

 

4.  Collect feedback for HR too – so the exit interview should allow the employee to share his or her thoughts on how and when the HR’s involvement could have helped prevent the exit. This also covers getting the employee’s thoughts on what interventions make sense to them and what didn’t have any impact on their motivation/engagement levels.

About Author
Simran Oberoi
Sr. Knowledge Partner - SHRM India

She has over a decade of experience primarily in HR advisory services in the areas of Rewards (Benchmarking, Strategy, Job Mapping, Measurement), covering APAC, South Asia and the US), Long Term Incentives engagements, Organization Restructuring, Capacity Building, Competency Frameworks and Talent Development.  

She has published several articles on different HR areas, with leading HR journals such as People Matters, Human Capital, Business Manager – HR magazine and industry magazines such as Oil Asia. She regularly contributes the SHRM perspective across print and electronic newspapers.

 

How to Recruit Right!!

Rushing for a Monday review when suddenly got a call from Mangesh who was supposed to join but turned down the offer just when we were all set to have him onboard.

All these years have faced many such Monday’s where excitement for closure was just missed by a call or sometimes no call. Recruitment has never been easy but it certainly beyond just scheduling interviews and offers.

All these years have worked with some real sharp recruiters whose Mantra when shared and practiced worked out well

 

 

Asking Questions might bother many but is a best way for an HR to understand the requirement before even saying yes to sourcing. It makes no sense to work on X when Y was required, so miscommunication will only lead to frustration and CV spamming. Having good understanding helps better filtration, lesser interviews and quicker closures. Keeping a sample question bank too is not a Bad Idea!!

Once through with inside knowledge having good sales pitch which is crisp but informative and has flow which can attract the candidate is a MUST. Downloading all the information at the first call might not be effective rather go slow and make the conversation interactive. Don’t push much, generate interest and move on. This helps to judge the candidate profile as well as his interest. Many time first call itself can sort out fitment issues and avoid facing such situation at the final stage. First call is most important!!

Try all means to nail the requirement but be judicious on the cost. If something can be closed through internal referral why outsource the same. But if it niche enough then why wait to do the same. The call is yours but wasting time to experiment will have additional cost.

Back outs can make you land in the most embarrassing situations so better be prepared. Having a backup plan just counts a lot. Remember a position is closed only after the candidate settles in the organization.

Judgment skill and perseverance play a major role too. Stay cool and let your mind speak for you. Many times our personal interests have to be forgone when picking the right candidate. Focus should be to hire a resource that is culturally and technically fit enough to sustain a long term association with the organization.

All this might help in improving recruitment as a process and a skill but still there are and will remain on going challenges which an HR/Recruiter has to go through. Whether it’s the pressure to fill the requirements or talent crunch in the market one needs to keep the communication channel active and need based try to get best possible to suit all ends.  

Recruitment too has its ups and downs and being updated with the latest Hiring Trends will only make one a better recruiter.

HAPPY RECRUITING!!

Job hunt #Twitter

Did you hear the latest ‘talk of the town’ ...140 character resume and you already started counting your words on your CV?

So twitter seems to be next recruiting tools but is it better? That time can only tell..

However considering the lengthy resumes which requires lots for effort from candidate for the best possible editing and hardly any from employer to leave it unread or simply move it to trash, 140 character is appealing. At least, scanning time will reduce and cracking the code of TAT would not be that far stretched dream.

But will 140 characters reveal all what is required for that ice breaker call? Or is it a start of new skill set development with some tweety vocab to describe ones career in an abbreviated manner.eg. 10 HR Head (R/EE/PMS/SC/TD) Mum MBA Org: ABC/DEF/GHI, wow and all this in just 57 characters. Not bad!! So now recruiters can expect some good filtering on comm. Skills J by default!!

Most interestingly twitter or social media scores on transparency and communication, which in portal is just one way. Here employer would be more conscious of the brand, when it comes to follow up tweets. Remember how many emails/calls it took you for you to onboard last job.

But how many are really twitter savvy or will this just cater to a niche segment or a social segment. Does that mean loosing on some good audience?  That’s a good discussion point too.

Nevertheless it’s a good connect and word on social media spreads more than any other channel and no harm in trying after all it has the best pricing. IT’S FREE

 

Slowdown can get you more garbage

So three months into slowdown now, have you started getting brilliant people easily in your company. I am not surprised if your answer is no. If I ask, have you seen clear sign on better performance from new, improved employees who are joining now and your answer is no, I am not surprised again.
There's something so fundamental about attracting & engaging talent that market conditions seldom play significant role here. You have to answer one simple question, "why should someone join your company" and this question remains valid as long as the number of workplaces in the world do not shrink down to one.
So in absence of this answer, it would remain a challenge to attract & engage talent. Do not mistake attracting & engaging talent with hiring, so may still be able to hire. But its highly expensive to run the company with just hired employees and not the "attracted & engaged" ones. The behavior of engaged employees is very very different from the hired ones and most of the time when you are complaining about your employees its this difference that you are talking about.
So lemme add a few pointers about how you can try to build attraction:
1. Its a no brainer that if you can contruct a clear strong core purpose around your business existence, nothing attracts better. NGOs, Revolutionaries use this always.
2. You can be bigger than your competitor thus can offer people learning, training, handholding, bigger team, clear growth path....or you can be smallere than your competitor thus can offer them flexibility, multitasking opportunity, nearness to top management, less hierarchy etc.
3. You can be easy to reach office, fewer day's work office, no-office, fun office, open office, food at office, green-office, garage-office, but it must be attractive for one reason or other.
4. Again a no-brainer, talented people would expect you to know your numbers right and if your numbers seem too less for even their ambitions, they may not get attracted. When was the last time you got excited because someone was a chasing a business idea that could get as big as Rs.10 Lakh.
These are just thought triggers, point is, you must find answer to "why should someone work for you" to be able to attract talent. Is that enough? I am not sure, but its the essential. Till then keep hiring :)