The War for Talent
Did You Build the Right Recruiting Process? By Brian Regan, President, Semper International
There is a war for talent happening right now. It impacts many facets of our economy. The print- ing industry is seeing it mostly in the specific trade positions. To be blunt, it’s hard to find skilled bindery and press operators. The talent drought is evident in
other positions, but there is an epidemic shortage with bindery and press operators.
As this article is being written, the unemployment rate has reached the national level of a whopping 4.7%. Unfortunately, this issue will be continuing into and past 2017 barring any significant global issue (war, bubble burst … housing?).
Talent pipeline building has been the buzzword for some time. The use of online tools to gain the eyes of potential employees has exploded. This trend is booming on professional networks like LinkedIn, niche job sites like the PIA Job Bank, and job aggre- gate sites like Indeed and Zip Recruiter—as is using all these avenues to harness the potential applicants into an applicant tracking system (ATS).
These tools, when properly deployed and managed, can have a powerful impact on how a firm attracts talent. While not all forms hit the nail on the head, many do have the fundamental systems to gain some traction on growing the talent pipeline.
There is an important piece of the talent procure- ment process that has eroded in relation to the hard-to-find skilled tradesperson. It is the ease of the process and, more important, the way they are engaged by a firm.
Limited Access to Technology Addressing the first issue, many of these people do not live their lives in front of a computer. With mobile technology rapidly consuming their online time, it’s unclear if they ever will use computers as much as a highly technical talent pipeline process requires. This creates the potential for lost talent.
The advertising may gain their eyes, but the appli- cation process frustrates and loses them. The process may be simple for companies to track can- didates but not enticing enough for the talent to go through the online applicant process.
The Magazine
A strong talent pipelining strategy backed by a solid ATS is recommended, but a firm must dig deeper. The human side of relationship building and work- ing with the talent through the process is a piece largely overlooked when building these online-to- ATS processes. Who is calling the applicant? Are they able to excite and motivate the person to join? Let’s not forget, we have only recently come out of a devastating recession. Many firms and recruiters are still used to a talent-rich environment. If your systems are designed from the perspective of high talent availability, it may not be best suited for the current low-talent-availability market.
The Human Touch Review your current process and focus a critical eye on how you are attracting talent and what you are doing after you gain their attention. Make sure you don't lose the right skilled person because of your process. Dig through the steps. Look at where the applicants are dropping off in the process and create a human solution. Add in more human-to-hu- man interaction to ensure you keep those hard-to- find people engaged and motivated to join you.
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WINTER 2017
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