Retaining
talent may seem like an easy thing to do in a global economy like today where
having a job may be good enough for most of us.
However, that isn’t the case.
Even with huge numbers of people unemployed and available in the labor
market pool, companies still prefer to target recruiting from the
competition. I even heard from a
recruiter that will remain nameless in Chicago that the recruiting team he is a
member of will not consider folks that have been laid off or unemployed. Why are recruiters overlooking the countless
number of people looking for work? The
answers may surprise you.
Traditionally
recruiters internal within companies and staffing agencies have always been
keen on targeting staff off the competition to recruit from. Why?
This answer is based on one primary reason – that is companies don’t
like to let their competitors know they are being targeted to avoid what could
be considered an act of “talent war”. In
the late 90s it was not unlikely to leave work only to find that the competition
had flierd the parking lot with help wanted ads and offering “happy hour” at a
nearby hotel where you could interview.
No-a-days the talent war is online and going mobile.
To many
recruiters there is a stigma that if you consider someone that is unemployed or
been laid off that they are the “bottom of the barrel” candidates. Though we all know this is not the case, the
tendency for recruiters to bypass the unemployed continues. It is almost better to not say you are
unemployed and eliminate that term from your vocabulary. In this case the choice of words can be
discriminating. I would encourage you to
replace with unemployed with “recently back on the market”.
Retaining
talent is not easy for companies even after new hires start. Wages have dropped and in many cases
productivity is up due to working with less staff – thus people having to be
stressed to work harder or longer hours.
This has a negative effect on staff morale. It does not help when legacy staff that has
experienced the pay decreases and visibility to the turn-over to negatively
influence staff either.
What
companies should do is use the opportunity of the times to separate themselves
from other competitors that have to take more drastic measures to survive. One way to do that is to focus on retention
programs to keep staff as long as possible and ride out the financial
storm. This can be done by a variety of
strategies aimed to make the workplace interesting, fun and rewarding.
First of
all, think about how develop talent.
What is the career path for everyone in the company? How is it that the receptionist can go from
that job to the CEO someday? If you have
a well-crafted career path for all staff and a documented process from which
staff can follow at their own speed to influence the promotion eligible
pool.
Second, what
are you doing to reward talent that
shows up to work on time, does not take extended lunch breaks, staff that
mentors others so they can be successful, does whatever it takes to get the job
done, and true team players? Think up a
way to reward such staff by having an internal “refer a colleague contest”
whereby people can nominate each other based on good demonstrated
behavior. Make this part of your career
path program as it supports the kind of culture you will want to have.
Lastly, have
your staff recommend somebody looking for a job. Recruiters will always consider internal
referrals and often care less about candidates that are unemployed or not. Now you know the “work around”.
-
Gregorio
Cardenas-Vazquez, September 19, 2011
