by Niamh Madden, Community Manager at KonnectAgain
2018 will be all about talent: Attracting great people, finding the right candidates, hiring, engaging and retaining them.
Talent Acquisition, Recruitment and HR professionals are still struggling to find the right people because of low unemployment, skills shortages and competitive employer branding.
Here’s my 2018 cheat sheet to give you a head-start to the new year.
Onboard before onboarding – The onboarding process needs to start before employees join and should be focused on what matters to each generation. Focus on what matters to millennials and Generation Z: company values and mission; career and personal development and mentoring. Make it easy for your people to stay in touch and feel part of the team before they join, whether that’s by asking them for their input, including them in a project or meeting for coffee.
Develop a retention strategy – With employees now averaging a tenure of just two years, it’s essential that organisations have a retention strategy. Gather insights into why people are leaving so you can make changes to your organisation, retain your employees and reduce the high cost of turnover.
Make room for Gen Z – Company culture trumps salary and perks and your organisation must allow for the flexibility and mobility Millennials and Gen Z demand.”Perks, parties and foosball tables won’t keep top talent from taking a job with your competitor for a 10% raise,” author Kevin Kruse of Employee Engagement 2.0 advises.
Tap into the “Stay At Home Parent” Talent Pool – A talent pool that is often overlooked are parents that have decided to take a “career break” to stay-at-home with their children. These parents are skilled, experienced and highly motivated when they decide to re-enter the workforce. It’s so important for organisations to either keep this connection with their former employees who are taking a career break or to tap into this talent pool when hiring.
Conduct “Stay” Surveys – Why wait until it’s too late? Find out what would trigger a job search for your flight-risk employees by doing Stay Surveys. Ask yourself if there is anything your organisation can do to give new opportunities to employees that feel it’s time to move on. If you’re not doing Stay Surveys you might just be leaving it too long to find out why people are leaving.
Ask if your Exit Surveys are really honest – Traditionally, the Exit Survey is conducted in-house by HR. Studies have shown that people are more likely to be honest when surveys are anonymous and not tied back directly to them. To find out the trends why people are leaving, outsource your exit survey to a third party who ensures results remain anonymous and action-focussed.
Generate boomerang employees – “People who left [your organisation] aren’t traitors, they’re alumni who went in a different direction in their life,” Kevin Kruse advises. What happens to your employees after they leave? Smart businesses keep in touch with their alumni with the aim of either rehiring top performers as “boomerangs” or leveraging their network for great referrals. With over half of millennials saying they’d return to a former employer, staying connected can help you attract boomerangs.
Make use of the gig economy– Freelancers, consultants and independent contractors now make up 20-30% of the workforce and the figure is set to rise. Many companies are redesigning how they hire by moving to a more agile workforce. Take advantage of this by asking what parts of your business could be more agile and tap into people’s interest in moving around regularly to new opportunities and roles on their own terms.
Robots could do more of the dull work – HR robots may seem a long way away, but many start-ups are looking into how robots could take care of all those admin tasks so that you don’t have to.The idea is that these types of robots will liberate us to be our best selves. When we don’t have to focus on low-value work, we can be engaged in more rewarding and challenging projects.
