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key findings

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Conclusion

and key findings

When we started this whitepaper, its overarching premise was to debunk commonly held digital myths in talent acquisition by talking to thought leaders and practitioners in the industry. It’s clear that the change that has occurred across industry in the intervening period has been seismic. AI has exploded into the market and is touching every facet of the talent industry. 

In conjunction with this now, far more accessible technology, the temperature of the Talent Climate continues to rise, with pain points such as time to hire, and skills shortages in certain sectors still front and center for many industries. Alongside this the ‘noise surrounding talent technology can at times be deafening.  Indeed, in the talent acquisition industry the speed of technological development continues to transform the world of work. This, coupled with current global macro-economic tightening, a new technology to understand in AI, the increasing need for tech skilling of the talent pool, and fierce competition for companies to stay at the top, all means talent professionals are under huge pressure.

The industry is at the foothills of revolution in how we attract and retain talent. And like most industries, technology and digital transformation is at the heart of this change. Companies are looking to technology, yet their teams need to stay on top of these advances.

That’s not to say that robots are replacing people. Instead, the best performing companies are leaning-in to the responsible use of AI, with focus given to technology that considers its wider impact and how it helps talent professionals re-think recruitment in a digital environment from automating the mundane and innovating the challenges, to allowing people to lead and strategize, thus allowing technology to act and process.

Ultimately, technology will allow talent professionals to build longer-term relationships with candidates, matching skills to future job requirements.

Technology is an enabler, not a replacement.
The future is a mix of tech and touch.

Our key findings

Technology needs to support employees, not replace them

Business leaders believe that technology will make employees more efficient, but employees don’t necessarily agree, fearing the ‘robots’ will replace them. Getting employees onboard is key to successful tech implementation.

Have a plan beyond simply launching your new tool

Too many businesses focus on launching new technology tools and then leave users to get on with it. Plan how use of the tool will adapt over 30 days, six months and two years to get the most value.

Talent tech is in its infancy, so long-term vendor relationships are key

We’re just at the start of the impact of technology on talent acquisition. Choose your tech vendors based on long-term strategy, not short-term aims.

In chapter two, we examined why technology projects fail – and how to avoid doing so. Talent technology isn’t something you implement and then simply leave to its own devices. Instead, successful technology implementations involve including users in the decision-making process, understanding the specific use cases you want the technology to intervene on, and planning for post-launch adoption and training.

Above all, adopting technology into talent processes is about meticulous planning, ongoing training and understanding how use of the technology can evolve. It’s about thinking beyond launch and planning for the future.

Digital overload weakens the impact of technology

Technology without user led implementation and a eye to simplification, leads to poor adoption and slows down processes, frustrating users. Only implement technology where it can have a strategic impact.

Traditional hiring routes won’t meet demand for talent

Wage inflation, headhunting from competitors and hiring job-ready candidates isn’t going to be enough to meet the huge appetite for tech talent – so it’s time to think outside the box.

Hire for attitude, train for skill

The complexity of technology means skills need continuously updating. In most cases, hiring someone who is adaptable, agile and has a willingness to learn is better than someone with one set of technical skills.

Technology will change both how a candidate applies for and engages with a job role, and how talent professionals source, assess and onboard new hires. It will also offer both parties more data and information about roles and people, allowing for better profile fits, more engaged employees – and less attrition.

Talent tech should be part of a wider strategy to meet the challenges of digital transformation

COVID-19 has proved a catalyst for digital transformation. As hiring tightens, talent professionals are at the forefront of this shift and need to be strategic partners to business.

Candidates expect a consumer experience

It’s not just employees who need to get used to talent tech. Candidates now expect a quick, frictionless hiring process, with easy to use and actionable technology. Fail to stay ahead of the tech curve and your future talent needs fail too.

Artificial intelligence is a game changer for strategic talent acquisition…

By 2025, 75% of organizations will shift from piloting artificial intelligence tools to operationalizing – one of the biggest data and analytics trends of the near future.

…but remember to implement change management

The efficiency of artificial intelligence means roles change and headcount can drop. Make sure you upskill your people and offer a real focus on development opportunities and develop an inclusive environment to grow and retain talent.  In summary, powerful AI is already here but we need to use it responsibly and ethically in order to mitigate bias, thus allowing the wider economy to thrive.

The future is a balance of tech and touch…

Of course, meeting the evolving challenges of talent technology is easier said than done. That’s why AMS provides a number of solutions that help organizations deal with the complex issues brought about by technological change. From how to choose a technology provider to building digital skills in your organization, chatbots to remote hiring – here’s what you need to know.

As mentioned earlier, the temperature of the Talent Climate continues to rise and the noise surrounding talent technology can at times seem deafening. As we climb the foothills of this digital revolution and reach for the uplands, we need the right solutions to cater for our needs and at AMS, our digital solutions help our clients succeed in a new world of work. Finding the right way to get the right people at the right time, on the right terms is what AMS does. We are proud to offer focused and relevant solutions that will make a difference to your world of work.
Talent is our world.

AMS One

AMS One  is a digital platform built to optimize the delivery of RPO talent solutions for AMS clients. With a focus on client, hiring manager and candidate experience, this new platform has benefitted from AMS’ deep understanding of best practice processes, harnessing the power of 27 years of delivering RPO talent solutions.

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AMS Verified

Is talent technology a puzzle you’re yet to solve?

Partnering with trusted vendors and evaluating their solutions through a rigorous vetting process, AMS Verified turns complexity into clarity. Our unique online platform cuts through the noise of the talent technology market with expert insights.
Make confident tech decisions, understand specific products, and stay up to date on the latest innovations.

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AMS Talent Lab

Hiring isn’t the only way to fill the skills gaps. Sometimes, it’s more efficient and cost-effective to help established employees develop niche capabilities. Or finding new, fresh talent and equipping them with the skillsets you need. The possibilities are as varied as your talent challenges. 

AMS Talent Lab can help clients meet their ever growing and demanding skills challenges while focusing on two distinct offerings provided by AMS Talent Lab. 
– Recruiter skilling:  enabling clients to grow the recruitment talent they need.
– Tech skilling:  helping clients to close the tech skills gap.

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Recognizing the importance of fostering diversity, equity and inclusion, this paper offers comprehensive guidance on promoting diversity sourcing and outreach that adheres to compliance standards.

By embracing these best practices, organizations worldwide can cultivate balanced talent pipelines that:

  • encompass underrepresented groups
  • foster inclusivity
  • provide equal opportunities for all.

These strategies not only position organizations as leaders in promoting diversity but also enhance their ability to attract top talent, gaining a competitive edge in today’s diverse marketplace

Regardless of geographical location, HR and TA professionals can leverage the insights provided here to create inclusive, skills-based recruitment processes that align with US compliance standards and contribute to a more equitable and inclusive workforce on a global scale

Everyone is talking about skills-based organizations. But, moving to a new way of working after centuries of established hiring patterns is no easy feat.  It’s a journey, not a switch and practice has some way to keep up with the rhetoric.

In this paper, we look at the impact of skills-based practices on talent acquisition and discuss the opportunity for TA to be leading the way with a skills-based approach to hiring.

Read more for:

  • The definition of skills-based organizations and skills-based hiring
  • The business case for taking a skills-based approach
  • The levers for change in Talent Acquisition
  • The skills-based hiring maturity model

How Talent Acquisition Teams can be a Catalyst for Change

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Everyone’s Talking about Skills-based Organizations

How Talent Acquisition Teams can be a Catalyst for Change

The period of massive technical advancement we know as the Industrial Revolution took off over 250 years ago. So, it’s extraordinary to think that the way we organize work has not really changed in all that time. Many of today’s organizations still evaluate and perform work along strict role-fulfilment lines. That’s just the way it has always been done.

Today, the global scarcity of talent is propelling urgent change. Technological upheaval, economic uncertainty, ageing populations, and dwindling birth rates are creating the conditions for creative solutions. Some business leaders and industry experts are working with a new operating model as a result: one that focuses on skills.

Deloitte estimates around 15-30% of organizations are currently disrupting workforce and talent structures in this way.1

But switching to a new way of working after centuries of established hiring patterns is no easy feat. Talent Acquisition teams are in a unique position to be a catalyst for change but enabling a skills-based transition has major implications for hiring practices and the organizational structures they’re embedded in.

So, how can this transformation be achieved?

Sculpted around skills.

There’s no harm in summarizing what we mean by skills-based organizations for the purposes of this article.

Under the standard, legacy structure, work is organized by roles in a functional hierarchy with a clear scope, remit, and accountabilities. A skills-based approach dismantles this and packages work around the skills needed, opening up opportunities for professionals to transcend the organizational silos of roles and tasks. Work is broken into meaningful chunks and employees with the relevant skills and capabilities are used to fulfil it in a fluid and agile way.

People feel empowered to unlock their potential, helping organizations grow the skills they need to stay competitive.

But moving to a skills-based requires seismic change. And while some businesses have begun to introduce elements of this model into their day-to-day processes (either in defining skills ontologies or within distinct talent practices, such as workforce planning, or performance management and learning and development) this approach is far from widespread. 

Ultimately, the journey towards building a skills-based organization will need pilots like these in certain business functions before such a significant business-wide change can be achieved.

The case for change.

Organizations that have taken steps towards being skills-based are reporting positive outcomes. According to Deloitte organizations are:

•52% more likely to innovate •57% more likely to anticipate change and respond effectively •107% more likely to place talent effectively

•98% are more likely to have a reputation as a place to grow and develop •98% are more likely to retain high performers

Here are some of the reasons businesses are seeing benefits:

1.   Increased match between talent and business needs. Selecting workers based on skills rather than prior job experience and education has helped organizations better ensure that they have the right talent to meet their business needs – not just for “right now”, but for the future, too.

2.    Organizational agility. When organizations understand the skills necessary to deliver work now and, in the future, and are aligned on the skills their workforce has, they can more quickly assess and move skills that are based on business priorities.

3.    Improved workforce performance and productivity. With a skills-based approach, organizations can better tap into all the skills a worker has – not just those they currently use in a specific job.

What’s more, businesses can better nurture and develop in-demand skills, and move talent with the right skills to where they are needed most.

4.    A sense of belonging. When work is structured around skills, employees can put their specific skillsets, strengths and interests to use around the organization, bringing them closer to business strategy. This can help breed a strong sense of belonging and loyalty. 

5.    Built-in diversity. A skills-based setup means DEI is more than a catchphrase. It allows organizations to make more equitable decisions based on an employee’s full range of skills, rather than their job description. Shifting the focus to value skills more than experience, education, or previous workplace, helps to avoid biases against certain talent groups – for example, candidates or employees who did not attend university.

If we can shift our focus, or broaden our lens, from jobs to skills, we’ll find workers have more in common than we think.

Nicole Brender a Brandis
Head of Strategy Consulting, Talent Advisory, Americas, AMS

Deep knowledge of the skills that make people successful across a broad range of strategic work, as well as understanding adjacent skills, opens doors to new talent pools and ultimately leads to a better match between talent and business needs.

Kirstin Schulz
Head of Strategy Consulting, EMEA, AMS

A journey, not a switch, for TA teams.

Until now, leadership and development teams have been leading the charge when it comes to skills-based approaches. But talent acquisition teams have an opportunity to move the journey to the next level because of their unique position as gatekeepers for candidates at the start of their journey.

Forward thinking TA teams are already starting to embrace skills-based hiring. According to LinkedIn, recruiting professionals are 25% more likely to search by skills than they were 3 years ago and 75% predict skills-based hiring will be a priority for their company in the next 18 months.

Having said that, only 64% feel they can accurately assess candidates’ skills today. So, there is still some way to go for some organizations.2

To implement skills-based hiring effectively, day-to-day TA work itself needs to undergo a transformation. Of course, this level of organization change doesn’t happen overnight. Key pillars of TA teams’ processes (such as job descriptions, for example) cannot simply be removed with no alternative in place. But steps can be taken to move TA teams along the journey towards a skills-based approach. Rethinking how they source, interview and ultimately think about talent is the key.

Nicole Brender a Brandis
Head of Strategy Consulting, Talent Advisory, Americas

TA teams have a fundamental part to play in building the blocks to a skills-based future. They can help this come alive at an organizational level by influencing the conversation and shifting the business to a skills-based mindset.

Kirstin Schulz
Head of Strategy Consulting, EMEA

Recruiters are the shop window to the external market. But it’s the infrastructure that sits behind them that needs to enable the recruiters to be able to hire for skills.

Shared missions and definitions.

Organizations should begin their journey by pinpointing what the strategic and critical skills are within the organization. This is no easy task. Ask three people to define a critical skill and you’ll get three different answers. Most managers think their roles or skills they are hiring for are the most important.

So, businesses must work out a shared framework, language and understanding of skills together. It means thinking through the skills that make key business strategies happen, those that disproportionately affect performance, and the skills that are hardest to attract, hire, and retain. It’s vital everyone is on the same page before critical skills are cascaded into ways of working and conversations with candidates and clients.

Skills-based hiring success.

Working in conjunction with this crucial mindset change, there are a multitude of levers that can broaden TA’s approach to skills-based hiring. From building a skills-driven model for sourcing and attraction to creating ‘strategic skills teams’ that purely focus on sourcing and engaging talent with business-critical skills.

One of the most impactful actions that TA leaders can take is to train recruiters to better understand adjacent skills and shared skillsets across different role types or functions and really break down siloed ways of engaging talent. This puts TA in the driving seat to completely shift the conversations with Hiring Mangers – away from experience towards skills, challenging long-held assumptions about what makes a strong hire.

12 levers to broaden TA’s approach to skills-based hiring

1. Have versus Learn
Determine which skills can be learned and evaluate the learning aptitude of potential applicants

2. Adjacent Skills
Source and screen based on skills, and train TA team to look for ‘adjacent skills

3. Identify Roles
Identify roles that have a shorter “shelf life” with rapidly changing skills (i.e. software developer) where agility is particularly critical

4. Reconstruct Job Descriptions
Re-construct JDs and job ads to highlight skills and capabilities over experience and education

5. Bench Hiring
For critical skills, sourcing and hiring outside of specific open requisitions

6. Organization Structure
Set up the TA org to align to skills rather than function or geo’s (e.g. dedicated ‘strategic skills’ sourcing team)

7. Drive data collection
Amplify skills data collection on internal and external candidates

8. Technology
Use AI-driven technologies for skills-matching, candidate identification and shortlisting

9. Adjust Assessments
Amplify skills in assessment & interviewing methods

10. Talent Pools
Curate skills-based talent pools

11. Campaign
Run sourcing & attraction campaigns for skills rather than roles

12. Expand
Expand the roles that fall under the skills-based hiring framework

Nicole Brender a Brandis
Head of Strategy Consulting, Talent Advisory, Americas

In an incredibly tight labor market, your chances of getting a 100% fit are virtually non-existent. A candidate may not have A skill, but they have B skill, and their application of B is very similar in what you need to bring to this role to be successful. You may need to start thinking about talent with a slightly different lens – harnessing transferrable and adjacent skills.

Kirstin Schulz
Head of Strategy Consulting, EMEA

Train TA teams to be change agents within the business. Think broadly about what is underlining this capability, what skills are required for the role, and what adjacent skillsets with some training can be developed?

Recruitment Leader (Global)

Case study: Shifting to a skills-based structure

Here’s an example of how one TA team restructured to align to a skills-based approach by creating a ringfenced team for sourcing strategic skills

Making this change has enabled the organization to proactively build the talent pipeline for critical skills without interrupting the day-to-day work of regional teams and CoE functions.

Recruiting Delivery Leaders
(Regional or Division/Business Unit)

  • Primary contact to Regional or Division/Business Unit leaders on all aspects of attracting/hiring talent
  • Direct management of recruiters
  • Dotted line oversite of req based sourcers

Sourcing Strategist Lead
(Global)

  • Owns global sourcing strategy
  • Integrates market insights into overall sourcing approach
  • Identifies which positions need proactive sourcing support
  • Coaches and mentors sourcing team

Req-Based Sourcing
(Regional or Division/Business Unit)

BAU Proactive Sourcing Team Candidate Attraction

  • Proactive req-based sourcing support for reqs which lack quantity/quality
  • Will leverage leads from talent communities and do other proactive outreach

Candidate Management

  • Manage in-bound applicant experience
  • Leverage technology for initial calibration
  • Screen top candidates for submittal of recruiter long-list

Strategic Skills Sourcing

  • Build and nurture critical skills talent communities.
  • Talent mapping and targeted candidate outreach.
  • Sourcing ahead of the need.
  • Proactively present hot leads for the business to participate in the nurturing process

The skills-based hiring maturity model

As TA teams move through the levers for change

and address the challenges of becoming skills-based, they should increase their overall level of maturity

Level 1

  • Emphasis on experience & education
  • Some openness to consider candidates with transferable skills
  • Limited cross-functional internal moves
  • No intelligent skills-matching in place

Level 2

  • Skills & capabilities reflected in JDs, job ads and sourcing approach
  • HMs and Recruiters well versed at identifying (transferable & adjacent) skills
  • Expansion of roles that fall under the skills-based hiring framework
  • Go-to-market strategy based on skills, not individual roles

Level 3

  • TA TOM (structure, technologies, processes) reflect skills approach
  • ‘Always on’ sourcing and hiring for critical skills
  • Well-established adoption of  AI-driven technologies for skills-matching, candidate identification and shortlisting
  • Internal and external hires reflect breadth of cross-functional & industry backgrounds
  • Deep integration of TA and L&D/up & reskilling
  • Expansive skills data collection on internal and external talent

Conclusion

A skills-based future?

Today’s talent market is tougher than ever – from the uncertain economic climate and changing demographics, to a global skills shortage. To combat this, businesses can’t simply stick to the same old, same old. To survive and thrive in this next chapter, innovation has become a necessity.

A skills-based approach offers a new path to a more optimized, efficient, and agile business – a journey in which TA teams can play a significant role. TA has the chance to lead the way and play an instrumental role in bringing about skills-based change, but effective transition will take time and affect the very core of how they contribute and support the business. Ultimately, it is one that can’t stop with them.

To secure the best and brightest minds and fulfil both current and future staffing needs it’s time to link TA and cross-functional teams to a skills-based future.

Consider:

  • How to understand and connect to wider organizational skills-based initiatives, and align all efforts to a clearly stated purpose, objectives, and success metrics.
  • How to currently attract, source, and hire talent and where processes could be adapted – for example, in bench hiring for certain skillsets – to demonstrate skills-based success.
  • How to start small, such as selecting skills that have an obvious intersection among several roles.
  • What technologies are available to accelerate efforts – and where change management and comms are required to gain buy-in and adoption.

At AMS, we are the go-to partner for enterprises looking to transition their Talent Acquisition capability into a skills-based model. From tech assessments, building a skills architecture, advising on and implementing the right technologies, reconstructing and redesigning how to write job descriptions, to supporting a skills-based organizational strategy, we can help businesses navigate this complex new chapter.

We support world-leading organizations to reimagine their talent strategies and the world of work.

Are you ready for a skills-based future?

Contact us today

_________________________________________
[1] Deloitte, Moving your organizational strategy from jobs to skills, 2022
[2] LinkedIn, Future of Recruiting 2023

TopBuilt with Shorthand


The Talent Climate Series is a set of data-driven reports by AMS and The Josh Bersin Company exploring today’s challenging and turbulent world of talent.

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The Talent Climate Series

Talent. It’s like our climate. Turbulent and ever-changing. 

The Talent Climate Series is a set of quarterly reports created in partnership between AMS and The Josh Bersin Company. They explore today’s challenging and turbulent world of talent, providing up-to-date and in-depth market insights, trends, and solutions for how to tackle the changing global conditions – so you can stay ahead of the talent forecast. 

Scroll down to access the full reports and sign up to learn more

Part 1

Time-to-Hire

‘Time-to-Hire’ is the most common hiring metric used by talent acquisition functions to indicate effectiveness.

Learn more

Part 2

Internal Hiring

Employees’ opportunities to move within an organization are a significant indicator of a business’s health.

Learn more

Part 3

TA at a Crossroads

Our latest survey of HR executives points to a critical pivot point in talent acquisition.  

Learn more

Part 4

Emerging Trends for 2025

We explore four trends that are set to shape the future of Talent Acquisition.

Learn more

TopBuilt with Shorthand



The most successful companies and constantly working to improve their candidate and employee experience. They know it’s critical to attracting and retaining the right people, especially in a tight labor market. But one thing has been holding them back. Very few have an effective method to measure the experiences of talent at each stage of the lifecycle. And you can’t improve what you can’t measure.

Enter the modern Talent Feedback Platform (TFP).

In this paper, we discuss:

  • How the Talent Feedback Platform works
  • The roadmap for change
  • The talent acquisition use case
  • A case study example

Companies are facing issues not recently seen in the talent marketplace. Today’s talent leaders will fail to adapt if they don’t have an effective method to understand the ever-changing profile of the needs and drivers of the talent they seek. But most current evaluation tools miss the mark by not enabling the measurement of the holistic talent lifecycle. This is forcing talent leaders to manage by intuition, resulting in the formulation of incomplete stories about what is working and what is not.

In this paper, we look at:

  • How talent lifecycle measurement technologies are evolving
  • How to measure the experiences of talent at different stages of the talent lifecycle
  • The four steps to get you started

Demand for hourly talent continues to outpace supply. What can organizations do to gain a competitive advantage? A seamless recruitment experience is key and this requires the perfect combination of technology, people and process.

Our guide to volume recruitment explores:

  • How to use technology in the right way to supercharge your volume recruitment
  • The importance of a  people-first approach and how to balance tech and touch
  • Key things to think about when optimizing your volume recruitment process

Three critical elements to power-up your approach

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Amplify your High Volume Hiring

Three critical elements
to power-up your approach

High volume hiring has always been complex.
But today it’s more challenging than ever.

Turnover rates in hourly jobs create relentless demand, and systems for finding the right talent are often not connected or powerful enough.

It’s common for businesses hiring hourly candidates to replicate the processes and systems they use for professional recruitment. But this isn’t effective. It pays to think differently. If you don’t fit your talent strategy to the unique needs of high volume hiring, your system won’t provide the power you need.

A successful high volume recruitment strategy combines three critical elements: Technology. People. Process. Fused together, these three strands help you amplify your output.

So, how can you power-up your hourly hiring strategy?

current employee turnover rate in industries such as hospitality and retail is 60%; source: US Bureau of Labor Statistics

37% of 7,000 surveyed, deskless construction and manufacturing workers expected to quit in the next six months; source: Boston Consulting Group

High volume hiring has always been complex.
But today it’s more challenging than ever.

Turnover rates in hourly jobs create relentless demand, and systems for finding the right talent are often not connected or powerful enough.

It’s common for businesses hiring hourly candidates to replicate the processes and systems they use for professional recruitment. But this isn’t effective. It pays to think differently. If you don’t fit your talent strategy to the unique needs of high volume hiring, your system won’t provide the power you need.

A successful high volume recruitment strategy combines three critical elements: Technology. People. Process. Fused together, these three strands help you amplify your output.

current employee turnover rate in industries such as hospitality and retail is 60%; source: US Bureau of Labor Statistics

37% of 7,000 surveyed, deskless construction and manufacturing workers expected to quit in the next six months; source: Boston Consulting Group

So, how can you power-up your hourly hiring strategy?

1.

Technology matters, but how you use it matters more

Technology has transformed the talent industry at all levels, from mobile recruitment tools, to artificial intelligence in sourcing, interview and assessment processes. It’s hard to keep up. But to increase speed of hire and reduce costs, volume recruitment needs tech.

Admin burden

High volume recruiting often means mundane, repetitive tasks. Take interview scheduling, for example. Your recruiter might need to arrange interviews for 10 candidates. It might take three calls to get through to each candidate before an interview is confirmed. Those 30 calls will take up a large chunk of their day.

Process overload

High volume recruiting means hiring the same profile of candidate over and over. If your application or interview stages aren’t automated, the process becomes slow and inefficient. If candidates don’t feel the process is moving fast enough, they will be easily swooped up by competitors.

The deal-breaker

Hourly candidates don’t engage in the same way professional hires do. Your recruiters have to get creative in how they attract talent and find an approach that works for candidates’ day-to-day. That means putting everything in the palm of their hands. You need to create an easy, fast, mobile-optimized experience.

Technology, used in the right way, can supercharge your volume recruitment strategy:

Streamline scheduling

Interview scheduling software automates the entire hiring process. Candidates can select a suitable slot and confirm the meeting via email. This then adds the event to both the candidate and recruiter’s calendars. Now, a process that took days to finalize is confirmed within minutes of a candidate accepting an interview.

Scheduling software also avoids any unnecessary errors or meeting clashes. This means you’re not losing candidates because of minor admin issues.

Power your conversational AI capability

Automation and conversational artificial intelligence (AI) such as smart chatbots lets you move applicants through the hiring funnel at pace. Successful applicants can immediately schedule an interview to the next stage.

When it comes to candidate sourcing, AI tech spiders through a wide variety of job sites and channels – much more than an average recruiter can possibly do manually. This allows recruiters to review much larger talent pools and find more candidates.

Lastly, chat simulation software can take over answering queries, screening candidates, scheduling interviews, and framing questions that need to be asked. In today’s market, immediate feedback is key to a positive candidate experience. By utilizing conversational AI, hourly jobseekers are guided quickly and easily through the process. More importantly, candidates get that instant contact at different touchpoints of the journey to keep them on board. 

Switch on around-the-clock hiring

Technology means that volume recruiting is available 24-hours. Candidates can have their questions answered and schedule interviews even while your recruiters are offline. Having on-demand access to the hiring process – even when they’re ‘on the go’ – keeps talent engaged with you, and not your competitor.

But the benefits aren’t limited to jobseekers. With the right tech, your organization can check the status of open positions and respond to candidates in real time. Turning on 24/7 hiring means you have access to a larger talent pool.

Unlock the power of mobile

Meet hourly talent where they are.

The overwhelming majority (70%) of US jobseekers use mobile devices to search for jobs.

It’s no surprise candidates are turning to their phones to job search. Mobile-based recruiting helps remove roadblocks when unnecessary logins or uploads are turned off. One-click apply options and automated reminders keep jobseekers connected and informed every step of the way.

Mobile also allows you to reach a much wider pool of candidates. Not all hourly workers can access a computer.

Get metrics that matter

Real-time data allows your business to look at specific hourly jobs, like cashiers or waitstaff, in a specific location. You can get fast answers to key questions like: Why is the attrition rate high here? Do job descriptions need to be updated to accurately describe the day-to-day environment and culture? Is compensation an issue? Maybe it’s the manager?

What’s more, data lets you actively address candidate slowdowns, discover trouble spots in applicant success, and find trends in scheduling and offers. Real-time insights can help you understand these nuances and adjust quickly. By accessing analytics, recruiters are also able to drill down on activity by stage, requisition, location, or date.

Key elements:

Automate anything that doesn’t need the human touch. Get back time to focus on what matters: connecting with candidates.

Don’t automate a broken process – fix the process, then use technology to accelerate it.

When McDonald’s worked with us to become the first organization to provide a voice-activated job search, they placed themselves as leaders of innovation in the hourly hiring market. Candidates can initiate their job search by simply saying to their Google or Amazon device, “Alexa, help me get a job at McDonald’s” or “Ok Google, talk to McDonald’s Apply Thru”.

 The impact:

  • Increased speed throughout the entire hiring process
  • Reduced time to hire through a streamlined apply to offer solution  
  • Launched across nine countries in seven languages

Find out more about the global-first, technology-led search solution. Read our McDonald’s success story.

To case study

Gap implemented our proprietary technology, Hourly by AMS, in 2021 and began phasing it across several distribution centers, accelerating their ability to hiring ability.

The impact:

  • During the first 72-hours live:
    · 421 candidates applied
    · Over 200 offers were extended with 100 offers accepted
    · 345 applicant met minimum qualifications and were scheduled for an interview
  • 1,000 offers were accepted in the first 4 weeks
  • 86% of candidates engaged on their cell phones
  • 80% saved on marketing spend
  • Converted 200% more candidates
  • Candidates hired in 1.8 days

Back to list of topics

Technology alone won’t help you hire better. Optimizing how people use it will. The danger around technology is over or underusing it.

A powerful high volume program requires the right balance between tech and touch.

2.

Plug in the personal touch

To supercharge your talent process, you need the right people, driving the right process, at the right time.

Your team needs to be hardwired into all things volume recruitment. Because research shows that, without the human touch and meaningful, enthusiastic interactions, you simply won’t reach today’s workers.

It’s not possible to automate the whole process and expect the right candidate outcomes. Face time with prospective employees is crucial. So, when can you add the human touch alongside the power of technology?

It’s not a tug-of-war between tech and touch. One should complement the other.

You can strike the right balance by using the human element at key stages:

Put a face to the process

When hiring hourly workers, candidate ‘ghosting’ is a top challenge for 38% of Talent Acquisition (TA) professionals and recruiters (TalentBoard 2022). Avoid people dropping off by engaging them with the right experience from the get-go.

Conduct a ‘pre-close’ interaction at the job offer stage. After a meaningful personal interaction with your recruiter, candidates feel an increased sense of accountability and loyalty. This means they’re more likely to show up on their first day.

To meet or not to meet?

There are some things that just can’t be communicated by tech. After qualifying candidates in online stages, schedule in-person meetings so successful applicants can ask questions – and recruiters can get a real feel for the person they’re hiring.

This helps manage expectations before you send an official offer.

Follow up to scale up

Consistent communication: two words that have a huge impact. Maintaining clear lines of communication makes for an efficient hiring process and paints a strong image of your organization.

Develop a follow-up process. Personally touch base with successful candidates after an interview and send out any follow-up information quickly. Within hours not days.   If you lose engagement, your candidates will go elsewhere.

Be the employer of choice

High volume hiring is a two-way street. Employers are looking for skilled talent, jobseekers want to work for an employer that embodies their values. Does your business have the right employer brand to appeal to the hourly talent you need?

An authentic and relevant brand story is your competitive advantage. Your company culture should be embedded into comms from the start of the process in channels where applicants are engaged – such as in job ads or interviews. But it’ll come across even more strongly when communicated by a real person.

The human touch allows your employer brand to shine through clearly and authentically during personal interactions.

Key elements:

Jobseekers are also less likely to ‘ghost’ if they have had a positive experience with another person, not just a piece of tech. Don’t forget the power of human interaction.

Use tech to solve the admin aspects and to streamline the process. But there must be a person at the end to collate information, analyze data, and review candidates.

Do you have the right people, trained in the right way? If someone is interviewing or spending time with applicants – face to face, virtually, or over the phone – make sure they know how to build connections.

Since 2009, we established an outsourcing and resource augmentation solution to jump-start Delta’s hiring across geographies, roles, and levels. The multi-layered selection process blends automation and human touch to enhance the candidate experience.

 The impact:

  • c.10,500 annual hires across airports and corporate headquarters
  • 88% of non-flight attendant hiring in 2020 were ‘blue collar’ hourly
  • Servicing 90 airports across 15 US States
  • Centralized hiring events to harmonize hiring efforts

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The fusing of technology and people will help engineer a powerful approach to secure hourly talent. But without the right strategic approach, volume recruiting will fail to get off the ground…

3.

Process creates the final strand for success

92% of candidates who click ‘apply’ never complete their application

of HR and TA professionals report a lack of candidates as the biggest challenge - HR.com 'The State of Hourly and High Volume Hiring 2022'

Competition for hourly talent is fierce. High volume hiring processes have zero room for error. They must be speedy and simple.

The first thing candidates want from their journey with a potential employer is an easy application process. A repetitive, slow or disjointed process might cause them to drop out immediately.

If you’re running through multiple phases of screening, assessment, and interviews, it’s time to question: Is this really necessary? Are there opportunities to make the process simpler?

There are some easy ways to optimize your volume recruiting process:

Work your workforce planning

How are you handling workforce planning? In the current market, hiring needs are always changing. You need an agile team that can quickly respond to changing business demands. The answer could be leaning on a partner to outsource part or all of your internal processes and teams.

Define the right persona

Even if you know the most common profiles, get back to the floor. The roles you have been hiring for forever will most likely have shifted significantly in focus, or even in skills required, over the last few years.

What is important in that role today? Have any of the ‘must have’ requirements evolved, or even disappeared? Make sure you know who you’re talking to

Get market insights that really matter

Once the person you want to hire has been identified, do you know where to find them? Do enough of them exist in the area you are hiring? What are they paid? Who is the competition? Having access to this information in invaluable. Use these insights to lead your recruitment strategy and even business planning.

Make sure your sourcing strategy is sound

When it comes to volume recruitment, you can’t rely on LinkedIn advertising alone. The key is grassroots sourcing. Candidates often come from the local area. Make it as easy as possible for them to walk in and ask about a role.

Local communities are always happy to help. Religious organizations, sports clubs, housing groups, and charities will go the extra mile to align those in need with opportunities. Make the time to ask. Job advertising and partners can then fill gaps in local organic traffic.

Assess and select, or streamline?

Should you use assessments at all? If you choose to, where and when? Formalized assessment tools are useful. They can give candidates a sense of the role and help prioritize high quality candidates.

But do they do this for you? Or are you running a legacy battery of tests that don’t have much relevance to your open roles, or are slowing down the candidate journey? Try your own process out to sense check how it feels from the outside. This can help to identify unnecessary stages.

Deliver on DEI

Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) is high on the agenda, and rightly so. To amplify diversity and reflect the communities you serve, you need to apply the DEI lens to the entire talent process.

Are you looking in the right places? Do you understand hiring metrics throughout the funnel, and at what point people might be exiting the process? Are you truly diverse in the way that is displayed on job descriptions? Is your recruitment process inclusive?

There might be a new talent pool out there just waiting to work for you.

Key elements:

Process is the powerline to your high volume hiring strategy. But it’s not one-size-fits all. Make the process work for your business. Test out your current strategies and identify the pain points.

Not every element of your current hiring strategy may need changing. Small tweaks to the process can make a huge difference.

Powering a successful high volume recruitment strategy

To power up your high volume hiring capability, you need to plug in all three elements: Technology. People. Process.

Technology solves the problem of hiring at scale, and with speed. But without people and process, your organization won’t deliver the right experience to beat the competition. Only the three working together will create an agile high volume strategy that can be fine-tuned and amplified to your exact needs.

If you need help fusing these elements and powering-up your strategy, connect with one of our experts today.

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When it comes to talent technology, artificial intelligence solutions have been gaining the most traction over the previous three years.

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Myth number 5:

Operationalizing AI technology in my business will be straightforward

When it comes to talent technology, artificial intelligence solutions have been gaining the most traction over the previous three years. During the pandemic, a gulf opened up between organizations who’d invested in technology and those who had not. Those who had successfully operationalized tech pre-2020 found it easier to pivot operations from office to home environments and many companies made it a priority to ensure they would not be caught out in future.

Before the height of pandemic lockdowns, AI adoption was most prevalent in the front office, with the primary focus being in business functions such as risk and compliance, or measuring consumer behaviours. Only 10% of companies reported adoption of AI in their talent function, according to McKinsey’s The State of AI in 2020 reporting.

A 2019 study by Oracle and Future Workplace suggested that half of all employees were using some form of artificial intelligence at work, with 65% ‘optimistic, excited and grateful’ about having robot co-workers. Furthermore, artificial intelligence was changing how employees interacted with their managers. According to the report, 64% of employees trusted a robot more than their manager and more than four in five (82%) believed artificial intelligence could do things better than their managers.

With the impact of AI still in its infancy, the key challenge for businesses – according to employees – was to simplify its use, with 34% asking for a better user interface, 30% asking for best practice training and 30% wanting a personalized experience.

“Our results reveal that forward looking companies are already capitalizing on the power of AI. As workers and managers leverage the power of AI in the workplace, they are moving from fear to enthusiasm as they see the possibility of being freed of many of their routine tasks and having more time to solve critical business problems for the enterprise,” said Future Workplace founding director Jeanne Meister.

Though the early stages of this period saw most organizations investing with extreme caution, the continued evolution of AI tech for talent management more than accelerated with substantial funding for AI tech firms specializing in talent solutions being announced in the hundreds of millions.

Fast-forward post-pandemic – where artificial intelligence techniques like machine learning and natural language processing provided vital information and predictions about the spread of the virus – and more and more companies are operationalizing artificial intelligence to drive strategic business value.

This is especially true in HR with the unprecedented speed of economic recovery causing significant skills and talent shortages globally, making data, insight and talent management strategies and solutions mission critical for many CEOs.

Indeed, by the end of 2024, 75% of organizations will shift from piloting artificial intelligence projects to operationalizing them, according to a report by Gartner, making it their number one trend in data and analytics technology.

Scaling challenges

In the talent and recruitment sector, artificial intelligence providers have done extensive development and research to ensure that their interfaces are modern and intuitive, making them easier to use for clients. They can also offer a wealth of additional insights to end users to aid evaluation and decision making in recruitment, with the potential to replace more static systems like applicant tracking systems.

However, moving from piloting an individual artificial intelligence program to scaling it across an entire department or product is challenging, with many struggling to reach the full operational potential of artificial intelligence technology.

As Manasi Vartak, CEO and founder of AI scaling platform Verta writes in Harvard Business Review: “AI is most valuable when it is operationalized at scale. For business leaders who wish to maximize business value using AI, scale refers to how deeply and widely AI is integrated into an organization’s core product, service and business process.

“Unfortunately, scaling AI in this sense isn’t easy. Getting one or two AI models into production is very different from running an entire enterprise or product on AI. And as AI is scaled, problems can scale too.”

So what are the issues to avoid?

The first challenge is around gaining buy-in from employers whose job roles will be impacted within a new operating model. In talent acquisition for example, different considerations need to be worked through depending on whether you have a segmented model, or a team of 360 recruiters.

However, adoption of AI is only going to continue to grow. More than a third of companies already use AI and 42% are exploring AI implementation in 2023, according to data from IBM. Businesses need to acknowledge that recruitment job roles – and a strong adoption strategy requires organizations to prepare their people for the skills they’ll need to leverage AI effectively. 

This means providing ongoing training and enablement on new AI technology that moves beyond the purely functional. A stronger focus on data analysis and working with enhanced data sets is a must.

In turn, this should free up talent acquisition professionals to focus on what they do best, which is to form strong, trusted partnerships with the business, have conversations with candidates and make personal connections.

When it comes to talent technology, artificial intelligence solutions have been gaining the most traction over the previous three years. During the pandemic, a gulf opened up between organizations who’d invested in technology and those who had not. Those who had successfully operationalized tech pre-2020 found it easier to pivot operations from office to home environments and many companies made it a priority to ensure they would not be caught out in future.

Before the height of pandemic lockdowns, AI adoption was most prevalent in the front office, with the primary focus being in business functions such as risk and compliance, or measuring consumer behaviours. Only 10% of companies reported adoption of AI in their talent function, according to McKinsey’s The State of AI in 2020 reporting.

A 2019 study by Oracle and Future Workplace suggested that half of all employees were using some form of artificial intelligence at work, with 65% ‘optimistic, excited and grateful’ about having robot co-workers. Furthermore, artificial intelligence was changing how employees interacted with their managers. According to the report, 64% of employees trusted a robot more than their manager and more than four in five (82%) believed artificial intelligence could do things better than their managers.

With the impact of AI still in its infancy, the key challenge for businesses – according to employees – was to simplify its use, with 34% asking for a better user interface, 30% asking for best practice training and 30% wanting a personalized experience.

“Our results reveal that forward looking companies are already capitalizing on the power of AI. As workers and managers leverage the power of AI in the workplace, they are moving from fear to enthusiasm as they see the possibility of being freed of many of their routine tasks and having more time to solve critical business problems for the enterprise,” said Future Workplace founding director Jeanne Meister.

Though the early stages of this period saw most organizations investing with extreme caution, the continued evolution of AI tech for talent management more than accelerated with substantial funding for AI tech firms specializing in talent solutions being announced in the hundreds of millions.

Fast-forward post-pandemic – where artificial intelligence techniques like machine learning and natural language processing provided vital information and predictions about the spread of the virus – and more and more companies are operationalizing artificial intelligence to drive strategic business value.

This is especially true in HR with the unprecedented speed of economic recovery causing significant skills and talent shortages globally, making data, insight and talent management strategies and solutions mission critical for many CEOs.

Indeed, by the end of 2024, 75% of organizations will shift from piloting artificial intelligence projects to operationalizing them, according to a report by Gartner, making it their number one trend in data and analytics technology.

Scaling challenges

In the talent and recruitment sector, artificial intelligence providers have done extensive development and research to ensure that their interfaces are modern and intuitive, making them easier to use for clients. They can also offer a wealth of additional insights to end users to aid evaluation and decision making in recruitment, with the potential to replace more static systems like applicant tracking systems.

However, moving from piloting an individual artificial intelligence program to scaling it across an entire department or product is challenging, with many struggling to reach the full operational potential of artificial intelligence technology.

As Manasi Vartak, CEO and founder of AI scaling platform Verta writes in Harvard Business Review: “AI is most valuable when it is operationalized at scale. For business leaders who wish to maximize business value using AI, scale refers to how deeply and widely AI is integrated into an organization’s core product, service and business process.

“Unfortunately, scaling AI in this sense isn’t easy. Getting one or two AI models into production is very different from running an entire enterprise or product on AI. And as AI is scaled, problems can scale too.”

So what are the issues to avoid?

The first challenge is around gaining buy-in from employers whose job roles will be impacted within a new operating model. In talent acquisition for example, different considerations need to be worked through depending on whether you have a segmented model, or a team of 360 recruiters.

However, adoption of AI is only going to continue to grow. More than a third of companies already use AI and 42% are exploring AI implementation in 2023, according to data from IBM. Businesses need to acknowledge that recruitment job roles – and a strong adoption strategy requires organizations to prepare their people for the skills they’ll need to leverage AI effectively. 

This means providing ongoing training and enablement on new AI technology that moves beyond the purely functional. A stronger focus on data analysis and working with enhanced data sets is a must.

In turn, this should free up talent acquisition professionals to focus on what they do best, which is to form strong, trusted partnerships with the business, have conversations with candidates and make personal connections.

Expert commentary

Erica Titchener
Global Head of Technology and Analytics, AMS

Gaining ROI for your AI investment

Technology in HR recruiting has been around for a while, but the level of insight you get when you introduce artificial intelligence that include additional data points recruiters aren’t accustomed to can be daunting.

This means that in order to successfully integrate AI technology and get a return on investment, businesses need to engage all relevant stakeholders who might be impacted by the tool and work out exactly what outcome they want. It might be efficiency, it might be workforce visibility, it might be getting to candidates quicker. Work out what you actually want to solve before purchasing.

Some vendors don’t appreciate that in large organizations, you need to make decisions at certain stages of a process that require data points that don’t feed into AI systems, such as those around compliance, or proof of accreditation. Secondly, focus on integration with your core HR platform.

While many vendors say you can use AI interfaces for intelligence alongside another system of record, the truth is talent professionals need as much data as possible in one place to make decisions.

As soon as you miss one of these key data points and a user has to go elsewhere, you start to lose adoption.

Another consideration when operationalizing artificial intelligence is the need to understand the change management program that goes alongside it. When working with clients who have implemented technology but are struggling with return on investment, more than 50% of the time the organization didn’t fully understand the impact of the technology they were implementing nor accurately articulated the benefits proposition of doing so.

In some cases, they massively oversold what the technology could do without providing programmatic help in the background, or in others they tried to creep it into the organization under the radar, because they were scared of change management. In both cases, adoption will ultimately fail.

It’s important to remember that bringing in efficiencies with artificial intelligence changes people’s roles. If you have a team that has been very manual in the past, it will inevitably have headcount implications. Someone who spent 50% of their time doing an administrative task might now only spend 15%, with the rest being value add to the business. This requires a different skillset and might even be a different person. New skills are required.

Finally, many organizations make the mistake of deploying technology but not putting any structure or accountability into place for adoption. IT implements the technology and works on changes without fully understanding what the business is trying to achieve. What is needed is a business partner or analyst whose primary role is to get return on investment from the platform. You might be paying a lot for the software, but if you don’t have this person in place, you will struggle to gain full value from your investment.

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Expert commentary

Florenta Teodoridis

Associate Professor Strategy, Marshall School of Business, University of Southern California

The future of artificial intelligence

When we talk about the impact of AI on the future of work, often we take the view that AI is set and we’re just waiting for the impact to unfold. This isn’t the case.

Artificial intelligence is a developing technology and the choices we make will affect how it impacts the future of work. We could choose to take a direction that focuses on the automation of existing tasks, which will push more displacement of people from jobs, or we could focus on building technology that complements the work individuals do.

An example is the potential benefits of AI in healthcare and education, where you can offer customized treatment to patients or education opportunities for individuals. If you think about education in particular, we haven’t reformed how we teach people in some time. One instructor teaches a class, but each individual learns differently. AI will always ask us to customize how we teach people – it will offer complementary teaching to individuals, rather than displacing existing teachers.

When thinking about how AI affects recruitment, it’s important to remember that AI is a goal, not a technology. Put simply, the aim of AI is to automate every task a human being can do. As technology advances, the more tasks AI is able to perform. However, there are always points at which we cannot push any further, as humans are predictable in some ways, but not others.

It’s also important to remember that we are looking for an algorithm to give us a perfect answer, or the perfect hire. However, as humans, we never have the perfect answer. Everything we do has a bias included, whether explicit or implicit. It’s a very high bar to expect artificial intelligence to solve everything for us, when the algorithms are simply mimicking our own human behavior – and we haven’t solved our own biases yet.

With so many different tools providing
information on different areas, it can be easy for users to become overwhelmed by data

Florenta Teodoridis

A second challenge around AI implementation is the quality of integration with existing systems in the talent acquisition process. While AI tools can streamline hiring processes, reduce bias in selection and identify best fit candidates, they still need to be integrated into a business’ existing ecosystem to ensure that all critical external and internal data points are available to decision makers throughout the recruitment process.

However, with so many different tools providing information on different areas, it can be easy for users to become overwhelmed by data or frustrated at having to go off system to obtain missing information. This can lead them to stop using AI tools and return to old ways of recruiting, diminishing ROI.

To avoid this, organizations are taking a two-fold approach. The first step is in the procurement stage, where it’s imperative to ensure you understand the reason behind and expected outcome from utilizing talent technology. The fewer tools your recruitment team needs to learn, the better the chance of integration succeeding and the more valuable the output.

Secondly, many organizations have enormous ‘technical debt’ – existing legacy technological systems that are unwieldy, out of date and unable to support integration. Transforming these systems and building in new functionality is a huge challenge, requiring organizations to change the skillset of their technology and IT teams too. As technology requirements grow, so does the need for those with the skills available to lead these changes.

Finally – and building on the previous point about the need for new skills in IT to manage transition – many organizations fail to build roles into their operating models and business cases that focus on the overall success and evolution of the technology they use. In order to maximize the relationship with an artificial intelligence technology partner, organizations need to be aware of the full capabilities of the technology and how its use can evolve as integration grows.

“Technology will continue to develop, impact and transform the world of work and recruitment processes.”

A strategic adoption plan may start with the use of one element of a technology, but should then take a long-term approach to maximizing its capabilities with ongoing integration. This requires a team who understand an organization’s strategic business aims and can match this to technological key performance indicators.

After all, one thing businesses can be sure about is that technology will continue to develop, impact and transform the world of work and recruitment processes. Ensuring you have a team who can keep on top of advances in artificial intelligence and build use cases into your strategic goals is vital to future success.

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