The war for talent is raging.In September, a record 4.4 million Americans quit their jobs, according to the US Labor Department. That was after 4.3 million people left their jobs the month before, with more than 10.4 million jobs going unfilled at the end of the month.

How America’s talent wars are reshaping business

Contributors
Nicola Hancock
Regional Managing Director, Americas & Investment Banking, AMS
Ron Thomas
Managing Director, Strategy Focused Group

The war for talent is raging. In September, a record 4.4 million Americans quit their jobs, according to the US Labor Department. That was after 4.3 million people left their jobs the month before, with more than 10.4 million jobs going unfilled at the end of the month.

Things haven’t gotten much better in 2022. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, more than 11.3 million job openings were still on the market at the end of May. As organizations compete to fill roles, wages have increased, with average hourly earnings up 0.3% month-on-month in June and 5.1% on the year.

Some of America’s biggest institutions are facing the squeeze. Speaking on a Fortune panel at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Bank of America CEO, Brian Moynihan, admitted that the war for talent is on.

“Our attrition rate came down throughout the decade and dropped in half during the pandemic, but has come back up to where it was in 2019. Part of this is a natural recovery in attrition rates, but a real part of it is in the tightness of the labor market. A lot of people left the labor market and are not going to come back, even with a strong bid for their services,” he said.

“That’s the reality we’re going to be facing. We’re chasing that dynamic of not enough people working. In the US, the immigration issue is also heavily impacting this. Our population growth rate has fallen in half over the last decade and we just don’t have enough people now. It’s going to be a big bid for a while,” added Moynihan.

To combat this, Bank of America bumped its minimum wage to $22 a hour, equivalent to nearly $45,000 a year for full-time employees. It also expanded its stock awards program to employees who make up to $100,000 annually – nearly 97% of total employees – who previously received a one-off cash bonus. The move could cost the bank up to $1 billion.

Beyond salary

Other businesses are following suit, with those working in service industries just as likely to see a wage increase as those in offices. However, the labor market squeeze means that continuous pay bumps are not sustainable. Instead, organizations are looking for new strategies to recruit, upskill and engage their employees.

“While salary plays a role in attracting talent, it shouldn’t be the dominant piece of the puzzle,” says Ron Thomas, Managing Director at consulting firm Strategy Focused Group.

“Can you sell your brand and purpose? Can you tell the story of how you build a career in the organization? What success stories do you have? People today are looking to connect and be a part of something bigger,” he adds.

“Organizations recognize that they have to think differently about their talent strategies,” agrees Nicola Hancock, Regional Manager Director, Americas & Investment Banking at AMS. “There aren’t enough people out there to simply think about constantly buying in more talent. Instead, they have to think more holistically and start developing their own talent and retrain existing employees.”

Internal mobility

For Hancock, this starts with organizations being less reactive in sourcing talent and more strategic. Such is the competition for hires, that even the biggest businesses are having to rethink how they attract the people they need.

“Everybody is looking at their employee value proposition, even those organizations that haven’t had to traditionally rely on that. Just look at the big corporate players, across all sectors, they’re all leaders in their respective industries who have been able to rely on their logos to attract and retain talent. Now, they’re recognizing that they’re having to work a lot harder,” she says.

One way to do this is to focus on building talent from within. However, internal hiring isn’t the same as internal mobility, warns Hancock. Instead, businesses need to think about how they can be agile in moving talent around the business depending on strategic needs.

“Internal mobility is cheaper and creates better engagement. Internal candidates get to productivity quicker, understand culture and know who to collaborate with to succeed,” says Thomas.

There are other ways American organizations are looking beyond salary. Some are increasing employee flexibility – whether location, remote work or compressed work weeks. They’re re-examining the benefits they offer in a post-pandemic era, moving away from office perks to offerings around mental health and wellbeing, and they’re particularly looking at career development, training and reskilling programs.

Reskilling programs

Back in 2019, JPMorgan announced a $350 million investment in skills development and social mobility. The investment created training programs upskilling the bank’s workforce for changes in technology and business, while also forecasting future workplace skills to build opportunities for internal employee development. It also made it compulsory for incoming asset management and investment banking analysts to take coding classes.

This allowed the bank to refocus its skillset – JPMorgan sees itself as a technology group, not just a bank, with technologists now accounting for a fifth of the organization’s 250,000 plus workforce. However, such large-scale reskilling programs are the exception, not the norm, says Hancock.

“The skills gap has always been there and it has gotten worse during the pandemic. This means that organizations need to fundamentally rethink how they approach talent acquisition. With digitalization, the skills organizations need change much more quickly than previously and the idea of a job for life doesn’t really exist anymore,” she says.

“Fundamentally, businesses need to be more agile and think about talent acquisition differently. Those that do will gain a competitive advantage, as it’s no longer affordable to keep buying in talent as it becomes even more of a premium,” adds Hancock.

written by the Catalyst Editorial Board

with contributions from:

Nicola Hancock
Regional Managing Director, Americas & Investment Banking, AMS
Ron Thomas
Managing Director, Strategy Focused Group

Global travel restrictions, the impact of remote working and the growth of workplace technology means that the need for employees to be office-based is diminishing. However, it’s not just the office that employers are foregoing, with an increasing number of organisations looking beyond location and geography when it comes to recruitment. Welcome to the era of ‘borderless’ hiring.

View the story

The boom of borderless hiring in the APAC region

Joy Koh
Head of Growth and Advisory (APAC), AMS
Siddharth Suhas
Head of Growth Initiatives and Partnerships (APAC), AMS
Michael Uhlmann
Senior Manager, RPO Solutions Design (APAC), AMS

While the pandemic has increased opportunities for employees used to working from home (WFH) to try working from anywhere (WFA), the concept is not a new one. Companies as diverse as Amazon, American Express and Siemens have adopted long-term work from anywhere policies, while Salesforce President and CPO Brent Hyder even called the 9-5 workday ‘dead’.

The benefits of being borderless

Another organisation that introduced a work from anywhere policy in 2021 was Swedish audio streaming service Spotify. It allowed its 6,500 employees to determine how often they worked in an office and even where the location they chose to work from (providing the company had operations there).

It also revamped how it set salary bands, setting them by country rather than city or region, encouraging employees to move within locations.

The result? One year on, Spotify has seen attrition rates fall – 15% lower in the second quarter of 2022 compared to the same quarter in 2019 – and diverse representation grow. In Europe, the streaming platform has grown its operations beyond its Stockholm headquarters into Germany, Spain and the Netherlands. At the same time, its location flexibility in the USA has seen half of hires come from cities outside its main US hubs of Los Angeles and San Francisco, helping it to meet diversity targets.

Growth in APAC region

In the APAC region, many organisations are choosing to hire from geographies or locations beyond their headquarters too.

A survey by global banking giant HSBC found that 40% of companies are encouraging more flexibility around the location or office employees work from over the next three years, with more than a third (36%) increasing the number of international remote workers they employ. Companies in India (51%), China (48%) and Australia (47%) had the greatest appetite for borderless workplaces, according to the Future of Work survey.

Meanwhile, at Indian IT services consulting giant Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), CEO Rajesh Gopinathan has plans to make 75% of the company’s 450,000 employees fully remote by 2025, reducing its global carbon footprint by 70% compared to a decade earlier. COVID-19 offers an opportunity to ‘leapfrog us into a new model’.

So what is driving cross-border hiring in the region?

“A lack of talent in the market and organisations fighting for the same talent, coupled with border closures due to COVID-19 limiting relocations, means many organisations have been forced to think about increasing borderless hiring programmes in the past year,” says Joy Koh, Head of Growth and Advisory, APAC for AMS.

“Secondly, companies are increasingly recognising that diversity is important to innovative and successful teams. It’s not just about diversity of location, but also the diversity of thought and problem-solving that people from different backgrounds bring. Companies are realising that a diverse workforce strengthens the organisation,” she adds.

Countries with the greatest appetite for borderless hiring

Australia

China

India

Three things companies should be doing to capitalise on borderless hiring

The way companies post jobs, screen resumes, make offers and onboard hires needs to change in the face of borderless recruitment. Furthermore, company culture is evolving as we move away from office-based organisations to remote ones. So while borderless hiring opens up new and exciting talent pools, it’s important to remember that the way these employees interact and engage with your business is also different.

To succeed, organisations need to think about the following:

Be aware of compliance and tax issues
Hiring employees from different geographies may mean a change in how organisational and employee taxation is calculated. Structuring globally compliant payrolls or industry-specific issues always requires detailed analysis before you go borderless.

Understand culture and how to engage remotely
While the pandemic has helped many organisations develop employee engagement programmes remotely, borderless hiring requires you to take this up a level. How are you going to build teamwork and a sense of belonging if employees never meet face-to-face? How are you going to ensure that those working remotely have the same opportunities as those in office? How will your culture evolve to be inclusive of people from new geographies and locations?

Plan for growth
Borderless hiring provides an opportunity for rapid growth, but businesses need to be prepared for this eventuality. If you suddenly find you have several hires in a region, are you prepared to set up regional hubs to facilitate more efficient work? Should this affect where you look to hire from? Prepare for borderless hiring to be a long-term strategy, not a short-term solution.

Siddharth Suhas, Head of Growth Initiatives and Partnerships APAC at AMS agrees that the combination of closed borders, tighter international talent mobility and dwindling local talent pools has forced businesses in the region to look further into borderless hiring, as well as outsourcing. However, it is the scope and speed at which borderless hiring is taking place that makes it a trend worth following.

“As with any new emerging talent channel or phenomenon, APAC is very much at the forefront and leapfrogging other regions. Tech hiring in particular, followed by certain operational and functional roles seem to be paving the way. What is different is that it is not just teams, but also leadership roles that are now being looked at with no location barrier,” says Suhas.

“It’s also probably one of the few times when both ends of the employer spectrum – big multinational companies and startups – are following and leveraging the trend. They might be doing it with different EVP spins, but the truth is borderless recruitment is now a very key part of hiring strategy,” he adds.

What this means for recruiters

Borderless hiring opens up a new set of challenges for recruiters and hiring managers used to more traditional recruitment methods. Historically, recruiters would be assigned to specific sectors and geographies. Now, they need to cast their net wider meaning a greater need for data analysis and automation to improve the efficiency and impact of the profession as search goes global.

There are also compliance and tax considerations – both corporate and individual – to take into account. However, one of the biggest shifts is a need to focus on cultural fit over skillset.

“Because borderless hires are not in the office, you can’t engage with them in the same way you used to,” says Koh. “It’s really important to screen them for cultural fit, so there is a sense of belonging and engagement. Someone sitting in a different country who doesn’t get to meet colleagues face-to-face can be at a higher attrition risk.”

However, companies thinking about borderless hiring can lean on the remote working experiment of the pandemic for ideas when it comes to culture, argues another AMS colleague.

“Companies have experimented with different strategies to engage staff whilst working remotely. We’ve seen some of the best organisations have adapted their approach and culture to almost a remote working first mindset. Although touch points between employees are less frequent, they can be more meaningful as organisations take the time to build connections and culture,” says Michael Uhlmann, Senior Manager, RPO Solutions Design APAC.

This requires a reset of traditional hiring practices. Is your organisation ready to make the change?

written by the Catalyst Editorial Board

with contributions from:

Joy Koh
Head of Growth and Advisory (APAC), AMS
Siddharth Suhas
Head of Growth Initiatives and Partnerships (APAC), AMS
Michael Uhlmann
Senior Manager, RPO Solutions Design (APAC), AMS

Jim Sykes – Sector Managing Director, Pharmaceutical & Life Sciences and Professional Services, AMSChip Holmes – Managing Director, Client Services, AMSCeline Raffray – VP Talent Acquisitions, BMSBeth Keeler – Associate Vice President, Global Talent Acquisition, Merck

View the story

Closing the US pharmaceutical industry’s growing skills gap

Jim Sykes – Sector Managing Director, Pharmaceutical & Life Sciences and Professional Services, AMS
Chip Holmes – Managing Director, Client Services, AMS
Celine Raffray – VP Talent Acquisition, BMS
Beth Keeler – Associate Vice President, Global Talent Acquisition, Merck

The world is facing a talent crisis. In the US, there were almost two jobs available for every unemployed person in July, with wage inflation rampant and the Great Resignation making it even harder to keep the talent that organisations are able to bring in.

One industry facing particular skills shortages is the life sciences and pharmaceuticals industry. Buoyed by rapid investment and hiring during the pandemic – as the sector ramped up manufacturing to deliver life-saving vaccines to millions of people – life sciences has nevertheless faced long standing challenges in bringing new talent and skills into the sector.

Back in 2017, industry trade group Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) warned that the US would need to hire 3.4 million employees to meet demand in life sciences and pharma by 2025, but that 60% of those jobs would be vacant due to skills shortages, a lack of effective education policies and increased competition for talent from other countries.

Skills mismatch

By 2020, a McKinsey & Co report into future pharma workforces concluded that 80% of pharma-manufacturing companies were reporting a skills mismatch, with the pace and scale of technological disruption key.

“Manufacturers are introducing advanced technologies, automating and digitising processes and applying advanced analytics to data. Pharma is also facing its own disruptions – for example, new business models (such as direct-to-customer sales and personalised medicine) and new product modalities,” suggests the report.

This reflects what Celine Raffray, VP Talent Acquisitions at BMS, sees in the modern day market.

“Like all companies in the life sciences sector we’re feeling the competitive nature of the jobs market, particularly for scarce skills such as digital or cell therapy. Whilst BMS has an incredible brand to leverage in order to acquire the best talent, I am very aware the challenge will only get greater in the coming years,” she says.

“As such, I see the need to be more agile and flexible and turn to innovative or inhouse solutions such as upskilling and reskilling of staff, enhanced internal mobility and the need to take a skills-based approach to talent acquisition as being of great strategic importance,” adds Raffray.

So how can the pharmaceutical industry meet the twin challenges of digital innovation and a growing skills gap?

“Historically, the life sciences sector hasn’t done a good job attracting talent from outside the sector. Instead, it has had a very heavy reliance on hiring job ready candidates rather than investing in campus or internship programs,” says Jim Sykes, Sector Managing Director, Pharmaceutical & Life Sciences and Professional Services, AMS.

“The challenge of this is that when you’re hiring job-ready candidates, you’re limited to headhunting talent from competitors. If you look at the market, you have increasing demand for pretty much any skillset, with attrition going up and unemployment going down. For me, the answer isn’t tactical, but rather it’s about more strategic approaches to how businesses approach talent,” he adds.

Sykes’ colleague, Chip Holmes, Managing Director Client Services at AMS agrees that the shortage of talent means that pharmaceutical companies have to rethink their talent strategies.

“For the first time, we have seen a greater willingness for talent to migrate out of the life science sector. Where organisations previously had attrition, it would usually be leaving one company in the sector to move to another. Now, we’re seeing people leave the industry altogether which is exacerbating the problems facing the sector,” he says.

New approach to talent acquisition

Changing the headhunting approach to talent means rethinking how pharmaceutical companies approach internal mobility, training and development and reskilling. Like other industries, more needs to be done in the life sciences to help existing employees update their skillsets to meet future demands – as well as engage them so that attrition falls.

However, actually creating effective reskilling programmes is still a challenge.

“A client of mine was going through a significant restructure. One therapeutic area was reducing significantly, while another was growing massively. You had a hiring freeze here, and a big recruitment drive there, but there was very little investment in crosstraining talent to facilitate moves between these therapeutic areas. With big pharma, the business units can be so big in their own right that they miss the opportunities to retrain talent,” says Sykes.

Those in industry agree that new ways of sourcing talent need to be developed to meet demand – but that doing so could also help diversify the industry. Beth Keeler is Associate Vice President, Global Talent Acquisition at Merck. She believes that transforming talent acquisition processes in the life sciences can bring new people into the sector.

“Hiring volumes at Merck, as with most companies inside and outside our sector, continue to be high and we certainly feel the competitiveness of the market when it comes to particular skills and geographies,” says Keeler.

“Amongst many initiatives, we are focused on transforming our talent acquisition processes to build long-term and diverse talent pipelines, creating more opportunities for those who haven’t been given a fair chance to gain qualifications for these roles. In doing so, we’re addressing the skills gap and building a better and more diverse organisation at the same time,” she adds. “We are proud to offer opportunities that provide purpose within a career through saving and improving lives while encouraging our employees to bring their authentic selves and various skill sets to our company to mirror the patients that we serve.”

Changing approaches to talent acquisition is one challenge – but how do you source people with niche digital skills who are in demand across different industries? As Sykes puts it – if your technological skills are such that you can work for tech companies like Apple or big banks like JPMorgan, pharmaceuticals is probably not going to be top of your list of employees.

Develop branding

The solution requires swallowing some pride and reasserting why the industry is a great place to work.

“In a lot of larger companies, there’s an assumption that everyone wants to work for them. The reality is that people now are less concerned with where they work than with what they do,” says Holmes.

“Organisations need to think about segmenting and differentiating their brand to target different groups of talent,” agrees Sykes. “The idea that you would go to market with a brand just as adept at hiring manufacturing talent as digital or clinical talent is nonsense. Tailor your brand to talk specifically to the talent you want to attract.”

“There is a golden opportunity now for Life Sciences companies. As a result of COVID, people now hold pharma and life sciences in higher esteem than ever before due to the amazing contribution to society that the companies have made. There is an opportunity to make a massive leap in attracting talent from other sectors.”

written by the Catalyst Editorial Board

with contributions from:

Jim Sykes
Sector Managing Director
Pharmaceutical & Life Sciences and Professional Services, AMS
Chip Holmes
Managing Director, Client Services, AMS
Celine Raffray
VP Talent Acquisition, BMS
Beth Keeler
Associate Vice President, Global Talent Acquisition, Merck

The world of recruitment has changed dramatically in just a few decades. What was once an entirely human-centric endeavour, with people wading through printed resumes, making calls on telephones and searching rolodexes for contacts has morphed into the digital world of AI, applicant tracking systems and chatbots.

View the story

Myth number 1:

Talent technology will replace the need for recruiters and sourcers

This is reflected in the wider working world. The World Economic Forum famously predicted that some 85 million jobs would be lost to automation by 2025, but with an additional 97 million created through new technology.

COVID-19 has only accelerated this digital transformation, with a 2020 McKinsey & Co report suggesting that a majority of companies had accelerated digitisation of internal operations and customer interactions by three to four years in the pandemic, while the share of digital products in their portfolio grew at a rate of a rapid seven years.

So with the impact of digitisation on the world of work and the growth in talent technology, are recruiters in danger of being replaced by robots?

In short, no. Recruitment is a deeply human process, rooted in the ability to connect, communicate and empathise with others. Think about how talent professionals source and screen applicants, understand and articulate an employer’s brand and then match the two together – and then try to imagine a non-human process doing so.

A 2020 report by cloud computing company Citrix called Work 2035 surveyed and interviewed nearly 2,000 business leaders about the future of work. It found that 73% of business leaders believe that technology and artificial intelligence will make employees at least twice as productive by 2035. However, when employees were asked the same question, just 39% agreed that technology and AI would make them more efficient. This digital disconnect represents the fear many employees have about the impact of digitisation on their jobs, versus the efficiencies that business leaders hope to gain.

With this in mind, it’s important to focus on the role technology has in reducing the pressure on talent professionals, rather than replacing them.

Human-centric recruitment

Josh Bersin is an author, industry expert and founder of corporate learning advisory The Josh Bersin Company. He believes that while the sheer volume of talent technology is accelerating, AI-based candidate searching and recruiting is still in its infancy.

“We’ve talked for years about the possibility of automating recruitment, but it is, at its core, a people-to-people business,” he writes in his paper the definitive guide to recruiting: human centred talent acquisition.

Instead, organisations should focus on ‘human-centred talent capabilities’, says Bersin. “[These are] more adaptable to change, more profitable, more innovative, their customers are more satisfied and they have higher employee engagement and retention. In short, when you have the right people, everything else gets better,” he adds.

Bersin’s research shows that companies leveraging human-centric talent acquisition are twice as likely to exceed financial targets, five times more likely to have a deep pipeline of talent and 30 times more likely to engage and retain employees.

At the same time, Bersin acknowledges that technology can strengthen talent pipelines – but the issue is that most companies don’t know how to effectively utilise digital recruiting solutions.

“Our research shows that virtual hiring tools, automation, talent intelligence platforms, and even AI and chatbots do drive key metrics like your ability to attract and hire great candidates or maintain a quality talent pipeline,” says Bersin.

According to Bersin’s report, organisations that use AI are four times more likely to boast a strong candidate pipeline, while those that use digital hiring solutions are twice as likely to attract and recruit the right talent.

So with that in mind, how can talent professionals work with technology to build the future of recruitment?

Combining people and process

The first step is to think of talent technology as a complement and partner to the human skills talent professionals bring. By using talent technology to bring in efficiencies and remove administrative tasks, recruiters and talent acquisition professionals can focus on more strategic goals.

This also creates efficiencies on the candidate side. In a candidate-driven market, it’s vital that employers offer a slick, speedy recruitment experience. Technology like chatbots, automatic interview scheduling and AI screening can speed up the hiring process and move potential candidates more quickly to the interview and offer stage.

Building people and process on top of technology

Digital transformation is affecting all aspects of business, so it’s vital that a business’ talent strategy works with the broader strategic goals of the company. This might mean harnessing technology used elsewhere in the business for talent acquisition, or using talent technology to find the right profile of candidates to drive transformation.

Either way, technology is going to underpin the future of work, so it’s vital to examine how organisations can build people and process on top of technology.

Building relationships with vendors to understand technology

The impact of technology on recruitment is in its infancy. Currently, most talent technology is aimed at improving workflow efficiencies. However, as the sector develops, new technologies will inevitably change how candidates apply for roles and how recruiters manage them. It’s also likely we will see a consolidation of technologies, with larger providers emerging offering wider services.

A long-term skillset organisations and talent professionals will need is the ability to build relationships with technology vendors in order to better understand their offerings, how these will integrate with an organisation and how they can maximise value.

So with the impact of digitisation on the world of work and the growth in talent technology, are recruiters in danger of being replaced by robots?

With this in mind, it’s important to focus on the role technology has in reducing the pressure on talent professionals, rather than replacing them.

Human-centric recruitment

At the same time, Bersin acknowledges that technology can strengthen talent pipelines – but the issue is that most companies don’t know how to effectively utilise digital recruiting solutions.

So with that in mind, how can talent professionals work with technology to build the future of recruitment?

Combining people and process

Building people and process on top of technology

Either way, technology is going to underpin the future of work, so it’s vital to examine how organisations can build people and process on top of technology.

Building relationships with vendors to understand technology

Expert commentary

Jonathan Kestenbaum
Managing Director
Technology Strategy & Partners, AMS

The future of technology in talent acquisition

There’s a number of ways to look at the impact of technology on people in talent acquisition. The easiest way is to look at how it’s impacted a similar industry, like sales. Here, the evolution of technology has seen sales development representatives, account executives and heads of sales increasingly use tools like Salesforce or Outreach. These people didn’t disappear when technology came in – they just became more efficient, optimised and data-driven.

The flipside of this is candidate experience. Applying for a new job is potentially a life-changing decision. If you get through to an interview, you’re looking for cultural fit, you’re looking to understand the vibe of an organisation.

You can’t get this without speaking to someone who works there and connecting with the human element of an organisation. This means that while technology can be an enabler of recruitment, the people element is and will remain crucial.

We’re only at the beginning of the impact of technology on recruitment processes, with workflow technology the main focus. There are many more layers and dynamics that will come into play as technology evolves. This means that technical savvy will be a unique skill for recruiters moving forward. The ability to understand technology and optimise recruitment processes around it will be a valuable skill going forward.

In the future, recruiters will actually use less technology than they do now. You’ll use five technology platforms, not 20. As the space evolves, we’ll see significant consolidation of technologies into larger platforms.

On the people side, technology is going to allow us to optimise for specific metrics that make a business impact, such as time to hire or diversity. Recruiters will build deeper, more meaningful relationships with candidates – and hold onto these relationships for a longer period of time. What’s going to differentiate organisations of the future is the relationships they hold with candidates. Technology will allow us to scalably stay in touch with candidates in a meaningful way, matching their skills and requirements to jobs.

Expert commentary

Jeanette Leeds
Managing Director
Hourly, AMS

How technology makes high volume hiring more efficient

AMS Hourly is set to focus on high volume retail organisations. It’s focused on engaging and optimising the hiring of hourly workers, through a quick and efficient process.

We do this through three key areas – conversational AI, automation and real-time data and analytics. Combining those three pieces can be very powerful in making the recruitment process more efficient and freeing up recruiters to do more strategic work.

One example of how such technology can improve recruitment is speed. The time from when a candidate engages with an Hourly chatbot to scheduling an interview is less than three minutes. This can be super powerful when you need to hire the same profile of candidate repeatedly in a short period of time. The chatbot asks a series of simple questions, the candidate answers and the system automates a response for you. It is rapid candidate sifting and scheduling.

Those in the market not using such technology are missing out on candidates, as the job market today is all about speed and candidate experience. Jobseekers today are used to a frictionless, consumer-like experience. They use Uber Eats to order food, or Amazon to buy products. Everything is so quick and easy and you don’t have to engage with another person. If your job application process is long and tedious, you’ll lose candidates to your competitors.

This is particularly true in the current job market, where demand for candidates is huge. There are way more jobs than candidates, so speed and efficiency is key.

There is a lot of fear about AI and automation in the job market, with people worried about technology replacing people. This will absolutely not happen. What will happen is that jobs will evolve. Technology will take over some tasks – particularly admin – but people will remain the decision-makers. Technology will guide and suggest, but people will make the ultimate decisions. It will make the job of a recruiter more strategic, more efficient and in the end, more fun.

If you have any questions regarding your tech and digital capabilities

Myth #2:
Once launched, technology will start looking after itself

Myth #3:
Today’s workforce is more tech enabled

Myth #4:
I’ll lose my talent acquisition employees to digital transformation

Myth #5
Operationalizing AI technology in my business will be straightforward

Back to intro

Talent technology is here to stay. The future is now.

View the story

Exploding Digital Myths in Talent Acquisition

AMS Whitepaper

Talent technology is here to stay.
The future is now.

We live in a world driven by technological transformation. New technologies have touched all industries and businesses. The talent landscape too has been propelled into the digital sphere, whether that’s automated CV sifting or conversational AI driven hiring processes.

George Westerman, the pioneering researcher and world recognized thought leader on digital transformation, recently commented: “When digital transformation is done right, it’s like a caterpillar turning into a butterfly but when done wrong, all you have is a really fast caterpillar”.

As the war on talent continues to heat up, it’s that tech-enabled butterfly that will herald the endless summer for organizations looking to future proof their workforces by securing the best talent. Those who fail to embrace a technology enabled approach are increasingly at risk of finding themselves unable to deliver the workforce they need, thereby putting the business goals they strive for at considerable risk.

However, change is a symptom of the brave and the talent technology market is fragmented, often confusing and moving at pace. According to the Boston Consulting Group, more than $12bn in venture capital was poured into the sector in 2021 and thousands of new talent applications have come to market in the last five years. It’s no surprise that industry leaders have found it difficult to embrace and adopt new technologies and ways of working.

Our latest white paper, Exploding Digital Myths in Talent Acquisition, debunks some of the most common myths surrounding talent technology and explores how tech-enabled tools, when implemented and used correctly, can underpin a talent acquisition strategy, and deliver better, faster and more dynamic decisions.

It’s important, however, that we bridge the gap between technology and talent. The fear of being replaced by automation can be a very real concern for employees. A 2020 report by Citrix found that 73% of employers believed that AI and technology would make employees more efficient by 2035. Conversely, only 39% of employees agreed when asked the same question. If left unaddressed, these concerns can lead to poor adoption of costly technology, further slowing the hiring process and demotivating existing employees.

But that need not be the case. It’s a myth that employees and technology cannot co-exist, or that AI will soon automate the entire hiring process. Rather, technology is here to remove mundane administrative tasks from talent professionals, allowing them to focus on candidate experience and strategic insights.

That’s just one of the myths around talent technology that this white paper aims to address.

From how to choose and implement talent technology through to the impact of artificial intelligence and automation on wider business, we’ll explode some of the misconceptions around technology and give tangible advice on how to implement tech tools within your talent acquisition function.

Along the way, we’ll hear from AMS industry experts, academics and thought leaders about their take on how digitization is transforming the world of talent acquisition, as well as examining global reports and studies on the sector. We conclude with a spotlight on AMS solutions, carefully developed, to make a difference to the world of work.

The temperature of the Talent Climate is rising, and talent technology is here to stay. Forget the myths, augment your talent teams by successfully operationalizing the right technology and you’ll revolutionize your workforce.

Talent technology is here to stay.
The future is now.

David Leigh
Chief Executive Officer
AMS

That’s just one of the myths around talent technology that this white paper aims to address.

How Recruitment Process Outsourcing helps you win in a tough talent world

View the story

Making the business case for RPO

How Recruitment Process Outsourcing helps you win in a tough talent world

Introduction

The job of recruitment is more challenging than it’s ever been. Volatility has become the new norm and the traditional ups and downs in hiring demand have become more extreme. At the same time the workforce is shrinking and the rate of change in skills and technologies is accelerating. That means demand for labor is greatly outstripping supply. The result is a highly candidate-driven market where good people get to pick and choose their employers according to an increasingly diverse list of concerns. Are there opportunities for me to progress? Can I work from home when I need to? How serious is this company about reducing CO₂?

In this new, challenging environment, organizations cannot expect to beat competitors to the best talent by sticking to the same old, same old. Instead, they need to take a more strategic, more holistic, and more innovative approach to recruiting and retaining talent.

It’s a big challenge – but it’s not one you need to tackle alone. Through a recruitment process outsourcing (RPO) partner, you can access scalable, expert resource to meet hiring demand quickly while still managing your overall cost base. And you can tap into deep expertise in areas such as talent strategy, sourcing, and employer branding so you can implement skills-based hiring, accelerate your internal mobility programs and be at the cutting edge of the latest developments in AI.

Over the next few pages, we look at 7 ways in which a recruitment process outsourcing partner can help your organization optimize its hiring power in an increasingly competitive market to achieve your business objectives.

1. Navigate the market with greater speed and agility

To survive and thrive in the face of fluctuating demand, organizations must become as agile possible – particularly when it comes to recruiting permanent and contingent workers. Only then will they be able to respond quickly enough to changing market conditions, deploying people with the right skills and capabilities, when and where they are needed.

The good news is that RPO partners tend to be masters of scalability.

Most RPO partners will offer you the option of scaling costs up and down in line with demand. In fallow periods, the TA function can be pared back to a core team. Recruiters who are surplus to requirements are transferred temporarily to other clients, ready to return whenever volumes start rising again. This allows the organization to downsize without losing vital skills and capabilities that will be needed in the long term and without damaging your brand.

Some RPO partners are also agile enough to refocus their hiring on different parts of the business or on different skills-sets. So, if your business needs to build a new capability to support a change in strategy, you can react at speed. Those RPO firms with specialist sourcing centers tend to be able to respond to business needs with greater speed and agility. These centers use data and deep market insight to identify, engage and nurture short-, medium- and long-term talent pools.

1. Navigate the market with greater speed and agility

The good news is that RPO partners tend to be masters of scalability.

Case study: Scaling the workforce at speed

When a global e-commerce company meet a sudden spike in demand AMS supported them to hire 175,000 US-based warehouse employees within just six weeks. The company’s internal team wasn’t big enough to cope with the sudden influx of candidates, so we used our scalable model to rapidly assemble and deploy a candidate care team of 35 agents.

Are you able to scale your team up or down quickly enough to respond to business needs?; Do you have access to specialist sourcing centres who can use market insight and candidate identification to build a strong talent pool?;? Do you have the capability to upskill and reskill talent to fit your needs?

2. Recruit for skills

Skills-based hiring has become a hot topic over recent years in response to the talent shortage. Done effectively, it can shine a light on different industries that are ripe with skills-adjacent talent, naturally widening the scope of potential new hires. But, while there has been a lot of talk around the topic, many organizations are struggling with how to get started. An RPO provider can be a close advisor in the journey towards a more skills-focused talent acquisition function.

Here are just four ways an RPO partner can help.

1. Market insights

Skills-based hiring depends on deep market insights. Many RPO partners have dedicated market insight teams that can help you understand what skills are available where and, also uncover the hidden industries and locations where skills-adjacent talent exists.

2. Expert sourcing

Through an RPO partner you have access to specialist sourcing teams who can run sourcing and attraction campaigns based on skills rather than roles, building talent pools of critical skills outside of specific open requisitions. If it’s early days on your journey towards skills-based hiring then outsourcing this as a discreet piece of work can be very effective way to start, freeing up your in-house team to focus on business-as-usual requests.

3. Technology

If you are looking to take a skills-based approach to hiring across your internal and external market, you need the right technology to support you. Luckily, AI-driven technology can now create efficiencies in advertising roles, skills-matching, candidate identification and shortlisting to name just a few. An RPO partner will help you choose and implement this technology or draw on their own proprietary tech to implement this on your behalf.

4. Upskilling and reskilling

Where you can’t find the skills you need, implementing a “recruit, skill and deploy” program has huge advantages and there are RPO providers out there who can support you to do this. At AMS Talent Lab we work with you to identify talent with the right potential, often from underrepresented groups, and equip them with the skillsets you need covering everything from programing to green skills. This not only helps you fill your skills gaps but simultaneously increases the diversity of your workforce.

Case study: Attracting and engaging tech talent

When a multinational bank struggled to attract and engage tech talent, they partnered with AMS to implement a skills-based approach to hiring. We narrowed down over 200 job profiles to 4 key skills; created an updated talent value proposition to specifically target these skills and implemented new sourcing strategies to find and engage the right talent. As a result:

Time to hire reduced from 65 to 28 days.
95% of candidates converted to bench selection.
Diversity of candidate slates increased.

• Do you know what skills you need? • Do you know how available these skills are in the market? • Do you know the industries with skills-adjacent talent?

3. Accelerate internal mobility

Given the realities of the skills shortage, you would expect companies to be turning to their internal workforce to search for talent. Yet internal hiring has been going down. Our Talent Climate report shows that the rate of internal hiring has decreased to 24%. One of the lowest rates we’ve seen in years.

According to Deloitte the issue is that most organizations are not making it easy for their employees to find new roles. They found that just 6% of companies felt they were proficient at internal talent mobility, while more than half of employees thought it was easier to find a job outside their existing organization than inside.

An RPO partner can help you build and implement an internal mobility program that makes it easy for employees to move around your organization and helps you fill your skills gaps. Their deep understanding of how to deliver an exceptional candidate and hiring manager experience makes them a perfect partner for this role.

At AMS we support 80% of our clients with internal hiring.

Case study: Creating a culture of internal mobility

Prior to the pandemic, this bank’s prevailing approach was to focus on the external candidate market. Many employees found it difficult to seek alternative roles as hiring managers looked externally to find talent.

AMS worked closely with the bank to set up a ‘career mobility squad’ to identify and accelerate growth-oriented employees and start creating a positive culture whereby moving roles felt effortless and rewarding. The squad implemented several new innovative ways of increasing internal mobility which led to a:

13.5% increase in internal applications.
7% increase in internal hiring.

4. Build a compelling employee value proposition

Having a strong, well-defined employee value proposition (EVP) has been linked to everything from decreased attrition to better productivity and bottom-line impact. A CEB study entitled Branding for Influence found that a strong employer brand can raise your quality of hire by 9% and improve applicant pool quality by 54%. According to LinkedIn, companies with stronger employer brands see a 43% decrease in the cost per hire.

The tougher the talent market gets, the more important your EVP becomes. Candidates today are subjecting organizations to ever greater levels of scrutiny. What will they make of your company’s market reputation? How attractive do you appear to them as an employer? These are critical questions that organizations must address if they want to survive and thrive in the current talent market. But data from Aptitude Research shows that less than 50% of recruiters spend time on employer branding or DEI initiatives each week.

Many RPO providers are also employer branding experts. They know how to develop an authentic and compelling EVP – and how to communicate it in a way that will help you stand out from the crowd and attract the top performers in your market. It doesn’t even need to be a costly or time-consuming process. In many cases, the basics are already there – the task is merely to bring your culture to life by engaging with employees, listening to their experiences, and retelling their unique stories to the outside world.

Case study: Establishing a reputation as a top employer

Synchrony, one of the largest issuers of store credit cards in the US was looking to build their team with qualified professionals. They recognized that having a distinct employee value proposition was crucial for achieving standout in a crowded market.

AMS helped them establish their reputation as a top employer by focusing on their culture, telling their unique story, and remaining committed to a strong candidate experience. As a result, they have been able to grow their business significantly while at the same time decreasing cost per hire and cost per application.

Do you have an EVP that is distinctive and compelling? Is your EVP aligned with your authentic company culture - or is it purely aspirational? Do your recruiters know how to communicate your EVP and bring it to life for candidates?

5. Create a more diverse and inclusive workforce

Diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) is not an issue – it’s a necessity. Study after study shows that when organizations truly harness the diversity of their workforce, they make better decisions, do smarter, more innovative work, and can financially outperform their peers.

Research also shows that a robust DEI strategy can make an organization a more attractive place to work. According to Glassdoor, more than 3 out of 4 jobseekers and employees (76%) report that a diverse workforce is an important factor when evaluating companies and job offers.

But increasing diversity, equity and inclusion is easier said than done. Despite best efforts, DEI initiatives often fail to deliver promised outcomes. Even when issues are identified and understood, many companies still find it impossible to develop solutions that work.

This is where having a quality RPO partner can make a real difference – because they should have the DEI insights and expertise needed to move the dial.

At AMS, we like to start with a DEI diagnostic, providing clients with an objective view of the current state of diversity, equity and inclusion within their organizations and identifying areas where structures and processes can be improved. We then work with our clients to put those structures into place. We also support our clients to achieve their DEI objectives through inclusive recruiting and by proactively sourcing candidates from under-represented groups.

5. Create a more diverse and inclusive workforce

This is where having a quality RPO partner can make a real difference – because they should have the DEI insights and expertise needed to move the dial.

Case study: Building a roadmap for a DEI organization

The DEI diagnostic we conducted for our client, Staples Inc., included an end-to-end review of their TA operations, policies and procedures. We carried out market and competitor research, facilitated interviews with senior leadership, engaged with individuals across the TA and HR teams, and conducted multiple workshops.

Through our diagnostic work, we were able to gain a clear picture of the situation on the ground, understand the processes and technologies the company had in place, and identify obstacles and opportunities associated with hiring diverse talent. This meant we could then provide Staples with a carefully tailored roadmap for sustainable and scalable DEI success.

Do you have a clear DEI policy with defined and achievable goals? Have you ensured your TA strategy is not creating barriers to hiring diverse talent? Are you looking at DEI holistically?

6. Unleash the power of technology

HR technology brings huge benefits to employers and candidates everywhere – and the dramatic acceleration in the development of AI has opened up new possibilities in improving the efficiency and effectiveness of recruiting. By adopting up-to-the-minute solutions for recruitment marketing, candidate relationship management and assessment, organizations can engage with new generations of digital natives in the ways they expect and prefer. The use of technology to streamline recruitment processes and reduce time-to-hire also allows talent teams to concentrate on higher-value activities, such as engaging with candidates and stakeholders or delivering intelligence, insights and thought leadership.

But the bigger the HR tech market becomes, the more complex it gets – and with so many different solutions available, it can be difficult for HR professionals to identify what trends and technology will really help them get ahead. Many organizations are also struggling to make the most of the technology they adopt. In a recent survey, 60% of recruiters stated that poor integration is the greatest frustration with technology.

Here are three ways your RPO partner can work with you to get the most out of your HR tech:

1. Understand the business problem

What exactly is the problem you’re trying to solve? How can technology add value? Who will be using the technology and how will they be using it? These are all questions a partner can help you answer to find the right solution for your business.

2. Identify the best available technology solution

RPO providers are regularly demoing, rating, and ranking new solutions on behalf of their clients. This gives them deep insight into the HR tech landscape and means they are well-placed to select the technology that will best meet your organization’s needs.

3. Embed the new technology

Finding the right technology is only the start. To get the most out of your solution, you need to make sure it is properly integrated and deployed – and, crucially, you need to bring all the potential users in your workforce fully up to speed with the new technology. This means delivering training to all relevant employees, as well as clearly communicating what’s changing and why.

Case study: Innovating ahead of the competition

We helped McDonald’s become the first organization to provide a voice-activated job search. The custom-built technology has helped to reduce candidate application times and to promote McDonald’s as an innovative employer. It’s just one example of how working with an RPO provider can help organizations beat their competitors to new technology and gain a clear advantage in the talent marketplace.

are you leveraging the right technology?

Are your technology solutions fully optimised and achieving their full potential?; Does your technology offer a consumer-level experience for all stakeholders?; Are you providing the expert training and change management needed to ensure new technologies are successfully adopted?

7. Improve time, quality and cost of hire

Ultimately the objective of every TA leader is to hire better people, faster at a lower cost and this is the primary reason they turn to an RPO partner for help. Most RPO firms work to a clear scope of service with defined SLAs and KPIs such as, improved candidate quality; improved time to hire; reduced costs; and candidate and hiring manager satisfaction rates.

Time to hire

Time to hire is still the most common metric used by TA functions to indicate effectiveness. But despite the heavy focus on this KPI, time-to-hire is on the up. Our Talent Climate series research shows that it’s skyrocketed over the past five years, reflecting the increasingly challenging talent market.

RPO firms use data-led market insights and up-to-the-minute sourcing methods to give you access to a wider and more diverse talent pool. They also put in place streamlined processes enabled by the latest technology. So, you to find and progress the right candidates faster.

Cost to hire

The built-in agility afforded by an RPO partner allows businesses to scale cost up and down in line with demand as well as take advantage of economies of scale, and the ability to leverage lower cost recruiting channels and technology. As a result, organizations typically find that they make significant savings with recruitment process outsourcing.

Quality of hire

You could argue that recruitment is the most important job of HR. If you don’t get the right people through the door, then your development and engagement efforts are wasted.

The right RPO partner will help you find and assess the right talent. They will work with you to develop the right talent value proposition to get in front of that talent. And they will implement an inclusive and engaging candidate experience to keep talent engaged with your brand through to offer and beyond.

Case study: Cutting hiring time in half

This leading banking and financial services group was facing high candidate drop off rates when hiring for admin and clerical workers. They wanted to offer candidates a gold standard digital experience with reduced time to hire and a more efficient process for hiring managers.

AMS partnered with the group to completely transform the application process. We put in a new automated system to drive candidate sourcing and application and a new assessment platform to deliver a branded digital assessment and video interview experience.

Candidates can now complete 80% of the recruitment process upon application with a screening call the next working day meaning a possible offer within 24 hours of applying.
Time to hire has reduced from 7 days to 3-4 days.

• Do you feel you are always compromising on speed, cost, or quality of hire? • Are you clear on the critical KPIs that drive impact in your business? • Do you know how your time, cost and speed of hire compares to the market?

Conclusion

A world-class RPO partner won’t just get your hiring done. With their insight and expertise, you can continue to attract, recruit, retain and reskill the right people for your business, no matter how tough the talent market becomes.

It’s about building a future pipeline as well as meeting your immediate hiring needs.

It’s about finding talent in places you never thought to look.

It’s about developing and communicating an authentic employee value proposition that attracts the very best talent and creates advocates among existing employees.

It’s about embedding DEI at every level of the organization.

It’s about knowing how to use the latest and greatest technology to streamline your recruitment process and create consumer-level experiences for candidates and hiring managers alike.

Want to find out more about what RPO can do for your business? Whether you are entering a new market, scaling up a team or looking to optimize your whole recruitment process, we have a solution to match.

It starts with a conversation.

weareAMS.com

Post-pandemic, most organisations are on a recruitment drive. However, the war for talent is fierce and businesses are having to get creative and look beyond salary to attract the right people. If your company is looking to hire more Gen Z talent, there are several things you’ll need to consider.

View the story

DEI & early careers:
Why it’s so important to start here

Terina Matthews-Davis
Client Director, Early Careers & Campus Americas, AMS

Jaymie Hinton
HR Operations Manager, AMS

Kahlil Greene
Online Educator and Senior, Yale University

Chief among these is understanding the desires, needs and interests of this generation. While it’s always dangerous to generalise about an entire population, it’s clear that Gen Z has different expectations about work and careers than previous ones.

Having seen older family members experience burnout, economic insecurity through recessions and poor work/life balance, they’re now demanding better from the companies they work for – better pay, better balance and a better impact on society and the environment.

Representation matters

This also means a more diverse and inclusive workplace. The business case for diversity has long been clear – a McKinsey & Co report found that companies in the top quartile for gender diversity on executive teams were 25% more likely to have above average profitability, while those in the top quartile for ethnic diversity were 33% more likely to be profitable – but businesses are still struggling to meet DEI targets.

However, for Gen Z, the debate around the merits of diversity are old news. As online educator and Yale’s first black student body president Kahlil Greene recounts in this piece for HBR:

“As a freshman, I attended an investment banking event for underrepresented minorities where a recruiter told us about the efforts of the company’s diversity recruiting team. The team struggled to get adequate buy-in and investment to build a more diverse and inclusive workplace. What finally broke the inertia was a robust business case that proved that diversity was good for profits.

“Although the recruiter didn’t intend for her story to be received this way, our big takeaway was: When it comes to DEI, that firm would only make progress if it was directly framed around profits, not because it was the right thing to do. It told me that they may not value ideas I bring to the workplace unless there was a direct link to revenue growth. I stopped considering working there after that session.

As one of my peers recounted, “If you care about your people, you care about what your people care about.”

Despite increased attention on diversity in the US, black and Hispanic early careers professionals remain 50-70% more likely to be unemployed than their white counterparts, according to research from the Brookings Institution. So how can we change this?

“A lot of times when I’m conducting interviews, when I get on the screen and I’m a person of colour and a woman, people are excited. Why? One, I’m doing an interview at that level. Two, the person being interviewed is making a conscious decision in their head about this being a place they want to work because I’m in this role. They can see themselves progressing in the company – representation matters,” says Terina Matthews-Davis, Americas Client Director, Early Careers & Campus at AMS.

Matthews-Davis’ colleague Jaymie Hinton is an HR Operations Manager at AMS. As a military veteran, she understands what it’s like to be on the outside looking in when it comes to finding a job. Hinton argues that many young people have the same feeling when it comes to current hiring processes, but that things are beginning to change.

“Sometimes people don’t feel like they’re included and safe to be themselves, whether they’re gay, straight or ‘different’ somehow. I’m ex-military and I’ve had doors shut in my face because hiring managers don’t understand transferable skills,” says Hinton.

“Younger generations can feel distant from the hiring process. When I got out of the military 20 years ago, it was about who you knew. Now, you have different ways of applying for jobs and companies are looking to be more diverse. There has been a change in awareness,” she adds.

Representation matters

However, for Gen Z, the debate around the merits of diversity are old news. As online educator and Yale’s first black student body president Kahlil Greene recounts in this piece for HBR:

As one of my peers recounted, “If you care about your people, you care about what your people care about.”

Be authentic – performative allyship
doesn’t work

When it comes to attracting future talent, it’s important to be authentic. Gen Zers aren’t falling for performative allyship, so simply sticking a Black Lives Matter poster in the window or showing support on social media isn’t enough.

Organisations need to be truthful about where they stand and what they’re doing to make a change, especially if they’re currently struggling with diversity. The more authentic and open you are, the more early careers talent will support you.

“It’s 100% about calling out where you are as an organisation. It shows your authenticity, it shows you are working on it and it shows candidates they can be part of a change,” says Matthews-Davis.

It’s also about actively going out into the communities you want to hire from and meeting talent where they are. This might mean partnering with HBCUs, sponsoring societies or getting involved in community events. Early careers talent is big on altruism and being active locally. If you’re not building local relationships, you’re not getting in front of them.

As Hinton says: “Everybody is in the war for talent and everybody is in the war for diverse talent. It has to be about more than expecting them to come to you.”

Go beyond your usual hiring routes

Hinton and Matthews-Davis help clients looking to hire more diverse candidates create strategies that have an impact. Practically, this might be about providing tools that match roles to candidates, such as platforms like WayUp or RippleMatch. It might be about partnering with new colleges or institutions to look for interns. Ultimately, it’s about looking beyond your traditional hiring routes.

“People hire people who look like them. They hire from where they went to university, so it’s about being intentional and understanding your strategy. If you say you want 50% of your incoming class being diverse, but you’re mainly hiring from Stanford, Harvard and Notre Dame, you’re probably not going to reach your target if you look at the percentage of students of colour from those campuses,” says Matthews-Davis.

“When you go outside your target schools, you find amazing talent that is hungry. Students there know they aren’t part of the core target list, so they have to get in early and prove themselves. Companies are starting to think more broadly about where their talent comes from,” she adds.

written by the Catalyst Editorial Board

with contributions from:

Terina Matthews-Davis
Client Director, Early Careers & Campus Americas, AMS
Jaymie Hinton
HR Operations Manager, AMS
Kahlil Greene
Online Educator and Senior, Yale University

Be authentic – performative allyship
doesn’t work

As Hinton says: “Everybody is in the war for talent and everybody is in the war for diverse talent. It has to be about more than expecting them to come to you.”

Go beyond your usual hiring routes

written by the Catalyst Editorial Board

with contributions from:

Terina Matthews-Davis
Client Director, Early Careers & Campus Americas, AMS
Jaymie Hinton
HR Operations Manager, AMS
Kahlil Greene
Online Educator and Senior, Yale University

The COVID-19 pandemic left retailers scrambling for talent as employees moved on to other industries with higher wages, better job security and improved benefits.

View the story

Three ways retail organisations can use technology to engage and hire frontline workers

Contributors:
Jeanette Leeds
Managing Director, Hourly by AMS
Adam Lukoskie
Vice President, National Retail Federation Foundation

The COVID-19 pandemic left retailers scrambling for talent as employees moved on to other industries with higher wages, better job security and improved benefits. Many traditional retail employees simply left the job market altogether, meaning the war for talent in the sector is intensifying.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics more than 1 million of the 11 million jobs available in the US are in retail, with one retail industry figure speculating that applicant numbers had fallen by 40% in just a year. With nearly two jobs available for every unemployed person, companies are having to get creative in their hiring processes to get the volume of workers they need.

For many retailers, this has naturally led to a reappraisal of how technology can make hiring more efficient and effective.

“Like many other industries, retailers have faced an increasingly tight labour market in recent years. In order to compete for talent, many have integrated technologies to further attract candidates and streamline the overall hiring process,” says Adam Lukoskie, Vice President at National Retail Federation Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the world’s largest retail trade association.

“From advertising on social platforms such as TikTok, to enhancing the user experience with clear and frictionless job applications, along with convenience factors like conducting interviews virtually and extending job offers earlier in the application process, retailers are creating more opportunities for people of all backgrounds to quickly secure roles in an industry that offers tremendous growth potential,” adds Lukoskie.

Enforced online shopping during the pandemic has also shifted the dial on digital transformation in the sector, with customers trialling new ways to shop.

A McKinsey & Co report found that 10% of UK shoppers tried grocery delivery during the pandemic, with 12% expecting to shop less at non-essential stores post-lockdown. The same report predicts that a third of all tasks in retail will be affected by technology by 2030. The seismic shift in how we shop means that recruiters are having to contend with both a shortage of currently available talent and the need to build in skills of the future.

“What big retailers tell me is their biggest problem is getting enough people to fill jobs. The supply of people and talent isn’t enough to fill available roles. The second part is about attrition. How do you keep people once you get them?”, says Jeanette Leeds, Managing Director Hourly by AMS.

For retailers, the competitive nature of the labour market is pushing them to streamline their recruitment processes, introducing artificial intelligence and automation into the early stages of hiring to help talent acquisition employees hire more efficiently. In a candidate-driven market, speed is vital. But how can technology improve retail recruiting?

written by the Catalyst Editorial Board

with contributions from:

Jeanette Leeds
Managing Director, Hourly by AMS
Adam Lukoskie
Vice President, National Retail Federation Foundation

In a tough, candidate-led jobs market, the traditional approach to talent acquisition is over. Employers are increasingly having to convince candidates that their company is the right one to join, offering a combination of purposeful work, development opportunities and values that match the individual

View the story

It’s plain as day –
employer brand really is everything

Contributors:
Bryan Adams, CEO, Ph.Creative
Bill Cleary, Managing Director, AMS
Terina Matthews-Davis, Client Director, AMS

As with many other future of work concepts, the COVID-19 pandemic has had a catalysing effect on employer branding. Faced with a genuine global crisis, business leaders were forced to not only communicate their values, but demonstrate them.

Lockdowns, physical and mental health challenges and a potential recession meant that employers had to decide whether common company values like trust, honesty and integrity were things to live by, or just words that sounded good.

Now the Great Resignation has hit and employers are struggling to fill talent gaps. Differentiating yourself from your competitors is key when the talent pool is shrinking – and talent is watching.

According to Glassdoor, 86% of women and 67% of men wouldn’t join a company with a bad reputation. Half of all candidates wouldn’t join a company with a bad reputation even if they offered them a pay rise. On the flipside, three-quarters of jobseekers are more likely to apply to a job if the employer actively manages its employer brand and 92% of people would consider switching jobs to a company with an excellent corporate reputation.

For recruiters, employer brand is important too. The same report suggests that a strong employer brand can reduce cost per hire by as much as 50%, with a negative reputation adding an extra 10% onto each hire.

“Brand is a differentiator, so for companies it’s about how do I promote my brand and make candidates aware of it, but also meet them where they’re at,” says Bill Cleary, managing director, advisory at AMS.

“This might mean identifying the different personas of the candidates you’re trying to hire and differentiating your brand message along those lines. It’s about being custom to the individuals and personas you’re trying to attract,” adds Cleary.

Creating an employer brand

Bryan Adams is CEO and founder of North American based employer brand agency Ph.Creative. He believes that there are plenty of misconceptions around how organisations can create an authentic employer brand. To begin with, he advises companies to focus on three key components: reputation, proposition and experience.

“Modern jobseekers weigh a prospective employer’s reputation heavily in their decision to apply for a job or accept an offer, because they’re keenly aware of the impact it will have on their own reputation and the way others perceive them,” he writes.

Like Cleary, Adams believes reputation can mean different things to different employees, so it’s important to segment different personas. This leads onto proposition, which defines the employee-employer relationship. This establishes the expectations that the company has for employees and how they will be rewarded. The key here is honesty – a mismatch in expectations can lead to lasting damage on your brand.

Finally comes experience. Good employee experience is vital in building your reputation, providing excellent – and sometimes vocal – feedback on what it’s like to work at your organisation.

As Adams writes: “Much as satisfied customers can often make the best salespeople, satisfied current and former employees can be an invaluable source of candidate referrals, strengthening your ability to attract top talent.”

The graduate landscape

One of the most competitive areas of recruitment is in the graduate and future talent area – and it’s a demographic that is heavily invested in employer branding.

Terina Matthews-Davis is Americas client director, early careers and campus for AMS. She believes that companies are having to be more creative and personalize their offerings to attract the next generation of candidates. It’s about giving students the opportunity to see places they wouldn’t normally get to go to on their own.

“In New York for example, instead of taking all interns to a Yankees or Mets game, companies are thinking ‘maybe not all our people are interested in baseball, so let’s give them a choice and split up our business leaders to go to different events/locations such as: Radio City Music Hall, backstage tour of a Broadway production, an event at the Metropolitan Museum Art, or even a guided tour of Central Park.’ It’s about giving them options to not only engage with the company, but also the city they’re going to be living and working in,” she says.

The candidate-driven market means that employers are having to temper expectations about when interns accept offers. Such is the volume of opportunities, that all candidates can be more selective about where they work.

“Companies used to ask interns to make decisions about offers immediately or within 2 – 4 weeks. In the current market, organizations have to be OK with interns shopping around for additional full-time opportunities, before making their final decision to accept or decline their intern conversion offer.” says Matthews-Davis.

To combat this, businesses need to up their engagement strategies. A starting point is to focus on young talent as mentors, giving prospective employees the opportunity to learn and hear from employees who have just been through the journey they’re starting.

Secondly, companies are recruiting from more diverse populations and colleges, doing away with the core school mentality of only recruiting from certain institutions.

Now the Great Resignation has hit and employers are struggling to fill talent gaps. Differentiating yourself from your competitors is key when the talent pool is shrinking – and talent is watching.

Creating an employer brand

Finally comes experience. Good employee experience is vital in building your reputation, providing excellent – and sometimes vocal – feedback on what it’s like to work at your organisation.

The graduate landscape

One of the most competitive areas of recruitment is in the graduate and future talent area – and it’s a demographic that is heavily invested in employer branding.

Secondly, companies are recruiting from more diverse populations and colleges, doing away with the core school mentality of only recruiting from certain institutions.

Finally, Matthews-Davis says companies are learning to invest in student populations over the long-term.

“When I was in-house building this population, we had a ‘keep warm’ policy. From when an intern accepts an offer to when they actually start can be nearly a year, so you need to keep them engaged so they don’t shop around.

“One way is to send them gifts. In certain sectors, it’s a badge of honor to have a duffel bag or vest with a company logo. So, companies are upping their game, sending out brands like Patagonia and North Face to keep engaged,” says Matthews-Davis.

This also provides employers with a chance to interact with future hires by surveying them on the sort of gifts they would like. By asking their opinion, brands can show this talent pool that their thoughts are valued, turning them into potential brand ambassadors as they show off their gifts to fellow students.

The challenge of this focus on employer branding is to match expectation with reality. Matthews-Davis believes there is a danger that entry-level talent could become ‘over-entitled’ and have unrealistic expectations around the speed of career trajectories. To combat this, she suggests that companies should provide mentoring from other employees explaining their career paths.

Ultimately, no amount of good branding can keep talent if the actual experience of working somewhere is different.

“What talent wants is true, authentic leaders that they can engage with. They want a balance of value-added work and development within the organization. Those things haven’t changed,” says Matthews-Davis.

written by the Catalyst Editorial Board

with contributions from:
Bryan Adams, CEO, Ph.Creative
Bill Cleary, Managing Director, AMS
Terina Matthews-Davis, Client Director, AMS

Finally, Matthews-Davis says companies are learning to invest in student populations over the long-term.

Ultimately, no amount of good branding can keep talent if the actual experience of working somewhere is different.

written by the Catalyst Editorial Board

with contributions from:
Bryan Adams, CEO, Ph.Creative
Bill Cleary, Managing Director, AMS
Terina Matthews-Davis, Client Director, AMS

Let’s make AI work for you.

An Eye on Tomorrow

Thinking about skills-based hiring?

Beyond salary

Image captions

Internal mobility

Reskilling programs

Image captions

The benefits of being borderless

Growth in APAC region

Countries with the greatest appetite for borderless hiring

Australia

China

India

Three things companies should be doing to capitalise on borderless hiring

What this means for recruiters

Skills mismatch

The US life sciences industry needs to hire 3.4 million people by 2025

80% of pharmaceutical companies report a skills mismatch

The US life sciences industry needs to hire 3.4 million people by 2025

80% of pharmaceutical companies report a skills mismatch

New approach to talent acquisition

Develop branding

Human-centric recruitment

Combining people and process

Building people and process on top of technology

Building relationships with vendors to understand technology

Image captions

Human-centric recruitment

Combining people and process

Building people and process on top of technology

Building relationships with vendors to understand technology

Expert commentary

The future of technology in talent acquisition

Expert commentary

How technology makes high volume hiring more efficient

If you have any questions regarding your tech and digital capabilities

Talent technology is here to stay. The future is now.

Image captions

Talent technology is here to stay. The future is now.

Introduction

Image captions

1. Navigate the market with greater speed and agility

Image captions

1. Navigate the market with greater speed and agility

Case study: Scaling the workforce at speed

2. Recruit for skills

1. Market insights

2. Expert sourcing

3. Technology

4. Upskilling and reskilling

Case study: Attracting and engaging tech talent

3. Accelerate internal mobility

Image captions

Case study: Creating a culture of internal mobility

4. Build a compelling employee value proposition

Case study: Establishing a reputation as a top employer

5. Create a more diverse and inclusive workforce

Image captions

5. Create a more diverse and inclusive workforce

Case study: Building a roadmap for a DEI organization

6. Unleash the power of technology

1. Understand the business problem

2. Identify the best available technology solution

3. Embed the new technology

Case study: Innovating ahead of the competition

7. Improve time, quality and cost of hire

Time to hire

Cost to hire

Quality of hire

Case study: Cutting hiring time in half

Conclusion

Image captions

Representation matters

Image captions

Representation matters

Companies in the top quartile for gender diversity are 25% more likely to have above average profitability

Companies in the top quartile for ethnic diversity are 33% more likely to have above average profitability

But Black and Hispanic early career professionals are 50-70% more likely to be unemployed

Be authentic – performative allyshipdoesn’t work

The US life sciences industry needs to hire
3.4 million people by 2025

The US life sciences industry needs to hire
3.4 million people by 2025

Talent technology is here to stay.
The future is now.

Talent technology is here to stay.
The future is now.

Be authentic – performative allyship
doesn’t work

Be authentic – performative allyship
doesn’t work