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Do You Need to Escape a Professional Reputation “Box”?

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Recently, I was talking with a dear friend who was about to interview a candidate she had unknowingly placed in a professional reputation “box”. The best way to describe this friend is fierce, in charge, and collaborative. And she was adamant about hiring someone who was different from her and could challenge her.

“What do you think?” I asked, “Does Pat have the skills you need?”

“Well, Pat is nice, but I just don’t think this is the person I need,” she replied.

“Why?”

“Well, Pat is more of a B player.”

I pressed further. Finally, she revealed that she doubted Pat’s strategic abilities. I asked for examples, but she didn’t offer anything concrete. Finally, I asked if she felt she might be biased based on her own personality. Suddenly, her face lit up with recognition.

Soon afterward, my friend thanked me for the conversation and said she was ready to approach the interview with a newfound lens. In this case, it was helpful to be sitting next to an executive coach at just the right moment. But that’s not always possible. So here’s some advice you may want to keep in mind…

Professional Reputation “Boxes” Are All Around

How do you know when assumptions about others are limiting your actions? What opportunities is this behavior causing you to miss? Here are several more examples:

  • Harper was introduced to the team’s new manager as the “go-to person” for everything, and Harper strove to live up to that persona. But recently, when stumped by a critical question, Harper made up an answer, rather than asking for help. When it became clear that the answer was wrong, trust was lost. Now, Harper no longer meets the expectations of the boss or colleagues.
  • Tracey is a mid-level executive who feels unsafe saying something in a group because all of Tracey’s comments are disregarded or met with skepticism. Tracey is unsure how this happened, but suddenly feels perceived as ineffective without knowing why.

Inside That “Boxed In” Feeling

In each of these cases, the individual feels trapped by a professional context they can’t seem to escape. It can be debilitating and alienating. Like the famous movie Gaslight, everything they say or do is received within a preconceived mindset: “B-Player”, “untrustworthy”, or “ineffective.”

This can create a sense of helplessness that fuels frustration, anxiety, and depression. At work, it directly influences an individual’s perceived competency, resulting in lower performance scores and fewer professional opportunities. And when left unchecked, it can drive valuable people to resign.

These situations may be extreme, but the themes are universal. At some point in life, we all feel like nothing we say or do can change the way others perceive us. But when perceptions go negative at work, organizations can lose talent that must be replaced, often at a higher cost.

The Roots of a Professional Reputation “Box”

There are many ways a professional reputation can become trapped in a perceptual box. Behavioral research highlights underlying factors. For example:

  • A famous large-scale audit of executives found that once leaders see an employee in a political context or situation, it solidifies their professional “reputation.” After this point, there’s little an individual can do to counteract this perception.
  • “We only see what we want to see” is a well-known cognitive bias. Countless studies have shown that our desires affect our perceptions, regardless of reality. We tend to ignore some facts in favor of others that support our original premise or perceptual bias.

With attitudes and assumptions like these, we put individuals in a difficult loop to maintain — they can either do no wrong, or do nothing right. And once others agree, there’s a groundswell of opinion to undo. The situation seems impossible to remedy.

However, by recognizing and responding to these issues, leaders can help employees change their reputation, and hopefully keep them on board.

How to Break Out of a Reputation Box

If you’re an individual stuck in a reputation box, what should you do? First, get a blank book so you can write about your experiences, feedback, and things you want to change. Acknowledge what you feel and what you know. Then start adjusting aspects of the situation that are within your control. Specifically, you can:

1. Change your point of view: Coach yourself by considering your situation as if you were an outsider. What advice would you give someone in your position?

2. Change your behaviors: Note your feelings and reactions to challenging situations. What are the underlying triggers? Do you see a pattern involving a particular person, context, or environment? When this happens, how do you feel? What is your reaction?

3. Write what you want to say: Keep a book of helpful phrases. After a difficult situation, we often say, “Wow, I wish I had said this instead of that!” Please write it down! What would you have preferred to say and why? This increases self-awareness. It can also prepare you to respond more effectively when similar situations arise in the future.

4. Maintain a curious mindset: Develop questions that can help you learn more when interacting with others. For example, “Tell me more about that.” Or “I’m not sure I follow. Could you help me understand your perspective?” Or “What questions do you have?” Or “What do you think about this approach?”

5. Examine your outlook: If we appear defeated, others will perceive us that way. Instead, stay curious. Ask “why?” more often. Focus on staying open, gathering information, and receiving feedback.

How Organizations Can Get Rid of Boxes

Escaping “the box” isn’t just for individuals who want to manage their reputation. What if you lead a group, department, or organization? How can you fight this common situation within your teams?

1. Recognize bias: Understand that the best way to combat bias is to teach team members about it and call it when you see it. This includes all cognitive bias — halo, horns, perception, and beyond.

2. Give people opportunities to change and grow: Provide options for your employees to be mobile, try new managers, and gain new skills.

3. Actively coach people and share feedback: This seems trite. However, leaders tend to fail at providing constructive feedback when team members need it most. And it’s not just about timing. Feedback quality is paramount. So take care to offer actionable input and recognize that continuous learning is far more powerful than a one-off comment.

4. Embrace data-driven performance management: An MIT Sloan research study on performance management clearly shows that a flexible, data-based development and performance management system decreases backward-looking bias and other undesirable aspects of the performance management process.

A Final Note on Escaping the Reputation Box

These are some easy and effective techniques that can produce quick and positive results. I have personally witnessed a turnaround when coaching people to use these methods. Success depends on resilience and the perseverance to follow through and keep moving forward. But for all the Pats, Traceys, and Harpers out there who feel you can’t escape a negative professional reputation — and to your employers — I encourage you to stay curious and keep thinking outside the box!

How to Create an Inclusive Culture for Veterans at Work

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Recently, one of the soldiers in my reserve unit decided it was time to hang up the uniform and transition to the civilian world. During an “exit counseling” meeting, I asked him about his thought process behind this decision and the reasons he joined a part-time reserve unit after active duty. He responded in a way I believe reflects the thinking of many transitioning soldiers. He was concerned that, without the structure of full-time service, he might not be able to land on his feet.

Fortunately, he didn’t have to wait long for an answer. Only a few months after moving on from active duty, he was applying his passion for graphic design in an organization that welcomes veterans at work.

Reintegration Realities

However, for many former service members, this gear shift isn’t nearly as fluid. It may seem odd that veterans face so many hurdles when seeking meaningful employment. After all, American corporations offer a plethora of opportunities, and civilian organizations generally view veteran culture in a positive light. For example, employers tend to associate military service with premier leadership acumen, dedication to working within a group, superior adaptability, and strong problem-solving skills.

These perceptions are on track. Former service members bring a wealth of skills, dedication, and a deep sense of duty to their corporate roles. Military responsibilities are rich in leadership, teamwork, and problem-solving. But these strengths sometimes get lost in translation during the civilian hiring process. With a more inclusive, accommodating environment for veterans at work, you can more easily recruit and retain candidates from this attractive talent pool. The following ideas can help:

Ways to Welcome Veterans at Work

1. Customize Your Onboarding Process

Recognizing the unique qualities veterans bring to the workforce is important for their success as they reintegrate. Effective employers acknowledge these distinct characteristics and tailor onboarding programs accordingly.

Imagine starting a new job and discovering that your military experience is not only acknowledged, but embraced. That’s the aim of tailored onboarding. You’ll want to show veterans their service is valued. It’s about demonstrating that an individual has a unique role to play within your company, and that role ties into a bigger vision.

  • Frame Your Culture in a Meaningful Way
    For successful onboarding, begin with a clear, complete introduction to your company and its culture. Focus on what’s expected, including organizational values, communication styles, and workplace norms. This kind of orientation equips veterans with the knowledge they need to assimilate more quickly and easily.
  • Fast-Track Assimilation With Relevant Tips
    Don’t forget to address the unique challenges veterans may face during their transition back into civilian life. For example, they will need to learn corporate lingo, adjust to a different chain of command, and understand how to operate effectively within existing teams.
  • Make the Most of Mentoring
    Mentorship within the organization can play a major role here. Pairing veterans with experienced colleagues is a natural way to help them establish valuable relationships while providing a reliable source of guidance during the initial stages of employment.

Bottom line: Effective onboarding isn’t just a gesture. It’s a commitment to help veterans succeed by ensuring they feel valued, clarifying how they contribute to your mission, and equipping them to grow and excel in their new role.

2. Provide Skills Translation and Training

After welcoming a veteran into the fold, your focus should shift to translating their military skills into the context of their civilian job. This critical process acknowledges a veteran’s unique talents and nurtures their abilities, so they integrate more seamlessly into the organization as a whole.

Veterans often possess years of experience in leadership, teamwork, and problem-solving in a military context, but these skills don’t always seem directly aligned with their civilian roles. Cultivating a work environment that allows these potential skills to shine can be a game changer.

  • Identify Transferable Skills
    Employers can bridge this gap by helping veterans understand how their expertise aligns with civilian job requirements, especially as it relates to organizational and leadership skills. Many military occupational specialties (MOSs) don’t transfer one-to-one with corporate skill sets. Identifying transferable skills in creative ways can boost a veteran’s work ethic while addressing your company’s specific needs.
  • Invest in Developing New Skills
    Upskilling opportunities also play a vital role in this process. Veterans bring a wealth of skills to the table, but their military experience teaches them there’s always room for further growth and improvement. By offering relevant training and development paths, you can ensure that vets remain confident about their professional capabilities and stay up-to-date with industry standards and practices.

At the same time, it’s crucial to recognize and leverage veterans’ unique abilities. Attributes such as leadership, teamwork, adaptability, and a strong work ethic are ingrained in their DNA. By acknowledging these strengths, you can honor veterans’ service while harnessing their potential to add value to your team.

3. Offer a Flexible Work Environment

People from all walks of life appreciate a flexible work environment. However, for people juggling multiple aspects of life as they transition from active service, the freedom to work without rigid clock-in/clock-out times is especially important. Employers can help in multiple ways. For instance:

  • Offer Self-Directed Scheduling
    Veterans often need to adjust their work schedule so they can accommodate medical, financial, and other crucial appointments. Also, participating in extracurricular lifestyle activities is essential. For example, veterans benefit from joining group workouts, taking time to re-establish bonds with family members, and engaging in other practices that support mental health. By accommodating these needs, you make it possible for veterans to take care of themselves without stress or conflict. At the same time, this demonstrates that employee health and wellbeing matter to you.
  • Provide Access to Helpful Resources
    Along the same lines, paying for fitness class memberships, health advisor services or a life coach builds yet another layer of resiliency and goes well beyond token gestures of care. Taking advantage of these lifestyle resources helps relieve a variety of mental health concerns, not just for veterans, but for your entire organization.
  • Encourage Work-Life Integration
    A flexible work environment naturally promotes work-life balance, which is a crucial factor in successful reintegration. Giving veterans the freedom to manage their personal responsibilities in tandem with work-related duties empowers them to be fully engaged and present during their working hours. Trusting them to do the right thing without an overbearing management culture enhances job satisfaction and productivity. This benefits your organization, as well.

Keep in mind that work flexibility for veterans isn’t just about convenience. It’s also a meaningful way to acknowledge individual needs and responsibilities outside of work. Offering a supportive atmosphere where individuals can flourish both professionally and personally is a powerful way to demonstrate your commitment to every team member.

A Final Note on Supporting Veterans at Work

Ultimately, ensuring that veterans transition successfully into civilian work life is a collective effort. It challenges employers to take a genuine, proactive interest in employee wellbeing. Those with successful veteran-centered programs are tapping into a highly talented pool of people with demonstrated skills, commitment, and work ethic.

In return, this creates an environment where veterans feel comfortable sharing their competencies, ideas, and lessons learned from their military experience. By developing supportive communities, offering a broader vision for growth, and providing a strong mission focus, supportive employers can leverage veteran talent to build a more diverse, skilled, resilient, and innovative workforce.

Building Workplace Trust With Background Checks

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Sponsored by Veremark

Trust. We all know it’s essential for a healthy, productive company culture. But as an HR or business leader, what steps are you taking right now to bolster workplace trust?

If you’ve been focused on other priorities, it’s time to take another look at what’s happening with trust among your ranks. Here’s why…

The State of Workplace Trust

Reliable sources tell us why trust deserves our attention:

  • According to Deloitte, when people trust their employer, they’re 260% more motivated to work and are 50% less likely to look for another job.
  • Gallup says employees who trust their managers are more likely to be satisfied, engaged, and productive at work. Yet only 21% of U.S. employees strongly trust their company’s leaders.

Managing trust requires finesse. And employees want leadership to play an active role — especially in these uncertain times. That’s why we’re looking closer at one way you can elevate workplace trust on today’s #WorkTrends podcast…

Meet Our Guest: Daniel Callaghan

Daniel Callaghan is the CEO of Veremark, an international background screening and pre-hire check service he founded in 2019 as an alternative to the weak solutions available at that time. Veremark is designed to give companies peace of mind and complete confidence when reviewing prospective candidates’ credentials or rescreening existing employees.

Here are highlights from our conversation…

3 Keys to Workplace Trust

Welcome, Daniel. You often talk about the 3 pillars of trust. Would you explain this concept?

Sure. Obviously, with the rise of virtual and hybrid work, the nature of employment is changing. It’s becoming more transactional, with shorter tenures. At the same time, cynicism is growing between employers and employees. So it’s increasingly important to build trust.

The first pillar of workplace trust is about getting the right people on your team.

The second is ensuring that everyone is acting ethically and with integrity. Trust isn’t one-sided. Both the company and employees need to be accountable.

And third, both parties need to know this relationship is reciprocal and valued for the long-run.

Research shows significant business benefits from trust. For example, employers that leverage these pillars see triple-digit productivity gains compared with low-trust companies.

How Employers Develop Trust

So what does it take to create a culture of trust?

Nothing happens overnight. But as you build on the framework we’ve outlined, it helps to look at how technology can facilitate trusted relationships.

For example, with the first pillar, background screening is important to ensure the right people are on your team. And a platform like ours can drive really impactful results.

Linking Background Checks With Workplace Trust

Could you tell us more about successful background screening works?

Credential verification is more than checking someone’s college grades. It’s about establishing a level of credibility and integrity, so you’re confident that a person is a safe workplace colleague and will add value to your culture.

First, start with the right objectives. You’ll want a positive mindset about why you’re introducing this process. It should be appropriate for your industry and roles.

For example, broader checks aren’t necessary for a low-risk business with low access to cash, and where someone is working from home. But for a financial services company that’s hiring lots of senior financial executives, you’ll want a more rigorous program that goes far beyond just ID, criminal, and credit checks on a domestic or global scale.

Second, choose a partner carefully. An outsourced provider ensures you’re not exposed to claims of discrimination, or misuse of data, or asking the wrong question in the wrong location. Domain experts with governance and compliance controls can avoid costly missteps.

Finally, you’ll want to do this with care. Job hunting is stressful for candidates and background screening is a necessary inconvenience. So make sure it’s as easy and transparent as possible. People should know where they are as they move through the process.

How Tech Improves Efficiency

You offer an innovative way to streamline verification, right? Tell us about that…

We know background screening is inconvenient for employers and candidates, alike. So why should you pay legacy services to recheck information that doesn’t change, such as your academic history?

We don’t think that’s fair. So we made it possible to turn verified data into digital credentials that candidates can use as a “career passport” to share with others in the future…

 

Learn More About Building Trust at Work

Find out how a more effective hiring process can strengthen your organization…
>> Get Veremark’s new ebook and claim your 10 FREE background checks now!

 

Listen to This Full #WorkTrends Episode

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The Business Value of Recruitment Process Automation

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Automation is a red-hot topic in business circles, and HR is no exception. For instance, to compete in today’s challenging labor market, many employers are looking for new ways to streamline and improve talent acquisition. As a result, recruitment process automation is rapidly changing how recruiters connect with candidates. But what does this mean for the human side of hiring?

Successful employers know that a personal touch is integral to a positive candidate experience. This is why they don’t want automation to replace recruitment staff. Instead, they prefer technology that works side-by-side with recruiters.

What makes this approach so effective? Let’s look closer by exploring these topics:

  • Why Candidate Experience Matters
  • How Recruitment Process Automation Enhances Candidate Experience
  • Implementation Best Practices
  • Features to Look for in Recruitment Automation Software

Why Candidate Experience Matters

With qualified talent still in short supply, employers can’t afford to overlook how they treat potential employees during the hiring process. Why? Nearly 4 in 5 job applicants believe overall candidate experience indicates how deeply an organization values its people. A stellar experience can help your company can benefit in multiple ways by:

1. Elevating Your Employer Brand

Employer brand plays a vital role in the hiring process. In fact, 82% of job seekers consider an employer’s brand and reputation before submitting an application. A positive candidate experience can significantly enhance your brand. Conversely, a negative experience is likely to tarnish your image and send fewer candidates in your direction.

2. Attracting and Retaining High-Quality Talent

A solid applicant experience can be instrumental in attracting and retaining top-tier talent. When prospective employees experience a positive recruitment process, they’re more likely to accept a job offer and stay on board longer. This decreases staff turnover and reduces overall hiring costs.

3. Creating a Competitive Advantage

Think of candidate experience as a differentiator that sets you apart from competitors. When applicants are considering multiple job offers, a positive experience can be the factor that helps them choose you. On the other hand, if their experience with you is negative, they’re more likely to choose another employer, no matter how attractive your offer may be.

4. Boosting Brand Advocacy

Most importantly, a positive hiring experience lays the groundwork for stronger long-term relationships. Even if a candidate doesn’t land an open position, they’re more likely to apply for future positions with your company and refer others to you down the road. What’s more, satisfied candidates are more likely to become brand ambassadors, spreading positive word-of-mouth that can lead to new business opportunities.

5 Ways Recruitment Process Automation Enhances Candidate Experience

At its core, recruitment automation streamlines and automates manual processes that are repetitive, time-consuming, and prone to human error. This includes steps involved with candidate sourcing, job description optimization, resume parsing, interview scheduling, applicant tracking, hiring logistics, employee onboarding, and more. For example, automation can help you:

1. Drive Ongoing Communication

Automation facilitates continuous communication with applicants, which is crucial for engagement and transparency. Features such as automated email notifications and updates can provide candidates with timely information about their application status and progress. Also, with interactive AI-powered chatbots, recruiters can offer real-time assistance and immediately answer applicant questions for a more responsive and supportive candidate experience.

2. Customize Interactions

Automation might sound like a robotic “one-size-fits-all” concept. But you may be surprised at how simple it can be to personalize communication through every stage of an applicant’s journey. Recruitment platforms make it easy to customize email templates and personalize each message, so you can keep in touch, even when applicant volumes surge. You can also generate dynamic assessments and evaluations based on each applicant’s unique profile.

3. Streamline Interview Scheduling

An automated applicant tracking system can simplify interview scheduling, reducing logistical headaches for both recruiters and candidates. For instance, you can implement self-service scheduling tools and AI-driven systems to sync dynamically with recruiters’ calendars. This enables candidates to choose interview slots that fit their availability.

4. Manage Candidate Feedback

Automation also makes it easier to collect useful feedback. By distributing automated surveys — along with reminders and follow-up notices — you can gather, organize, and analyze relevant data about any aspect of your recruitment process. This provides valuable insights you can use to continuously improve the applicant experience.

Best Practices For Implementing Recruitment Process Automation

1. Understand Your Organization’s Needs

Before automating various stages of recruitment, it is crucial to assess your organization’s unique goals and requirements. Start by investigating issues with your recruiting process to pinpoint top priorities. Then document the objectives you want to achieve through automation.

This can help guide your decisions on which tools to adopt, how to use them, and where to focus your efforts for the biggest impact. It can also jumpstart discovery discussions with software vendors.

2. Select the Right Automation Technology

A plethora of talent acquisition software is available, with each platform offering its own unique capabilities. Your choice should align with your organization’s needs, budget, and long-term goals. In addition to core recruitment automation software, you may find it useful to leverage complementary tools, such as:

  • AI-powered chatbots
  • Automated text messaging technology
  • Candidate pre-screening tools
  • One-way video interviewing platforms

When choosing software, focus on factors such as cost-effectiveness, user-friendliness, support and maintenance, alignment with your existing process, and flexibility to adapt and scale with your organization’s needs over time. In-depth demos, hands-on trials, and pilot programs are all viable ways to gauge how well a tool fits your needs.

3. Integrate Automation With Your Workflow

When you invest in new recruitment tools, you’ll want to make the most of their capabilities. This means you’ll want to integrate the software into your existing recruitment process and HR ecosystem. The goal is to streamline and simplify your workflow, not complicate it.

Remember that automation should enhance your current process, not replace vital human interaction, analysis, and decision-making. Also, to avoid disruptions and maintain a cohesive workflow, look for tools that easily integrate with your existing software and systems.

4. Emphasize Training and Upskilling

User adoption is the key to software success. Even the most user-friendly platform relies on training to maximize its potential. This means every team member should understand how the platform can enhance their daily work activities and how to use relevant features effectively.

Investing in training and upskilling accelerates adoption, which in turn leads to more frequent and efficient use of the platform. Ultimately, this increases ROI.

5. Evaluate and Optimize Continuously

Automation is not a set-it-and-forget-it solution. For best results, you’ll want to evaluate your automated processes on an ongoing basis. Use the data and feedback from your automation tools to understand what’s working and what needs refining. This includes identifying areas for improvement, adapting to changing technology, and ensuring an optimal candidate experience as your organization changes over time.

Features to Look for in Recruitment Automation Software

How does innovative software like Recruit CRM use the power of automation to manage the complex dynamics of recruitment? Look for features like these:

1. Automated Candidate Communication

Does the platform make it easy for recruiters to schedule periodic email messages and updates to ensure that candidates are informed at each step in their journey? This kind of proactive communication fosters candidate engagement and trust, setting the stage for a positive recruitment experience. In addition, look for capabilities that streamline client communication. You’ll want to keep everyone in sync throughout the hiring process.

2. AI-Powered Candidate Matching

The best solutions available today are integrated with resume parsers. This significantly improves the candidate matching and screening process. For example, Recruit CRM integrates AI technology with Sovren resume parsing software to automatically analyze each applicant’s profile, skills, and experiences. This makes it much faster to identify the ideal fit for each role. What’s more, with OpenAI integration, key insights from interviews and interactions are captured accurately. This further streamlines the hiring process and enriches the candidate experience.

3. Privacy Assurance

Personal privacy is a top priority for applicants as well as employers. To ensure strong data integrity, insist on automation software that is GDPR compliant. This can help you build trust with candidates by ensuring their data is secure and transparent. It also safeguards your firm from potential legal challenges.

A Final Note

Recruitment process automation is not just about streamlining operations. It’s also about making the candidate experience a more productive, rewarding journey for both recruiters and applicants.

As organizations continue to invest in digital solutions, this is an ideal time to embrace recruitment automation. Smart choices can elevate your brand by helping recruiters do a better job of attracting, engaging, and supporting potential talent.

How to Overcome Top HR Challenges in Tech Startups

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Human resources can be a highly rewarding profession, especially at technology startup companies. In fact, recent research says effective human resources management actually helps drive innovation — and tech companies are all about innovation! Nevertheless, HR challenges can be tough to manage. So, what can you do to help your company deal with difficult HR issues? Let’s take a closer look…

8 HR Challenges Tech Startups Often Face (And How to Overcome Them)

1. Attracting and Retaining Top Talent

The ability to hire qualified people and keep them onboard is vital for every company, particularly in the technology world. But this is no easy task. Because tech hiring is extremely competitive and time is of the essence in a startup, employers must always be on the hunt for the best and brightest.

To build a strong talent pool, you need to be proactive. Job postings on job sites or social media are not enough. You can’t afford to wait for candidates to come to you. Go out and find people with the skills you need.

Applicants with qualifications like a graduate degree in engineering can help your company grow. To find them, focus on target-rich environments. For example:

  • Campus recruiting at a technical college is a good place to start.
  • Outreach among tech conference attendees can build brand awareness and establish valuable relationships.
  • Offering referral incentives to existing employees can leverage your team’s professional networks.

2. Managing Rapid Growth

Startups are unique because, from day one, you must rapidly scale and expand. This is necessary to make your presence known and gain traction in a fluid, highly competitive industry.

However, the pressure on employees is relentless, and HR teams feel the strain. For example, the continuous drive to grow often leads startups to rush the recruitment process. This can test the limits of even the most seasoned human resources professionals, 98% of whom say they’re feeling burned out.

To remain efficient in a fast-paced environment, outsource extra recruiters to help scale and support your workforce. This interim strategy can be highly successful, as long as your recruiting partners are competent and committed. Also, be sure their values align with your company culture, so you can rely on them to represent your brand effectively.

3. Building an Employer Brand

Establishing and defining your employer brand can be one of the biggest HR challenges for any startup. Because you’re unknown in the marketplace, the race is on to make your brand visible and engaging. Your mission is to appeal to the right talent by differentiating your company in ways that clarify your vision, values, and culture.

The Forbes Human Resources Council says your best brand ambassadors are your staff members. This is particularly true for tech startups. A personal, employee-driven strategy is a compelling way to set your brand apart from larger, more established tech giants.

Call a brand launch meeting to help employees get involved in making your company brand more widely known. Establish an internal team dedicated to employer brand advocacy. They can generate ideas and develop content for your website and social media pages. Also, incorporate staff in ongoing marketing and recruiting videos. Include their anecdotes on your website. The possibilities are limited only by your team’s time, budget, and imagination.

4. Navigating Legal and Compliance Issues

The tech industry’s legal landscape is highly complex. Data privacy and intellectual property rights are only two issues that complicate the already massive task of starting a company that complies with government laws and industry standards. To be a viable competitor in the tech industry, no startup can ignore these requirements.

But tech-related laws are not the only regulations. For example, one of the central HR challenges in any startup is to ensure ongoing compliance with labor laws. Do you have effective policies and procedures in place for this and other people-related issues that arise?

For example, are you prepared to manage discrimination and harassment charges against your organization? High-profile companies like Google and Facebook have come under fire for gender discrimination. Even as a small company, you’ll need to communicate expectations for employee conduct and put a disciplinary framework in place. This protects your team members, as well as your company.

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is a great resource for a framework that can help you handle discrimination complaints.

5. Creating an Inclusive, Diverse Workforce

Despite great strides in creating a more inclusive society, many companies still struggle to foster workforce diversity and inclusion. This remains a serious challenge for HR in the tech industry. For example, female representation in key roles continues to lag across the STEM spectrum.

The advantage of a startup is that you don’t have to overhaul existing processes that are archaic and outdated. Instead, from the beginning, develop targeted recruitment campaigns that appeal to a wider pool of talent. And adjust interview procedures so they are sensitive to gender and culture differences. Harvard Business School recommends explicitly stating your commitment to inclusion in job descriptions and removing gendered language from interview questions.

We’ve found that a gender-inclusive workforce brings many benefits to the table, including stronger so-called soft skills like communication, adaptability, problem-solving, and empathy. These skills can be invaluable to tech start-ups that rely on collaboration to innovate. As Marta Jasinska, Chief Technology Officer at Bloom & Wild says, “It’s really hard to scale something if you build it on your own.”

6. Managing Distributed Teams

In the aftermath of the pandemic, remote and hybrid work models are increasingly common. This can cause HR challenges involving communication and collaboration.

The tech industry is not immune to these issues, but we’re often better equipped to handle them. In a remote environment, teamwork and communication rely heavily on technology. And many tech teams are already familiar with software that makes distributed team collaboration possible.

But strong communication tools are only part of the equation. What makes or breaks remote work are the processes and social bonds that help team members work productively together. The challenge for HR is to help remote workers feel heard, included, and connected with broader goals, no matter where or when they are working.

You can make this happen by encouraging regular social interactions and team-building activities. For example, establish online chat channels designed exclusively for team members to share personal news and support. This helps remote workers feel like a part of the team, rather than isolated individual contributors.

7. Supporting Work-Life Integration

In addition to recruitment and payroll, HR is also tasked with performance management. This can be tricky in tech startups, where people are often expected to go above and beyond.

However, remote work options are common in the tech sector. Fortunately, remote work tends to support a healthier work-life balance, which in turn, leads to better performance. But how can HR encourage better work-life integration?

This can be particularly challenging at a tech startup. In a company’s early stages, the pressure to succeed is tremendous. Intense entrepreneurial focus and drive are essential. But long work hours and a high-pressure environment can easily become overwhelming.

HR plays a key role in helping employees avoid burnout. Introduce more work model choices: flexible hours, a hybrid of remote and in-office work. Provide regular opportunities for people to unwind and casually interact. Offer wellness activities as ongoing programs and as performance rewards. And provide mental health support so everyone knows they can manage stress privately with the help of a coach or counselor.

8. Developing and Retaining Leadership Talent

Strong leadership is the key to any successful startup. But one person can’t do it all indefinitely. When should a founder start expanding the leadership team?

Look for missed deadlines. These go hand in hand with missed opportunities. Also, when the stress of scaling a business leads to a drop in your quality of work, it’s time to add leadership bench strength.

This is one of the most critical HR challenges in any startup. You’ll need to spot signs of managerial weakness and counsel the founder when the time is right to find additional executive expertise.

Then it’s up to you to identify, recruit, and select leaders for critical management roles like operations and finance and customer experience leaders. Some candidates may emerge internally as they prove themselves in existing roles. In a startup, it can be easier to pinpoint internal candidates with high potential. Other senior roles are likely to be more difficult to fill, so they may require creative sourcing.

A McKinsey analysis says few founders do what’s necessary to reinvent their organization as they move from development to launch, and then into high-growth mode. Once the pressure of bringing a product or service to market passes, it’s vital to invest in developing and supporting other potential leaders from within. This builds a talent pipeline that can step up when a founder is ready to hand off responsibilities. Ultimately, this makes growing a business much easier.

The best way to do this is by delegating specific assignments to new talent while maintaining structure in senior roles. However, this balance continuously shifts as a company scales. You can act as a mediator, adjusting organizational design to minimize the chaos of too little structure while avoiding the bureaucracy of too much.

A Final Note on HR Challenges in Tech Startups

The tech environment is extraordinarily competitive, and recruiting the best talent can be daunting. But hiring for open positions isn’t the only priority. Tech startups face multiple complex HR challenges.

When navigating these various demands, it’s important to balance the needs of the company with the needs of your staff. Sometimes, you may be the only advocate for staff wellbeing, inclusion, or development. Be prepared.

Also, it may be tempting to react to immediate problems each day. Startup teams do that. But while you’re fighting fires, don’t forget to keep the long game in mind.

8 Ways Companies Are Becoming More Inclusive This Year

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Is your organization striving to create a more inclusive work culture? If so, you’re not alone. Many HR and business leaders are committed to improving diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). But some strategies are more successful than others. What methods are actually moving the meter these days?

To understand what works in the real world, we asked eight business executives to tell us about effective DEI changes they’ve implemented during the past year. Their collective answers read like a best practices playbook:

  • Improve Meeting Policies to Support Wellbeing
  • Review and Revise Job Offers
  • Establish Employee Resource Groups
  • Share Diverse Employee Experiences
  • Shift Pay Structure to Base Salary and Bonus
  • Introduce Mental Health First-Aid Support
  • Prioritize Leadership Paths for Women
  • Intentionally Redesign Teams for Diversity

For details about these ideas, read the responses below…

How to Become More Inclusive: 8 Examples

1. Improve Meeting Policies to Support Wellbeing

As part of our commitment to workforce wellness, we addressed recent employee feedback about excessive meetings and pandemic-related burnout. Specifically, we emphasized the importance of taking small actions to reduce meeting frequency and duration, so we could ease stress for everyone. For example:

  • We send regular calendar blocks so everyone can conduct brief “meeting audits.” This is when employees use our Meeting Decision Tree tool to review upcoming meetings and determine the necessity.
  • We’ve recommitted to scheduling meetings only within core business hours (9:00 am – 4:00 pm) to promote reasonable work-life balance and family time in the evenings.
  • We’ve designated Friday afternoons as meeting-free time. This enables people to focus on creative assignments, catch up on projects, and prepare for the week ahead.

Our new practices and resources are improving wellbeing. They’re also facilitating better collaboration, problem-solving, productivity, and innovation.

Natasha Miller Williams, VP, Head of Diversity and Inclusion, Ferrara

2. Review and Revise Job Listings

During the past year, we have intentionally revisited the way we write job ads. We’ve always made sure our offers are inviting, clear, concise, and accurate. However, we felt it was time to address other details so we could hopefully increase diversity among candidates.

The results are visible to the naked eye. Now, I am super happy to look at our diverse teams, knowing that our attention to rephrasing may have made it easier for people to join us.

These were our priorities when reviewing and improving job listings:

  1. We used truly gender-neutral language.
  2. We highlighted the importance of skills, so it’s clear that this is the decisive factor in our hiring decisions.
  3. We listed job requirements only if they were absolutely necessary. You never know if needless demands are unintentionally excluding people.
  4. Finally, we reviewed job titles and descriptions to ensure that they are truly inclusive and free of biased language.

Piotrek Sosnowski, Chief People and Culture Officer, Life And My Finances

3. Establish Employee Resource Groups

Our organization has been attempting to improve inclusivity by enhancing our approach to diversity and inclusion training. For example, we have created employee resource groups (ERGs) to provide a safe space for employees based on their identity or shared experiences. 

These ERGs serve as proactive networks that help members build communities, collaborate professionally, and work together on initiatives that promote inclusivity across the organization. They also help our organization understand uncommon experiences and points of view, while ensuring that everyone is respected at all times.

Michael Alexis, CEO, teambuilding.com

4. Share Diverse Employee Experiences

For any organization that wants to build a more welcoming culture where everyone feels they belong, raising awareness about inclusivity is vital. However, it’s not always easy to understand the difficulties that other people face — especially when those difficulties aren’t highly visible. 

This is why we’ve been providing opportunities for employees from across the organization to share their unique stories. Specifically, we invite everyone to discuss the unique difficulties they face, along with advice on how peers and managers can be more helpful. They also answer questions from others in the organization.

By sharing employee experiences, we’re spreading empathy across our organization. This helps team members build stronger bonds and creates a more positive, inclusive work environment.

Max Wesman, Chief Operating Officer, GoodHire

5. Shift Pay Structure to Base Salary and Bonus

Although our industry traditionally pays employees on a commission-only basis, we’ve adopted a compensation package that includes base salary plus a performance bonus. This gives employees better financial security and peace of mind. Also, we feel it helps ensure our clients receive the best impartial advice from every agent.

What’s more, this move promotes more inclusivity. That’s because sponsorship and mentorship are integral aspects of mobility for people of color and other underrepresented employees. But commission-only pay can derail vital team relationships and breed a culture of competition that further divides people.

We encourage our people to collaborate in establishing performance metrics that will promote better team cohesion and move us collectively toward our DEIB goals.

Anthony Martin, Founder and CEO, Choice Mutual

6. Introduce Mental Health First-Aid Support

During the last year, our organization has focused heavily on promoting employee mental health. In particular, we’ve focused on making our workplace safe for people with any kind of neurological difference, such as ADHD, dyslexia, or autism.

As part of this effort, two of our staff members completed mental health first aid training. Now, people across our organization know that if they’re struggling, they have somewhere to go where they will be heard and supported but not judged.

This effort has been very well received. In fact, it’s been so successful, we’ve recently trained two more mental health first-aiders.

Matthew Stibbe, CEO, Articulate Marketing

7. Prioritize Leadership Paths for Women

People expect modern organizations to provide an inclusive work environment. And this responsibility for creating a welcoming work environment for all falls on the management team. This is why we’ve essentially created a women in leadership program designed to help women from all backgrounds achieve their professional aspirations.

Unfortunately, many businesses don’t promote single mothers into leadership. That’s because they assume women won’t have the time or commitment to succeed. But in my experience,  these women tend to be more driven than average.

Long ago, I started my company as a single mother. I understand firsthand just how hard it can be to juggle personal and professional life. But I also know how committed women in this situation are to keeping their promises to customers, employees and family members.

Our organization wants to reward this kind of commitment. That’s why we assist women of all ethnicities and backgrounds as they work towards a degree or a leadership position in our company. We want to help women in our company shoot for the stars and reach them.

Kathy Bennett, CEO and Founder, Bennett Packaging

8. Intentionally Redesign Teams for Diversity

We recognize the value of diverse perspectives and experiences in driving innovation and fostering a more inclusive work environment. So, one action we’ve taken this year to enhance diversity involves remixing our teams.

Specifically, we deliberately redefined the composition of teams across departments and projects. Our goal was to better represent the diversity of our workforce within smaller groups. Therefore, when reassigning team members, we considered factors such as gender, ethnicity, age, and skill sets.

By intentionally rethinking the composition of our teams, we’ve aimed to break down silos, encourage collaboration, and promote the cross-pollination of ideas. By bringing together individuals with different perspectives, expertise, and life experiences, we hope we’re better positioned to harness the collective intelligence and creativity of our workforce.

Kimberley Tyler-Smith, VP of Strategy and Growth, Resume Worded

What’s the Real Cost of DEI?

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In today’s diverse, dynamic work world, employers increasingly recognize the transformative power of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Still, concerns often arise about the cost of DEI initiatives. The best answers consider benefits as well as costs. In other words, if you want to build a compelling case, focus on business value. But what exactly does that look like?

To make sense of it all, let’s dig deeper into DEI’s true value. This article sheds light on the remarkable return on investment you can achieve with a wholehearted commitment to DEI.

The Benefits of DEI

Consultants at McKinsey have conducted extensive research on the impact of gender and ethnic diversity on financial performance. They found that companies with diverse executive teams are 25% more likely to experience above-average profitability. This finding demonstrates a clear link between DEI and financial success.

Another example underscores the impact of diversity on customer experience. Salesforce, a leading customer relationship management platform company, is known for its strong commitment to DEI. But this didn’t happen by accident. In 2020, Salesforce revamped its talent acquisition strategy and training programs to reduce bias and expand minority employment opportunities.

Within a year, the company more than doubled its hiring rate among marginalized communities. In addition, internal research revealed that employees from these diverse groups became more engaged and contributed to higher customer satisfaction ratings.

How much should your organization invest to become more ethical and profitable? Let’s explore….

The Cost of DEI

Diversity budgets come in all shapes and sizes. They range from a modest $10,000 to a mind-boggling $216 million. But the sweet spot lies at a median budget of $1.2 million. 

When allocating funds to increase workforce diversity, you can prioritize specific business activities (training programs, recruitment, recognition) or functions (HR, Marketing, Community Relations). 

For smaller organizations with fewer than 1,000 employees, it is feasible to initiate DEI efforts by assigning specific responsibilities to existing staff members. For example, you could allocate about 50% of an existing employee’s role (such as an HR project manager), to oversight of DEI initiatives. This makes it possible to integrate DEI responsibilities into your workflows without creating a dedicated role or team.

However, in larger organizations, it’s crucial to establish clear ownership of DEI with a dedicated role or team. This ensures that DEI efforts receive the necessary focus and resources to drive meaningful change.

At the average Fortune 1000 company — with a workforce of 34,000 people and revenue of $15 billion — the DEI budget is significantly larger than other companies require. For a smaller organization — with 2,ooo-10,000 employees — a reasonable estimated budget for establishing a DEI program is likely to range from $50,000 to $300,000.

But no matter what your company size or DEI budget, the key is to spend that budget effectively. How should you allocate available funds? Let’s look closer…

Structuring a DEI Budget

The range of DEI expenses varies, depending on numerous factors, such as an organization’s size, industry, geographic location, and scope of DEI initiatives. It’s important to note that there is no fixed or universal standard for DEI budgeting. Each firm faces unique financial realities and priorities.

Now, let’s break down ways to distribute your budget across key areas:

1. Personnel Expenses

This includes any costs associated with hiring and maintaining a dedicated diversity and inclusion team. It may include salaries and benefits for DEI professionals to develop your strategy, implement initiatives, offer guidance, and provide support.

2. Training and Education

This covers expenses for design, development, and delivery of diversity and inclusion training programs, workshops, and seminars. It can include the cost of external trainers, development of training materials, e-learning platforms, or subscription fees for diversity and inclusion training resources. Investment in engaging, transformative training programs varies widely, from $30,000-$150,000.

3. Recruitment and Branding

To promote diversity and inclusion, budgeting for recruitment and hiring initiatives is essential. This may include expenses for advertising on diverse job boards, attending job fairs that target underrepresented groups, engaging with recruitment agencies that specialize in diverse talent, or implementing software and tools that help reduce bias in the hiring process. Companies usually set aside $10,000-$30,000 for DEI-focused recruiting and branding initiatives.

4. Employee Resource Groups 

Employee resource groups can foster a sense of belonging and provide a platform for underrepresented employees. But you’ll need a budget to establish and sustain these groups. This can include funding for ERG events, activities, resources, and initiatives that promote DEI within your organization. Employers often allocate $10,000-$30,000 for this line item.

5. Policy Development and Implementation

This ensures that your organization’s policies align with DEI principles. It may involve expenses for external experts, legal consults, or HR DEI specialists to review, update, and create relevant policies. However, you can manage this process without extra expenses. These tips can help:

  • Review your existing policies and practices to identify potential biases or barriers. 
  • Make necessary adjustments to ensure inclusivity across various functions and responsibilities, such as hiring, promotion, and performance evaluation. 
  • Encourage transparency and accountability in decision-making to prevent bias and discrimination.

6. Data Collection and Analysis

Investing in data collection and analysis tools enables organizations to track DEI progress effectively. Budgeting for these resources may include expenses related to software, surveys, and data analysis tools. It may also include the cost of consultants to conduct audits and assessments.

7. Community Partnerships

To build external relationships and demonstrate a commitment to DEI beyond the workplace, employers often allocate a portion of their budget to community engagement and partnership programs. These are common steps:

  • Look for external organizations or community groups that align with your DEI goals.
  • Consider how these efforts can open doors for additional expertise, resources, and networking opportunities.
  • Collaborate with appropriate groups to define joint initiatives, such as workshops, panel discussions, or mentoring programs. 

A budget of $5,000-$50,000 can help drive effective partnerships or sponsorships.

8. Ongoing Evaluation and Measurement

Budgeting for ongoing evaluation and measurement is crucial because it ensures that you can determine the impact of DEI initiatives. This may include funds to conduct surveys, audits, or focus groups. It may also include the cost of hiring external consultants to evaluate your company’s progress.

Meanwhile, you can save money on evaluation activities by regularly measuring DEI ROI.

The ROI of DEI

To showcase the value of your DEI efforts, you’ll want to estimate ROI. Follow these steps:

1. Identify Measurable Objectives

Start by defining clear objectives for your DEI initiatives. These objectives should align with your organization’s overall goals and values. For example, you may aim to increase employee retention, enhance innovation through diverse perspectives, or improve customer satisfaction and loyalty.

2. Determine KPIs

Select specific key performance indicators (KPIs) that align with your objectives. These metrics should be quantifiable and trackable over time. For instance, you could measure employee satisfaction and engagement, diversity representation at various levels of the organization, or customer feedback related to diversity and inclusion.

3. Establish a Baseline

Before implementing DEI initiatives, establish a baseline measurement for each selected KPI. This provides a starting point, so you can measure subsequent progress. The easiest way to do this is to gather and analyze available data from existing HR and business systems and programs. You may also want to collect and analyze relevant data by conducting preliminary surveys, assessments and interviews.

4. Track Progress and Impact

As you implement DEI initiatives, regularly monitor and track the selected KPIs. They may include minority hiring rates, promotion rates, turnover rates, employee satisfaction scores, customer satisfaction scores, or other relevant metrics. As you measure change in each metric over time, you can follow your organization’s overall DEI progress. This trend analysis will also help you quickly identify unexpected issues that should be researched and resolved. 

5. Assign Monetary Value

By assigning a value to improvements in selected KPIs, you’re taking a vital step forward in justifying the cost of DEI initiatives. This step can be challenging, but it will help you demonstrate the tangible benefits of your efforts. For example, you could estimate the cost savings associated with reduced turnover, or the potential increase in revenue resulting from improved customer satisfaction and loyalty.

6. Compare Investments and Returns

Next, estimate ROI by comparing tangible DEI costs (financial resources, time, and effort) with the monetary value you’ve assigned to improvements you’ve observed. In other words, subtract actual costs from tangible benefits. Ideally, the result of this calculation will be a positive value (benefits – costs = net benefit).

7. Consider Qualitative Impacts

While ROI calculations often focus on quantifiable metrics, it’s also vital to consider qualitative outcomes. In other words, for some business endeavors, the overall positive impact can far exceed the result of a straight cost/benefit equation. Look beyond the numbers to consider the importance of qualitative benefits such as a more vibrant work culture, improved employee morale, enhanced brand reputation, and stronger relationships with diverse communities. Goodwill may be intangible, but it is a powerful business asset.

A Final Note on the Cost of DEI

Some companies have struggled to demonstrate the value of their DEI initiatives. However, with thoughtful planning and an ongoing commitment, it is possible to develop an effective working budget and successfully demonstrate ROI.

Although the upfront cost of DEI initiatives may seem steep, organizations can experience tangible benefits in the long run. But the true value of diversity, equity, and inclusion actually goes beyond financial success. DEI has the potential to elevate your work culture, customer relationships, and brand position in ways that can transform your organization for the better.

Hiring Outsourced Labor? Here’s How to Maximize ROI

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In a world filled with uncertainty, one thing is certain. “Business as usual” is no longer a realistic strategy. So, during unusual times like this, is it wise for companies to continue hiring? Many employers say yes. But others are turning to creative alternatives like outsourced labor. Here’s why:

Despite lower inflation and a temporary pause in lending rate hikes, the U.S. economy remains shaky. Some experts still say a recession is likely. Yet even though job growth has recently gained some steam, layoffs continue to spook employees — especially in the tech sector. And who can blame them? After all, technology companies have laid off nearly 211,000 people this year. At the same time, the number of open tech jobs has plunged from a high of 477,000 last August to only 168,000 this month. Chilling.

Even so, employers continue to grapple with the country’s ongoing labor shortage. In May, the unemployment rate remained low at 3.7% (about 6 million people), while job openings inched up to 10.1 million. In other words, many more jobs are available than today’s unemployed Americans can fill.

All these variables are making workforce planning especially difficult. So, rather than debating whether to downsize or expand your workforce — why not consider doing both? This strategy may seem counterintuitive. But it actually lets you retain valued employees while hiring talented candidates who want more work stability.

Of course, for this to succeed, your company’s reputation, benefits, and culture must be top-notch. U.S. employees are interested in organizations with a vibrant work culture backed by strong core values. In fact, 75% of employees say it’s “very important” to work for a company with well-defined values. And almost 20% of employees consider it the most important factor for job satisfaction.

If your company neglects these things, you could lose current employees. What’s more, attracting strong new talent will be much more difficult. For ideas about how to make the most of this strategy, keep reading…

How to Hire Quality Talent Amid Labor Shortages

When hiring, prioritize quality over quantity. The importance of hiring the right people can’t be overstated. It may feel good to receive hundreds of applications for an open position, but it won’t necessarily make things easier. If only a few applicants are qualified, you’ll need to spend many more hours of review and deliberation to find them. This unnecessary effort only makes your hiring process less efficient. 

If you choose to hire full-time employees, seek out candidates who have worked at startups or other scrappy environments. This kind of work experience suggests that a candidate is resilient, resourceful, and comfortable wearing multiple hats. 

Alternatively, consider hiring contingent workers. Because outsourced labor is ubiquitous and inexpensive, this is an attractive solution during talent shortages. Outsourced workers can focus on repetitive, easy-to-learn tasks so your full-time, in-house employees can spend their time on more strategic activities. This increases organizational efficiency and effectiveness. It also enhances the employee experience, which should improve workforce retention.

It’s also worth keeping in mind that the current labor shortage is expected to persist. If so, employee hiring and retention challenges are likely to continue. As a result, many companies could turn to outsourced staffing as a long-term solution. That’s a compelling reason to put successful outsourcing practices in place from the start.

5 Ways to Boost Workforce Performance With Outsourced Labor

Keep in mind that managing outsourced labor differs from managing in-house staff. To make the most of your outsourced workforce, try these tactics:

1. Invest in Structure and Quality Control

Designate one or several points of contact to manage outsourced labor roles, responsibilities, check-ins, and quality standards. This creates structure, which in turn prevents confusion, missteps, and other problems. It ensures that your contingent team members are aligned with your organization’s objectives and functional needs. Plus, it encourages two-way communication that helps minimize disengagement, quiet quitting, and excessive turnover.

2. Schedule Regular Check-Ins

Touching base with outsourced staff and outsourcing partners helps maintain accountability, transparency, and trust. By conducting weekly or biweekly check-ins, you can identify and address issues more quickly and keep the relationship moving forward smoothly.

I’ve seen several clients hire and onboard outsourced staff, and then treat it as a “set and forget” business arrangement. Soon, expectations became unclear, and clients didn’t get what they needed. Keeping in touch with contingent employees is vital to be sure everyone stays on the same page.

3. Don’t Overlook Onboarding and Training

An effective onboarding and training plan sets up outsourced workers for success. By providing the information, resources, guidance, and support needed to perform well alongside in-house employees, you can optimize the business value of contingent staff.

Unfortunately at many companies, onboarding is lackluster — even for in-house hires. In fact, according to Gallup, only 12% of employees think their organization does a great job of onboarding new people. With so much room for improvement, effective onboarding is likely to become a key trend in the future of outsourcing.

In my experience, new hires don’t start strong without complete information and training. They’re less likely to understand their role, and often they’re unsure where to go for answers when questions arise. This can lead to unnecessary mistakes.

However, when organizations plan and deliver thoughtful onboarding, they’re rewarded with motivated people who feel empowered to hit the ground running. So taking time to onboard both in-house and outsourced staff can quickly boost your team’s overall efficiency, productivity, and effectiveness.

4. Watch for Hidden Costs

An outsourced labor strategy is often a budget-friendly move. However, hidden costs can potentially erode any financial advantages. For example, you’ll want to pay close attention to the cost of communication and coordination with outsourced workers, as well as the cost of compliance with local labor laws and regulations.

When selecting an outsourcing provider, choose one that is transparent about prices. Also, look for a provider that adds value with payroll, human resources, and compliance services. This reduces management complexity for your organization and minimizes unexpected additional expenses.

5. Protect Against Security Risks

Unfortunately, data security risks are a modern business reality — especially when you rely on outsourced labor. Of course, some security breaches are unintentional. This is where proper upfront training can build awareness and help staff protect sensitive data and systems.

Regardless, intentional threats still exist. Although your trust in contingent staff will naturally increase over time, proactively protecting your business is mission critical. Some of my clients have experienced security breaches because they shared a little too much data and information before new hires settled into their roles. You don’t want that to happen.

To minimize exposure, carefully review outsourcing provider agreements for indemnification clauses that protect you in the event of a security breach. Also, your organization should use password-sharing tools that make it easy to detect and lock out workers who pose a threat.

A Final Note on Outsourced Labor

For most organizations, business uncertainty and talent shortages continue to play havoc with workforce planning. In this environment, it’s critical to determine how your organization can operate effectively and efficiently, no matter what. Hiring the right people is essential. But if you’re reducing headcount or slowing your hiring rate, outsourced labor is an attractive alternative. Relying on contingent staff to augment your in-house team can help you cut expenses and improve business efficiency without compromising core functions. And when managed well, this solution can help your organization effectively weather today’s economic challenges.

Nontraditional Career Paths Could Be Your Next Talent Goldmine. Here’s Why

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For decades, higher education has been considered the best way to gain the knowledge and experience employees need for a successful career. (At least, that’s what many people assumed.) For hiring managers, a college degree has long been a baseline for candidate qualifications. But what about people who pursue nontraditional career paths? If you overlook these candidates, are you missing out on a talent goldmine?

The Truth About Nontraditional Qualifications

All too often, resumes from people without a traditional education are immediately dismissed. This practice is so prevalent that applicants with any bachelor’s degree are more likely to get an interview, even if they didn’t study relevant subjects. In other words, you may have related skills and experience, but if you don’t have some kind of college education, you probably won’t be considered.

These hiring habits are antiquated and harmful. Exclusionary practices limit the candidate pool to a select group of people who can afford the financial burden of higher education. And those who can’t afford a degree but pursue one anyway will accrue a massive debt burden just to be competitive.

Frankly, focusing solely on people with a college education is not only bad for candidates — it’s also bad for business. Here’s why. When you reject nontraditional applicants up front, you’re arbitrarily excluding qualified candidates from interviews. As a result, you’re likely to miss perfectly qualified, eager candidates with the right skills and experience. It also means your recruiting process may be longer and more costly. What’s more, it can lead to weaker hiring decisions.

Fortunately, employers are starting to soften their stance on higher education. Large companies such as Google, Bank of America, and General Motors have been removing college degree requirements from certain jobs. Not surprisingly, younger workers are welcoming these changes. For example, 75% of Gen Z workers already believe college isn’t the only way to get a good education. And as more younger workers enter the workforce, their influence on hiring practices will increase, as well.

Bur hiring managers who want to hire the best candidates don’t need to wait for prevailing trends to change. There are concrete steps that can open your organization to more qualified applicants, regardless of their educational background. So, what exactly can you do to destigmatize nontraditional education in hiring decisions, and strengthen your businesses in the process?

4 Ways to Support Nontraditional Career Paths

1. Make Sure Change Starts at the Top

To transform a hiring culture that’s deeply ingrained in your organization, everyone needs to get involved. Start by ensuring that leaders accept new hiring standards and consistently champion these changes.

Get senior executives and middle managers to buy-off on talent acquisition methods that attract candidates from alternative sources. This is especially true for leaders in charge of hiring decisions. Broadly communicate your commitment by advertising new methods internally and externally. And prepare to prove the impact of this approach by ensuring that nontraditional hires have sufficient resources and support to succeed in their role.

2. Follow Other Employers’ Lead

An increasing number of companies across a broad spectrum of industries are already letting go of four-year degree requirements. When this occurs, skills and experience requirements also tend to expand. One useful tip is to research businesses with similar talent needs so you can learn from them.

For example, analyze how organizations like yours have adjusted their job requirements and evaluate the impact of these changes. For example, if you’re in the tech industry, Dell is an excellent example. Dell actually abandoned its university recruiting program. Now, the company offers apprenticeships and certificate programs to help develop talent with a wide range of desired qualifications.

3. Build Your Own Nontraditional Education Opportunities

One of the best ways to find top job candidates is to train them in-house. There are many ways to foster nontraditional talent from within, including career development opportunities, apprenticeships, upskilling, and reskilling programs. In fact, upskilling alone can improve a company’s culture and boost CEO confidence in measurable business results.

Many companies are already using these strategies to move their hiring practices away from a traditional focus on college degrees. For instance, Accenture launched an apprenticeship program in 2016. This program has helped the company hire hundreds of productive, qualified candidates from nontraditional education paths.

4. Get Involved in Your Local Community — And Stay Involved

Have you tapped into your local community as a sourcing channel? Many organizations have discovered that hiring locally removes relocation obstacles and makes it easier to verify candidate references. By sourcing local candidates, you can also increase the likelihood that new talent will fit well into your company culture.

For the best results when hiring locally, it’s important to conduct ongoing community outreach. By building your local networks and expanding awareness and knowledge of local sources, you can more easily build a more reliable, qualified talent pool.

Final Notes on Elevating Nontraditional Career Paths

The days of hiring managers demanding degrees are numbered. Candidates don’t always have equal access to higher education — or the money and time to complete a college education. Degrees still have their place in the talent acquisition process. But increasingly, employers are seeing better results by adjusting their sourcing and hiring methods — starting with degree requirements. By leading the charge, HR and business managers can reduce skills shortages, overcome talent obstacles, and improve organizational performance.

Generative AI in Recruiting: Peril, Promise, or Both?

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Sponsored by Radancy

Generative AI has risen to the forefront of work technology at a staggeringly rapid rate — bringing opportunities for employers to achieve powerful productivity gains. But, as with other disruptive technologies, it is also raising some serious concerns. For example, what are the implications of generative AI in recruiting?

AI-based content creation tools may be relatively new, but they’re clearly here to stay. That’s why it’s important for employers to understand how this technology is changing HR ecosystems, and prepare for its impact on recruitment and hiring processes.

Meet Our Guest: Todd Maycunich

Please join me in welcoming Todd Maycunich, a driving force behind Radancy, a leading talent acquisition platform. During his 17 years at Radancy, Todd has held multiple strategic roles, including VP of Product Innovation and Director of Platform Development.

Currently, Todd serves as SVP of Radancy Labs, where he leads a global insights team that leverages primary and secondary data to understand and address key trends that are shaping the future of talent acquisition. Join us as Todd and I dig deeper into the promise and pitfalls of generative AI in recruiting…

Behind the Rise of Generative AI

Todd, welcome to #WorkTrends! Why such a massive interest in generative AI now?

ChatGPT was released to the public on November 30, 2022. It wasn’t the first conversational user experience that demonstrated the ability to reason — but it was the most popular by far. In fact, it reached 100 million users faster than any other application.

These tools are capturing the imagination. People are suddenly having experiences they haven’t had with conversational bots. And they’re wondering if we are at the precipice of the next paradigm shift in computing. So I understand the hype.

The Downside of Generative AI in Recruiting
What are some of the risks of using these tools in HR – particularly in the recruitment process?

When new technology emerges, so do new problems. That’s particularly true when the pace of technology moves as quickly as AI is today.

But after six months of studying and using this technology in the context of hiring, here’s one of my concerns:

We’re using AI now in many ways to generate content. And that content is training the AI that will ultimately generate content in the future.

I think this poses more risks than opportunities. It creates a homogenization effect, so it’s harder to stand out. This can have a negative impact on brands, among other things.

Avoiding AI-Induced “Sameness”

That’s so scary. I think this tech is wonderful, but the risk isn’t just to recruiting and hiring. It will touch everything, yes?

There’s a lot of energy focused now on making sure some guardrails are put in place. Most companies are already thinking about how to protect their brand and their voice when AI helps generate content.

So the good news is that this is top-of-mind now. And companies like ours are integrating it safely into the talent acquisition process, as opposed to being a little bit fast and loose.

Implications for the Hiring Process

Can this technology make candidates seem indistinguishable by obscuring certain characteristics or attributes?

Yes, this is fascinating. Will it make a hiring manager’s job easier, or harder? I’m torn.

For example, what happens when a candidate uses AI-based writing suggestion tools to communicate with an employer, instead of directly researching the company, the job, or even the hiring manager? Will it make suboptimal candidates seem optimal?

This is a good example of how these tools can make it difficult to see people as individuals…

For more insights from Todd about how your HR team can make the most of generative AI in recruiting, listen to this full podcast episode. And be sure to subscribe to the #WorkTrends Podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher.

Also, to continue this conversation on social media anytime, follow our #WorkTrends hashtag on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram.

The WOTC and Prescreening: How Employers Can Stay in Compliance and Reap the Benefits

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Sponsored by ADP

The WOTC (Work Opportunity Tax Credit) offers businesses a tremendous opportunity for tax credits based on hiring. But for organizations to participate and leverage the advantages of this federal program, they have to be in compliance. That means prescreening applicants. Given the recent update released by the IRS that clarifies the need to prescreen, the time is now to learn more.

As with so many complex tax credits and other regulations today, successfully navigating them requires not only understanding how to stay within the bounds, but then how to create a process to make it part of your hiring system.

A Tax Credit and a Boost

The Work Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC) was first introduced in 1996. Since then it’s gone through a number of changes and extensions, including incorporating a credit for long-term welfare recipients in 2006. It’s authorized to stay in effect until December 31, 2025, so it’s anything but a flash in the pan: it’s a well-institutionalized regulation.

It’s designed to be both a tax credit for employers and a boost for employees, a combination of business advantage and social good. Companies who hire those American job seekers who consistently face barriers to employment can see up to $9,600 per employee — depending on a number of factors. In turn, qualifying new hires get the chance to break free from depending on government assistance and become self-supporting, steady earners and contributing taxpayers.

Leveraging the WOTC means respecting it: in its intent, the WOTC is designed to lift the barriers to employment among specific groups, and that’s why it includes specific criteria for compliance. It’s also opening up wider talent pools for employers at a time when hiring is tight, to say the least — and this should be seen as an added opportunity.

For larger companies that hire in numbers, it could be a windfall if done right. For smaller businesses it can make a tangible difference in a hiring budget: for every 4 or 5 new hires who fit within the target group, you may have the means to hire another employee as well.

Who Qualifies

Employees need to belong to a list of targeted groups, as specified by the IRS, and jobs must entail a minimum of working hours. Pay attention to the descriptions as well as the durations specified in each (adapted here):

 

Qualified IV-A Recipient:

  • A member of a family that receives state assistance under IV-A of the Social Security Act providing Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF)
  • Assistance must be received for any 9 months during the 18-month period, ending on the hiring date.

Qualified Veteran: 

  • A member of a family that receives assistance under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) (food stamps) for at least a 3-month period during the 15-month period, ending on the hiring date, or
  • Unemployed for a total of at least 4 weeks (consecutive or not), but less than 6 months in the 1-year period, ending on the hiring date, or
  • Unemployed for a total of at least 6 months (consecutive or not) in the 1-year period ending on the hiring date, or
  • Entitled to compensation for a service-connected disability and hired not more than 1 year after being discharged or released from active duty in the U.S. Armed Forces, or
  • Entitled to compensation for a service-connected disability and unemployed for at least 6 months (consecutive or not) in the 1-year period ending on the hiring date.

Qualified Ex-Felon:

  • Hired within a year of either being convicted of a felony, or
  • Released from prison for the felony.

Designated Community Resident (DCR): 

  • At least 18 and under 40 years of age, with a principal residence either in an Empowerment Zone (EZ) or
  • A Rural Renewal County (RRC).
  • The WOTC credit doesn’t cover wages paid or incurred for services performed while the person lived outside of an EZ or RRC. (You can find the latest list of EZ and RRC designations here.)

Vocational Rehabilitation Referral: 

  • Has a physical or mental disability and was referred to the employer while receiving or upon completion of rehabilitative services under:
  • A state plan approved under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, or
  • An Employment Network Plan under the Ticket to Work program, or
  • A Department of Veteran Affairs program.

Qualified Summer Youth Employee:  

  • At least 16 but under 18 years of age on the hiring date or on May 1 (whichever is later), and
  • Only working for the employer between May 1 and September 15 (not employed prior to May 1) and
  • Lives in an Empowerment Zone (EZ).

Qualified Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) Benefits Recipient:

  • At least 18 but under 40 on the date of hire, and
  • A member of a family that received SNAP benefits for either the last 6  months or at least 3 of the last 5 months.

Qualified Supplemental Security Income (SSI) Recipient:

  • Received SSI benefits for any month ending within the 60-day period that ends on the hire date.

Long-Term Family Assistance Recipient: 

  • At the time of hiring, is a member of a family that meets one of the following conditions:
  • Received assistance under an IV-A program for a minimum of the prior 18 consecutive months, or
  • Received assistance under an IV-A program for a minimum 18-month period beginning after 8/5/1997, and it has not been more than 2 years since the end of the earliest of such 18-month period, or
  • Ceased to be eligible for assistance under an IV-A program up to but no more than 2 years before because a federal or state law limited the maximum time those assistance payments could be made.

Qualified Long-Term Unemployment Recipient: 

  • Unemployed for not less than 27 consecutive weeks at the time of hiring
  • Received unemployment compensation during some or all of the unemployment period.

How to Certify

Eligibility for WOTC is not as simple as just hiring a member of one of these underrepresented talent pools and receiving a credit. As with many federal programs, the devil is in the details — and you can’t certify after the fact.

The IRS recently published additional guidance that clarifies the need to prescreen, and how to do it. As the update notes, “​​To satisfy the requirement to pre-screen a job applicant, on or before the day a job offer is made, a pre-screening notice (Form 8850, Pre-Screening Notice and Certification Request for the Work Opportunity Credit) must be completed by the job applicant and the employer.

To reiterate, both employer and job applicant need to complete Form 8850 in advance. Certification has to happen before you can claim this tax credit, which means establishing that the employee you hired is indeed a member of one of the targeted groups on the list.

And there’s more: employees in the targeted list qualify as long as they work at least 120 hours — any less, and the hire isn’t in compliance. Employers also can’t claim the tax credit for rehired employees (it’s not that much of a stretch to imagine that some employers might think they could rehire an employee in order to certify them for the WOTC).

While the maximum credit is $9600 for an eligible employee, the amount of credit an employer receives depends on the WOTC target group identified, as well as how many hours the employee works:

  • If the employee works at least 400 hours during the first year of employment, the tax credit equals 40% of the employee’s qualified wages.
  • If the employee works less than 400 hours but at least 120 hours, the credit equals 25% of the employee’s qualified wages.
  • Eligible employees MUST work a minimum of 120 hours to qualify.

Reading Between the Lines

It means something that the IRS releases an update clarifying its rules on prescreening. Clearly, there were issues being found in terms of when employers were screening: noncompliance was on the radar. Compound that with wanting to increase participation in the program, and likely a decision was made that it was time to set the record straight. Again, complying with the WOTC could mean a major windfall for a larger employer and a key difference in the budget for a smaller one.

But many employers may have been caught in a blind spot. Some have been customarily conducting certain screening processes post-hire, considering the practice a viable shortcut. The intention may be to assume the new employee qualifies, since there has been some due diligence on the part of the employer already. Another assumption may be that by certifying after the hire is complete, the credits will come sooner. But both approaches are wrong.

For one thing, Form 8850 covers specific information in a specific way in order to certify a hire — and as such, is far more effective in terms of fact-finding for WOTC compliance. From an HR standpoint, since both employer and job applicant need to fill out the form, there may be more incentive for the applicant to get all the information right if it helps boost their getting hired. And minor missteps can really add up, putting companies at greater risk, and great costs stemming from an accumulation of noncompliant hires.

Getting the Process Right

Simply making the shift to when an employer conducts screening and sends in their certification request, and then keeping clear and adequate records to stay in compliance would make all the difference. Here’s what you need to know:

Recruit potentially eligible candidates through the state workforce agency (SWA) or the local employment office. Then, screen them: the applicants need to answer the questions on page 1 of IRS Form 8850 on or before the job offer date. 

If the applicant is eligible (they qualify for one of the WOTC target groups), the next step is up to the employer. Employers must sign and submit the IRS Form 8850 — as well as Department of Labor (DOL) ETA Form 9061 or 9062 to the state workforce agency (SWA) within 28 calendar days of the new hire’s start date. 

Keep careful records of hours worked and qualified wages paid. Remember: WOTC-certified employees need to work at least 120 hours in the first year of hire.

Claim the tax credit using IRS Form 5884, and make sure you have not only accurate records but copies of all the forms and supporting documents submitted to the SWA. Keep tracking your employee’s hours in case the IRS wants to conduct an audit.

Better Practices, Better Results

Remember: audits potentially contributed to the IRS’ decision to publish an update with clarifying language on the need to prescreen. It’s clear some employers weren’t being compliant. The line in the sand has already been drawn. But it’s also possible that not all employers are aware of the ramifications of being out of compliance with the WOTC.

Not only does post-screening forfeit initial benefits, but there’s an overall risk of having the WOTC credit revoked if an employer is found to have systematically not complied with prescreening requirements. In a big company that is always hiring, that could be a disaster.

The solution isn’t to hope for the best here. It’s to lean on solutions that help you make the shift without adding complexity. An integrated solution can make it far easier to change a long-held process consistently across the board. But given the historic lack of clarity on compliance and why shortcuts won’t work, this may be the time to look for better guidance.

The Benefits of an Outside Provider

Consider partnering with an outsourced solution provider who has experience with prescreening. A solution provider who has a solid track record with successful prescreening will be able to create a better process that’s streamlined and efficient. They can help get your organization over the common hurdles and build better ways to ease the pain points.

Given the pressures organizations are under — from intensely competitive hiring to a need to scale and adapt within shorter windows than ever — being able to leverage the advantage of the WOTC could be a key differentiator.

Minimizing your organizational exposure to risk is never a bad idea. But having a well-run, successful, WOTC-compliant hiring program may do even more. It’s a huge boost to its employer reputation that could pay off in a steady talent pool and a great workforce.

EDITOR’S NOTE: ADP has developed additional information about the WOTC and how employers can apply it. Learn more here

8 Ideas for Talent Acquisition Success in 2023

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Every employer’s definition of talent acquisition success is different. But many employers have learned valuable lessons over the years. Recently, we decided to capture some of those lessons so other hiring organizations could benefit. That’s why we asked business and recruiting leaders to share tips for talent acquisition success in the year ahead.

Tips for Talent Acquisition Success

From using predictive analytics to cultivating a sense of community among team members, we received a collection of answers that reads like a practical “how to” playbook. Below, we share the top answers to our question, “What’s your best strategy to gain a competitive advantage in talent acquisition this year?”

  •   Re-Engineer Your Brand as a Recruiting Tool
  •   Share Engaging Video Content
  •   Be Flexible
  •   Use Predictive Analytics
  •   Deepen Your Diversity Initiatives
  •   Assess the Market and Develop Appropriate Goals
  •   Audit Your EVP and Culture from a Prospect’s Perspective
  •   Create a Sense of Community

To learn more about how you can make these ideas work for your organization, read the full responses below…

8 Ways to Achieve Talent Acquisition Success in 2023

1. Re-Engineer Your Brand as a Recruiting Tool

We all know how important employer branding has become in the age of social media. But we sometimes overlook it as a true recruiting channel in the overall talent acquisition strategy.

Often it’s used as a marketing tool for selling a company brand. But my best tip is to re-engineer your employer brand so it acts as a recruiting tool. For example:

  • Develop lead magnets that link to employee stories.
  • Conduct career-building webinars for industry newbies and collect emails or resumes from interested registrants.
  • Create quizzes or surveys targeting people who are open to job opportunities, and use these teasers outside your career page to gather more leads.

If you’re an HR or recruiting professional, employer branding challenges you to put on your marketing hat. This year, add a sales hat to that mix so you can attract more qualified candidate leads and close more job offers.

Kelly Loudermilk, Talent Innovator, BuildHR, Inc.

2. Share Engaging Video Content

How many of us would decide to buy a house or a car without knowing vital details? Yet most employers still expect candidates to settle for this kind of hiring experience.

The problem is that smart people don’t have the time or desire to jump through all the traditional job application hoops to find out what’s on the other side. That’s why savvy employers are including more detailed information about jobs on the front end of the recruiting process, so they can attract better talent.

But what about nuanced questions where the answers won’t fit into a tidy bullet point on a job description? Questions like, “What types of challenges does your team solve regularly?” or “What is it like to work with the manager?” This is where video can help.

By recording video answers to these critical questions, recruiters have an indispensable new set of assets that can make candidate outreach more effective. Video also helps employers seem more transparent, which helps them stand out in competitive hiring situations.

Justin Vajko, Principal & Chief Strategy Guy, Dialog

3. Be Flexible

If your company expects to attract and retain talent, you must offer employee experiences that support real flexibility and build your culture around this way of working.

Our new “Work Now” research report found that leaders view the workplace as flexible because of the freedom associated with their role and stature. However, employees don’t experience the same level of flexibility.

Leaders who expect to attract and retain great employees need to listen carefully, move past assumptions based on their personal experience with the organization, and design more connected, flexible experiences for other members of the workforce.

Also, if you’re tempted to rely on pulse surveys for feedback, here’s another tip. While these tools may be helpful, remember you may be viewing results through a biased lens that doesn’t tell a true story.

Instead, move beyond pulse surveys. Engage with employees, listen to their stories, invite them to the table, and co-create the future together. That’s how you can fundamentally improve the way you work.

Douglas Ferguson, President, Voltage Control

4. Use Predictive Analytics

I believe predictive analytics is key to talent acquisition success this year. Predictive analytics is the practice of using data to make predictions about future events. With these tools, you can identify potential candidates for open positions, before jobs are even posted. That means you can get a jump on the competition and hire the most qualified candidates before other organizations can snap them up.

In addition, you can use predictive analytics to assess an individual’s probability of success in a particular role. This means your recruiters can focus on candidates who are most likely to succeed. Ultimately, advanced analytics can help you hire the right people for the right roles, and that can lead to a significant advantage in the war for talent.

Antreas Koutis, Administrative Manager, Financer

5. Deepen Your Diversity Initiatives

The emphasis on workplace diversity has continued to gain momentum. It’s now essential to consider candidates you might otherwise overlook because of their race, gender, or other factors. This isn’t about fulfilling quotas. It’s about expanding recruiting reach by tapping into a more diverse talent pool. Ultimately, this adds depth and dimension to your culture.

Try reaching out proactively to attract candidates from diverse communities. Get out of the office and connect with groups that are underrepresented in the workforce. For example, you can host recruitment events in locations that are convenient for people in these groups.

Partnering with schools in these areas is another way to introduce students to your industry and educate them about related career paths. Internships can also help you connect with young people from diverse backgrounds and help them prepare for future roles in your organization.

Matthew Ramirez, CEO, Rephrasely

6. Assess the Market and Develop Appropriate Goals

Establishing a competitive advantage for talent acquisition success requires a laser focus on both short-term and long-term hiring needs.

Be prepared to investigate the current labor market and integrate leading-edge technologies into your recruitment processes. By investing in data-driven insights, you can develop innovative strategies that differentiate your company from the competition. For example, you can:

  • Evaluate the job market in real-time,
  • Leverage AI and machine learning to source talent more efficiently and proactively,
  • Create proactive employer branding campaigns to showcase your company culture
  • Engage with passive candidates through targeted outreach strategies.

In addition, focus on developing a comprehensive remote hiring strategy, because more companies are moving or expanding their operations away from traditional office locations.

Linda Shaffer, Chief People Operations Officer, Checkr

7. Audit Your EVP and Culture from a Prospect’s Perspective

In a highly competitive job market, standing out and showcasing your culture is the biggest competitive advantage you have in attracting new talent.

Now is a great time to be sure your EVP shows prospective employees why they should work for you, what you offer, and how they can contribute. An EVP is simply your shop window for people you want to attract, retain, and help you grow your business.

I recommend auditing your EVP to put fresh eyes on all your candidate touch points. Review your culture, identify your strengths, and analyze your exit survey data. What can you improve? Does your “careers” website accurately reflect your desired EVP?

Get your whole team involved in this assessment process – HR, Talent Acquisition, and Marketing should work together to showcase your organization in the right light across multiple channels.

Charlie Southwell, Marketing Director, Let’s Talk Talent

8. Create a Sense of Community for Talent Acquisition Success

If your company offers remote work, you have a substantial competitive advantage.

Research indicates that remote work opportunities influence candidates’ salary requirements. But remote work structure isn’t the whole package. Candidates are also interested in knowing how employers create an environment that fosters connection among team members who may not work onsite. For instance, it’s critical to create a sense of community in a remote-based organization with practices like these:

  • Quarterly strategic team meetings
  • In-person team training
  • Regular video lunch and learns
  • Video town halls
  • Hackathons
  • Employee resource groups (ERGs)

Research indicates that people with at least 7 work friends are 35% more likely to stay with their employer. In recent interviews with employees who’ve been at our company for more than 2 years, most told us that interacting with their team is a key reason they enjoy coming to work.

Remote is a terrific way to attract new employees, but creating a sense of community is what keeps employees engaged.

Pat Mulvey, Director of Talent Acquisition, Saatva

 

EDITOR’S NOTE:  These talent acquisition success ideas were submitted via Terkel, a knowledge platform that shares community-driven content based on expert insights. To see questions and get published, sign up at terkel.io.

IT Recruiting is Still a Struggle. These Strategies Can Help

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Recent headlines are shining a bright light on high-profile layoffs in the technology industry. But for many employers, IT recruiting is still an uphill battle — largely because the IT talent shortage continues to dampen hiring plans.

For years, organizations have posted more job openings than qualified candidates could fill. The opportunity cost is staggering. To put this into perspective, consider that by 2030, at least 85 million jobs could go unfilled. In financial terms, this shortfall could translate into $8.5 trillion in unrealized annual revenues.

Fortunately, the pandemic-era shift to remote work helped expand the global pool of candidates. But it also increased competition for the strongest candidates.

What can you do if your competitors are offering higher salaries or better benefits? It doesn’t mean your organization is out of the running. How can you gain an advantage? In this fierce IT recruiting marketplace, you can attract and retain the best global talent by focusing on three key priorities:

Strategies for Global IT Recruiting Success

1. Define Audiences and Create Candidate Personas

It’s essential to know your target audiences. This includes thinking carefully about the personas of candidates you want to attract, and understanding their career drivers.

First, your talent acquisition team and hiring managers should take time to explore the different cultures related to your target markets and understand what is important to these potential candidates. This insight will help you develop messages and incentives that resonate with the various types of people you want to draw into your organization.

For instance, messaging that a software developer in India considers important and engaging won’t necessarily interest a software developer in Bulgaria or any other country. The same principle applies to nearly every other position and region, across the board. 

Also, a large pool of talent isn’t yet ready to enter the workforce but will become a priority in the future. Don’t wait. Start considering now what it will take to reach those young candidates and appeal to their interests.

For example, an internship program is one way to build a pipeline of candidates who will soon be prepared to enter the workforce. When college students perform effectively and have a positive work experience as interns, you can build a bench of people who are ready to be hired when they graduate.

2. Develop Your Employer Brand and Showcase Your Culture

To attract and retain top global IT talent, it’s especially important to publicly showcase your employer brand and company culture in an authentic way. 

Social media is one of the easiest, most effective tools to accomplish this. Ideally, your social media presence provides visibility into your organization’s culture, mission and values, professional development opportunities, diversity initiatives, corporate social responsibility, and team bonding activities. This helps potential candidates envision what it could actually be like to work there. 

Your social media presence is especially important when attracting younger talent. In fact, The Harris Poll says 58% of Gen Z and Millennial job seekers with work experience rely on social media to research potential employers. And 48% have applied for job opportunities they found on social media.

And other research reveals that most candidates who are seriously considering a job offer will carefully review a potential employer’s social media profiles for red flags before they decide to accept.

BREATHE LIFE INTO YOUR EMPLOYER BRAND

Clearly, Gen Z and Millennials are turning to social media when looking for jobs. They’re also willing to get involved as employees if employers simply ask.

For example, an employee brand ambassador program could significantly amplify your organization’s social presence. By crowdsourcing social media activity internally, you can generate higher-quality content, increase audience reach, and drive much deeper engagement.

Employee brand ambassador programs can also capture behind-the-scenes “magic” that makes your organization a unique place to work. This could include everything from feel-good stories about managers who recognize team members in fun ways and internal team traditions like weekly trivia contests, to candid videos of silly work moments and community volunteering events. Your employees are uniquely positioned to showcase your brand in ways that no one could communicate alone.

From Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter to LinkedIn and Glassdoor, the content posted by and about your organization reflects your overall employer brand. So it’s important to work closely with your marketing and social media teams to ensure your efforts support the organization’s brand identity across all platforms and channels.

3. Prioritize and Personalize Candidate Experience 

The last (and perhaps most important) piece of the global IT recruiting puzzle is to provide the best possible candidate experience. This is vital because it helps distinguish your organization from other companies that are vying for the same talent.

Your candidate experience is essentially your brand experience. In fact, 78% of job hunters agree that the candidate experience they receive directly indicates how much an employer values its people.

Not surprisingly, a weak candidate experience has caused some job hunters to withdraw from the hiring process. Their top 3 issues:

  • Disrespect during interviews
  • Poor rapport with recruiters
  • The process simply took too long.

Ultimately, a negative candidate experience can harm your brand. For example, 72% of candidates that encounter a negative candidate experience will tell others about it directly or online. That’s not the kind of word-of-mouth any employer wants to spread.

ELEVATE YOUR CANDIDATE JOURNEY

How can you ensure a strong candidate experience? Focus on each stage of the process:

  • First, carefully review and evaluate the entire journey. Start with the moment someone learns about a role at your organization. Then, move through each step until a new employee arrives for the first day on the job.
  • When candidates initially apply, is the process as easy, accessible, and straightforward as possible? Can people apply quickly online, or do you require them to go through multiple steps and submit excessive amounts of information?
  • During the interview cycle, your hiring team has a chance to shine. How do you assure candidates that you’re interested in them and you value their time? Is everyone in the hiring process able to prepare for interviews? Do they develop relevant questions, so candidates can provide useful answers? Does your process give candidates ample opportunity to ask about job expectations, organizational culture, and other key decision criteria?
  • Throughout each stage of the journey, clear, consistent communication is key. Are you keeping candidates in the loop with regular updates and next-step information? And if you choose not to move forward at any point, do you explain why in a timely, thoughtful way?

These steps may seem obvious, but if you want better results, you won’t leave them to chance. Why? According to a U.S. survey, interviews trigger anxiety in as many as 93% of job seekers. A great candidate experience can help relieve stress. This means candidates will be able to focus on discussing their strengths, demonstrating their skills, and determining if the position is a good fit.

Final Notes on Global IT Recruiting

In today’s candidate-driven global IT market, applicants have the power to choose which employer they prefer. That’s why it’s crucial for hiring managers and talent acquisition teams to know their audience, develop their employer brand, and perfect the candidate experience. When these three components work well together, your organization has the best chance of attracting and hiring the right kind of talent for every job.

A Perfect Job Offer is Much More Than Just a Number

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TalentCulture Content Impact Award Winner - 2023

How would you define the perfect job offer? Some people think it’s about finding a magic number that will seal the deal with the right candidate. But smart recruiters know it involves much more than that.

Compensation negotiations have always been complex. But now they’re changing in some fundamental ways. This is largely thanks to new pay transparency laws, which mandate that employers include salary ranges in job postings. As a result, here’s what I see ahead…

How Pay Transparency Changes The Hiring Game

Pay transparency is a boon for job seekers, who will have access to much more useful information about open positions. But this doesn’t need to be a zero-sum game. No doubt, many employers will adjust their tools and processes. And that means recruiters can prosper under these new pay transparency rules. How?

For recruiters, the goal is the same as always — bring the perfect offer to the table. But now, the way to get there is likely to be different than it was in the past.

Making a perfect job offer has always required a balance of three key objectives — fairness, cost-effectiveness, and competitiveness. But these elements are dynamic. The balance is always shifting. So the more you understand how these relationships are changing, the better.

Imagine this: A knowledgeable recruiter leans more heavily on one of these three objectives when making an offer. That strategy might work in today’s hiring climate.

But what about next year? Without the right tools, the same recruiter may not have enough information to make reliable decisions. Instead, compensation will be based on guesswork. And this could jeopardize the balance that holds these offers together.

To build more solid job offers in 2023, take a closer look at the 3 factors I’ve mentioned:

The 3 Pillars of a Perfect Job Offer

1. Fairness

Candidates should be paid fairly. It may sound obvious, but with new pay transparency laws, recruiters have a more important role in making sure this is the case.

Fairness can be tricky to prove because it’s relative. Start by comparing candidates with their own abilities, with employees who do similar work, and with others in your organization.

But keep in mind that it’s not enough for you to think an offer is fair. A candidate must also believe it’s fair. That’s because candidates are much more likely to accept an offer they think is fair than those who think it’s based on guesswork or gamesmanship.

How can you convince candidates that an offer is fair? Don’t assume they’ll take a recruiter’s word for it — they want to see the data. That means your organization will gain a significant advantage if recruiters are able to show their work. This is possible to do with modern data analytics tools, even at scale.

2. Cost-Effectiveness

Your recruiters should be able to attract the best candidates to your organization at the right price. This sounds like a reasonable expectation. But what, exactly, does it mean?

Too often, organizations treat recruiting simply as a cost center. They set a budget and expect recruiters to work within those parameters. That’s important, but there’s so much more your talent acquisition team can accomplish.

Even now, as the economy experiences a downturn, recruiters aren’t just sourcing scouts who fill open positions. They’re also talent strategists who can think holistically about your business needs and goals while also providing the best candidates at the right price.

A compensation strategy involves so many complex elements: workforce planning, budgets, guaranteed vs. at-risk pay, and financial performance. The effects of compensation decisions reach far beyond any individual job applicant. In fact, deciding how many people to hire and determining what to pay them are among the most costly and important decisions any business leader must make. So, as the economy continues to sputter, cost-effective job offers are increasingly important to every organization.

3. Competitiveness

A job offer should balance the chance of a candidate saying yes with the compensation cost to the organization. Understanding what’s at stake is essential in today’s environment. This is why many employers are upgrading their compensation analysis tools. Because in a volatile labor market, good data makes the difference between successfully navigating choppy waters and crashing against the rocks.

In a way, cost-effectiveness and competitiveness are two sides of the same coin. Recruiters want to make offers that help their organization manage costs, even as they attract and retain top talent. But without the right data, finding that balance can be difficult.

This is where recruiters are most likely to make mistakes. In a white-hot talent market, landing qualified candidates can be a struggle. In a down market, it’s a challenge to stay within prescribed budgets. That’s why the perfect offer deserves as much market intelligence as possible, no matter what the hiring climate may be.

Getting Ahead of the Curve

Fair, cost-effective, and competitive. A perfect job offer must balance all three. Recruiters can get ahead of the curve now by taking tangible steps to implement this three-pronged strategy. Specifically, they can focus on using the right information, ensuring that processes are accountable, and communicating about pay throughout each step of the recruiting journey.

At its core, a perfect job offer is based on the best available compensation insights. For successful employers, that means real-time data that indicates what job seekers expect to be paid, what candidates are offered and are willing to accept, as well as what internal data says about existing compensation standards.

The era of pay transparency is here. It may be new, different, and perhaps even a bit intimidating. But it’s also an exciting time to be a recruiting professional. Because, if you’re willing to adapt, a perfect job offer is always within your reach.

 

Hiring In a Recession: 3 Strategies for Business Resilience

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The global economic climate is in a precarious state, with experts now predicting a 70% likelihood that the U.S. will enter a recession this year. No doubt, this news is unsettling for business owners. But it’s important to remember that recessions are a natural part of ongoing economic cycles. They can even present opportunities for organizational growth and resilience if you know how to capitalize on them.

So, how can leaders navigate today’s challenges and emerge even stronger on the other side? By strategically hiring in a recession. If you want to build bench depth on your team during tough times, here are three strategies to consider:

3 Strategies for Hiring in a Recession

1. Go Global With Remote Hiring

We’re in a much different position now than during The Great Recession of 2008. So is the global workforce. Thanks to technological advances and the prevalence of remote work models, it’s much easier now for hiring managers to tap into the vast global talent pool.

Compared with local hiring strategies, seeking out top talent internationally offers multiple advantages. Not only can you gain access to a much larger source of candidates, but you can also achieve significant overhead cost savings if you hire people in locations where labor costs are lower.

In addition, sourcing job candidates from around the world can help you develop a much more diverse team. If you are careful to hire skilled professionals, an international approach can inject your work culture and business deliverables with fresh perspectives. This can help your business operate more effectively and efficiently while supporting long-term growth.

That said, hiring globally isn’t without its challenges. To succeed, hiring managers need to be aware of hiring laws and regulations in their chosen countries, as well as cultural differences. It’s also important to ensure that hiring practices are fair and equitable, regardless of where potential employees may be located.

The importance of remote work leadership also needs to be taken into consideration here. Your organization should be prepared to develop and support management skills and practices that will help remote teams stay connected, engaged and motivated.

2. In an Era of Mercenaries, Focus on Your Missionaries

The last few years have been like a game of musical chairs for the labor market. The Great Resignation resulted in 44% of workers hopping from job to job, searching for higher pay, better benefits, and more flexible work options.

This led to a new trend known as “mercenary hiring,” where employers use inflated compensation packages to recruit highly skilled candidates without regard for the company’s mission or culture. However, this recruiting practice can be very risky. While it may be an effective way to attract top talent in a tight labor market, it can also lead to increased workforce churn and damage company culture.

Fortunately, there’s an antidote to mercenary hiring. Hire “missionaries” instead. Focus on people who share a passion for your company’s mission, purpose, vision, and values. These job seekers are more likely to invest in long-term success with your organization, so they’ll also be more invested in your company’s growth.

Of course, it’s one thing for employers to identify, attract and hire these “missionaries.” But it’s even more important to focus on creating an environment that nurtures them and encourages them to thrive. For example, this can include competitive salaries, consistent recognition, and generous professional development opportunities, as well as incentives like flexible scheduling and remote work options.

3. Find Opportunity in Adversity

The hiring landscape may have changed, but one thing remains the same: Hiring during a recession is an opportunity to tap into highly qualified talent you might not find as easily during better economic times.

During the last recession, the U.S. lost 2.6 million jobs. And in 2022, we began seeing some very prominent companies announcing major layoffs. While this news can be disturbing, hiring managers should see it as an opportunity to find the best and brightest talent amidst the chaos.

History has shown us some iconic instances of hiring when the job market was at low ebb. For example, in the 1940s, Hewlett-Packard famously capitalized on the closure of military labs to beef up its workforce. And during one of the nation’s worst 16-month economic cycles, Microsoft took the initiative to hire some of its most influential engineers. Both cases offer powerful business lessons.

Key Takeaways

So, what’s the moral of this story? Here are the three key takeaways to keep in mind about hiring in a recession:

1. Top Talent is Only a Zoom Call Away

With the rise of remote work and virtual hiring tools, it’s easier than ever to find top talent in all corners of the world. Don’t limit your search to local candidates. Consider expanding your talent acquisition reach to a global scale. This can open you to a broader pool of qualified, motivated candidates while giving you access to diverse skills and experiences.

2. Resilience in Hiring is More Than Just Hiring More People

In a recession, it’s important to be strategic about who you recruit. Look for individuals who share your goals and understand your company’s mission. People who sincerely want to advance your agenda are much more likely to stay with your company during difficult times. Focus on building a team of dedicated employees who are willing to be flexible during uncertain times. This will help you weather the storm and emerge stronger on the other side.

3. When Others Freeze Hiring, Be Bold

During a recession, it can be tempting to react with a hiring freeze. Although that approach may save costs in the near term, it is also likely to be a mistake. Investing in talent during tough economic times can set you apart from competitors and position you for success in the long term. Don’t be afraid to be brave and continue investing in your team, even when times are tough. This can help retain your best existing employees, while also helping you attract strong new talent. That combination can build the foundation your company will need to drive future growth.

Final Note

Overall, the key to successful hiring in a recession depends on three factors – your ability to be adaptable, strategic, and focus on building a team that is willing and able to weather the storm with you. By keeping these principles in mind, you can navigate even the toughest hiring climate and make your organization more resilient in the face of any economic downturn.

Screening Job Candidates Online: Risky Business?

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Sponsored by: Fama.io

It’s no secret. On a daily basis, recruiters and hiring managers are screening job candidates online by simply entering their names in search boxes at Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and beyond. Experienced professionals know they shouldn’t be doing this, but many do it anyway. Why?

The Slippery Slope of DIY Candidate Screening

Publicly available online information can reveal a lot about potential employees. It gives employers insight into an individual’s hobbies, interests and personality traits. It also shines a light on controversial opinions, political affiliations and protected class information. 

Gaining unrestricted access to a candidate’s public social media profiles may be easy. But instant access isn’t a free pass to engage in unethical or potentially illegal hiring practices.

That’s why it needs to stop. Screening job candidates without permission is an invasion of their privacy rights — especially the right to consent to the search.

Catching Up With the Rules

To be fair, most recruiters and hiring managers don’t fully understand laws involving online background screening. That’s partially due to the relative novelty of this practice, as well as a lack of updated guidance.

But now that online screening has become so widespread, employers need to know how to protect their organization as well as job candidates. That’s why it’s important to understand the Federal Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA).

Learning how to comply with these regulations is worth an employer’s effort. Online screening can be a powerful tool to determine an individual’s hireability. And when performed correctly, an online background check is an effective and perfectly legal hiring practice. 

How can you make this process work better for your organization? Let’s look closer at key legal aspects of screening job candidates online. First, I’ll explain how problems tend to arise. Then, I’ll suggest steps for a fully compliant, worry-free screening process. 

Understanding the Controversy

Why exactly is social media screening so controversial? Calling it an invasion of privacy is hard to defend, since many social media profiles are publicly available. Furthermore, applicants freely choose what, when and how they share on their social media profiles.

Much of this information may reflect positively or negatively on a candidate’s ability to perform in a work-related capacity. For example, education, work history, extracurricular activities and hobbies are often prominently featured on social media profiles. And employers typically evaluate this kind of information during the interviewing process, anyway.

However, the issue isn’t about employers using information that would otherwise be discussed during a standard interview. Instead, it’s about access to information that organizations are legally and ethically obligated not to consider.

We’re talking about legally protected categories such as race, ethnicity, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability status or religion. This is where issues arise, because the moment anyone views a social media profile, it may inherently reveal details about protected categories.

How Widespread is This Practice?

In a 2018 CareerBuilder survey, 70% of employers said they regularly review social media profiles as part of the hiring process. Furthermore, 54% acknowledged that they’ve rejected applicants based on a social media review.

However, the survey does not indicate how often social media reviews were being conducted by hiring managers who are legally obligated not to consider protected information. 

When used correctly, online screening can highlight positive work traits like compassion or open-mindedness. But it can also reveal negative traits. For example, what if a candidate threatens others in a post or shares a video while committing a violent act? This kind of behavior isn’t welcome in the workplace and would likely hinder the candidate from performing effectively in any role.

Steps to Achieve Better Outcomes

For a fully compliant screening process, consider these best practices:

1. Clarify the Rules

Defining a clear set of guidelines is essential for all background check methods — including online screening processes. According to leading U.S. employment attorney, Pam Devata, “In general, the same rules apply, whether you are using social media or more traditional methods for conducting background checks.”

In a recent interview, Devata explained, “The keys are consistency, accurate record keeping, ensuring that any data accessed is not legally protected information prohibited from being used in employment decisions, and that any decisions are rooted in business necessity.”

2. Focus on Documentation

Before attempting to navigate the nuances of social media screening, it’s important to establish consistent, generalized hiring practices across the organization. This includes putting a process in place to record and track all pre-employment decisions and FCRA-required disclosures.

Although it can be challenging to document online screening activity, consistent, accurate record-keeping will put your organization in a better position to address any issues that may arise. 

3. Partner with a Specialized Service Provider

One of the easiest ways to address the complexities surrounding online candidate research is to rely on a trusted online background screening partner like Fama.

With a proven, independent team managing the screening process, employers can gather only the information needed to assess an applicant’s job potential, without the risk of revealing protected categories. In fact, the strongest digital screening solutions include compliance filters. This ensures that reports shared with hiring teams focus solely on job-relevant information.

At Fama, we go beyond bare-minimum compliance protections by applying ethical AI and machine-learning technology. Also, a team of skilled humans reviews our screenings to ensure their legitimacy and accuracy. This helps us continuously improve our screening capabilities and our results.

Final Thoughts

No doubt, social media screening is bound to remain a controversial topic. But when you’re not sure about the legal implications, it’s important to avoid the false assumption that it’s safe to assess a candidate’s online presence on your own.

Guaranteed compliance is always possible by working with an objective, third-party screening solution. This means your team will benefit from a fully compliant screening process. And ultimately, it means your organization can focus on finding the best candidate for every job.

5 Ways to Improve Employee Experience With HR Tech

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Sponsored by: Neocase

Did you know more than 160 million people are employed in the U.S.? Unfortunately, however, rising turnover is eroding workforce retention. In fact, 48% of hiring managers say turnover is higher this year – up from 44% in 2021. And the cost of replacing those people isn’t cheap. No wonder employers want to build a positive work culture that attracts and retains top talent. That’s why many are turning to HR technology to improve employee experience.

But here’s the catch: In recent years, the HR tech landscape has been bursting at the seams. This means choosing the best solution for your organization’s needs can be overwhelming. To overcome this obstacle, think first about how you want to improve employee experience, and work from those objectives to define your selection criteria.

HR Technology 101

To provide some context, let’s start with a brief overview of core HR systems. In most HR technology stacks you’ll find at least one of these systems as a foundation for all other people platforms, tools and applications:

1. HRIS – Human Resource Information Systems

HRIS was developed to help organizations track and store employee data and records for essential administrative needs. As the HR function grew more complex, HRIS platforms added modules to support talent acquisition processes and recruitment operations, as well as employee information management and maintenance. 

2. HRMS – Human Resource Management Systems

Over time, HR became more deeply integrated with other functions, so HR tracking software had to meet these expanded business requirements. Now, HRMS/HRIS systems are used interchangeably to support operations such as payroll, time tracking and compliance management. 

3. HCM – Human Capital Management Systems

HCM supports a more expansive set of HR operations, including employee performance analysis, compensation planning and projection, workforce development and more. HCM covers all HR functions with a comprehensive solution that can be customized to support the entire employee lifecycle.

Why Employee Experience Matters

A strong employee experience is essential to attract top talent and keep people engaged with your work culture. As Gartner says, “Employee experience is the way employees internalize and interpret the interactions they have with their organization, as well as the context that underlies those interactions.”

But as many organizations have discovered, an exceptional employee experience isn’t easy to develop and maintain. In fact, according to Gartner, “Only 13% of employees are fully satisfied with their experience.”

What’s at stake? A negative employee experience leads to low morale, poor work performance, and other issues that directly affect organizational culture and business results. On the other hand, a positive employee experience helps lift morale, productivity, efficiency, and work quality.

How HR Tech Can Improve Employee Experience

Clearly, creating the best employee experience possible leads to significant business benefits. So, to achieve the highest potential impact, consider these five priorities:

1. Automate Tasks and Streamline Workflows

Is anything worse than monotony? It is just as painful for your HR team as it is for others in your organization. Many manual HR tasks are excellent candidates for automation. Focus first on business processes that will free your HR team from tedious, time-consuming, redundant paperwork, and email communications.

Start by developing an employee journey map to better understand your current processes. Then look for bottlenecks, gaps, and disconnects. These issues are opportunities to streamline processes or speed response times.

Organizations often begin by mapping onboarding or offboarding processes. This ensures that an employee’s first and last impressions will align with company values and the employer brand.

2. Gather Employee Feedback

A silent employee can be a dangerous or at-risk employee – even if they don’t realize it. Many workers hesitate to speak up for a variety of reasons. Some fear punishment if they express negative opinions, while others think their input won’t be heard or appreciated.

If an employee doesn’t have a chance to share feedback or ideas, they could feel undervalued and unimportant. You can remedy this with HR technology specifically intended to improve communication.

Consider feedback tools that encourage employees to make their voices heard. Monthly surveys, quarterly outreach messages, and other kinds of digital communication can help build stronger connections and spark more useful conversations.

But that’s just the beginning. Once you receive input, you need to respond or implement changes. Otherwise, people could become more frustrated if you solicit input but don’t seem willing to act upon it.

3. Provide Self-Service Portals

One of the best ways HR technology improves employee experience is through self-service applications. Many platforms can help organizations build and deploy custom tools that help employees serve themselves at their convenience.

One of the best-known examples is a benefits portal. Many employers offer secure web-based destinations with all the information and tools people need to research, select and manage their particular benefits. This frees employees from having to manage the constant back-and-forth of emails or phone calls just to get basic benefits information or answer common questions.

This kind of solution increases efficiency, while giving employees more control. At the same time, portal analytics can help your HR team understand employee preferences and identify content and functionality that can better them.

4. Offer Anywhere, Anytime Access

Unfortunately, many employees feel totally disconnected from HR. Some need guidance and oversight, but HR teams and managers are stretched too thin to engage.

Integrated real-time HR communication tools can help you and your management team focus less on paperwork and more on people. Think of it as the digital equivalent of an office with an open door!

The benefits of integrated communications extend to employees, as well. This leads to a more closely-knit workplace culture that operates more efficiently and is better aligned with business priorities.

5. Design Intuitive Workflows

Demand for better, faster response started with customer service. But it has quickly spread to internal organizational functions, as well.

When we ask HR a question, we want the answer now. We also want to find answers ourselves, ideally with no more than one or two taps on a smartphone.

This aspect of HR technology requires decision-makers to put themselves in an employee’s shoes for a reality check. How easy is it to perform a task you want to accomplish? For example, if you’re a full-time manager using a self-service benefits portal, how intuitive is the path to information you need at the moment you need it? How much information do you have to dig through to find a useful answer?

This aspect of HR technology is central to the employee experience. Why? Because, if employees struggle to use a digital tool, they will also struggle to adopt that tool and succeed with it.

Final Thoughts

HR technology can play an important role when you want to improve employee experience. Whether you’re implementing a self-service portal to support job applicants, deploying an employee feedback tool or expanding business process automation to improve HR response times, your efforts can positively influence talent acquisition and retention. These 5 priorities can help your team focus on solutions that will make a strong impact.

Why Build Your Own Freelance Talent Network?

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Sponsored by: Worksuite

The case for building a flexible talent network has never been more compelling. During the “Great Resignation” of 2021, 47 million U.S. employees voluntarily left their jobs. And in 2022, a wave of disengagement took hold among remaining workers, giving birth to the term “quiet quitting.” Now as 2023 begins, the global talent shortage continues to play havoc with hiring strategies.

Access to skilled people who can keep your business moving forward is no longer a sure thing. That’s why smart employers are investing in freelance talent options. But what’s the best way to find and manage a qualified pool of on-demand talent?

When building a contingent talent network, you may be tempted to source contractors from public marketplaces. This seems easy enough, but it can be a frustrating and time-consuming option. On the other hand, if you run an established business, you could grow your own talent pool by leveraging your brand presence, network connections and internal resources.

This do-it-yourself approach means you don’t need to rely on potentially low-quality, unknown talent from a third-party network. However, it does require some careful planning. So to help you achieve better results, here are our best tips for sourcing, hiring and retaining top freelance talent.

Why Avoid Public Talent Marketplaces?

Marketplaces like Fiverr and Upwork are often an easy and popular first stop for employers seeking on-demand talent. And they can be useful if you need support in a pinch. Whether you’re looking for developers, designers, writers, or photographers, these platforms let you choose from hundreds of eager freelancers — often at bargain prices. 

But with so many potential candidates for every opportunity, finding a freelancer who meets your specific requirements can take longer than you’d like. And these marketplaces tend to produce hit-or-miss results. Here’s why:

1. Barriers to Entry are Low

It’s possible to find some fantastic people on these platforms. But sourcing them can be time consuming for your managers and teams. That’s because it’s so easy for anyone to join these public marketplaces. No experience or qualifications are necessary. All it takes is an account and a profile that attracts clients.

Literally anyone can promote their freelance services on these sites, whether they’re capable and qualified, or not. You never know exactly what you’re getting until you actually work with a contractor.

2. Faking Performance Rankings is Easy

You might think it’s a safe bet to hire a freelancer with hundreds of glowing five-star customer reviews. But don’t be fooled. Social proof can be easily bought.

Positive reviews are essential to get found and hired from among the hundreds of other marketplace hopefuls. So naturally, freelancers want to look as good as possible, as fast as possible. But accumulating strong legitimate reviews for freelance services takes a lot of time and effort.

Artificially enhancing your marketplace ranking is illegal. Nevertheless, this has spawned an underground network of people who buy, sell, and exchange reviews so they can get ahead.

These false ranking services aren’t visible on public freelancer marketplaces. But a Google search quickly reveals plenty of opportunities to buy or swap reviews in places like these:

Some websites even blatantly offer to help freelancers falsify their marketplace rankings. Well-known options include ReviewXchange and Fiverr 5 Stars. 

Bottom line: When hiring from public freelance marketplaces, “buyer beware” is a smart strategy. But if you can achieve better results in other ways, why take unnecessary chances and spend limited time and resources on public marketplaces?

Are Any Public Talent Marketplaces Credible? 

If your only option is hiring from a third-party marketplace, we recommend considering a handful of “focused talent service platforms” (FTSPs). Freelancers accepted by these platforms have been rigorously screened to ensure they are qualified for positions they’re pursuing. This reduces your risk as a hiring organization and makes it easier for you to conduct a talent search with confidence.

Below are four viable FTSPs that offer fully vetted, high-quality talent:

  • MarketerHire — Provides access to qualified marketing specialists
  • IndieList — Offers carefully-screened freelancers, contractors, and consultants from Ireland 
  • BetterUp — Connects businesses with expert coaches
  • Springboard — Provides access to fully trained, vetted professionals in cybersecurity, software engineering, design, data science and tech sales

Harnessing the Power of a DIY Talent Network 

Generally, businesses recognize it’s cheaper and easier to retain existing customers rather than continuously hunting for new prospects. The same principle applies to talent acquisition. An internal talent pool offers multiple benefits:

1. Speed to Hire 

Sourcing new talent often requires substantial time from your team. But by tapping into an existing talent pool, the process can be as fast as running an advanced search in your freelancer management system database to find the best fit among available people.

A good platform can provide granular details about anyone in your talent pool. For example, you should quickly be able to find someone in your extended organization who has demonstrated the skills you need on another project. You may also see a note or ranking about this person’s contributions, so with only a few clicks you can determine the strength of the individual’s qualifications.

2. No Training Downtime 

Your existing talent is already familiar with your organization, its operations, and its work practices. This means you don’t need to spend extra time continually onboarding and training new people.

3. Leverage Talent Across Your Business 

By extending access to existing talent across your organization, you can improve cross-functional business performance and reduce overall hiring spend.

4. Grow Your Internal Talent Pool 

Freelancers don’t exist in a vacuum. They all are connected with other skilled people. You can expand your internal talent pool by tapping into these networks. It’s as easy as sending emails requesting referrals.

Experienced freelancers won’t refer you to people they don’t trust because they know it could damage their own reputation. But many will happily refer viable colleagues.

You may decide to incentivize referrals – or not. Either way, existing contractors can be a highly effective and efficient source of network growth.

For example, with an internal talent network platform like Worksuite, you can use the Marketplace module to post and share opportunities for upcoming work. You can also vet new candidates, assign work opportunities to individuals, and invite them to submit RFI-style proposals for upcoming projects. In addition, you can maximize your reach by sharing new opportunities with both internal and external sources.

Where to Look for Contingent Talent

Freelance marketplaces and job boards aren’t the only way to find great contingent talent. Consider these alternatives: 

  • Social Media — Outreach on platforms like Twitter and Facebook can attract candidates from members of your global brand community.
  • LinkedIn — You can search and contact freelancers directly or spread the word more broadly with posts on your LinkedIn company page or in specialized groups.
  • Referral Campaigns — Offering “finders fees” for referrals from employees and contractors can generate significant interest.
  • Alumni Talent Pools — Adding former employees and contractors to your database of on-demand resources is an easy way to maintain ties with qualified people.
  • Networking at Industry Events — Gathering profile data from participants at key professional conferences and other events can help you easily develop an extensive pipeline over time.

Developing Talent Network Trust and Loyalty

Sourcing is vital when building a high-quality freelance talent network. But that’s only the beginning. It’s also vital to keep people onboard and engaged with your organization.

Freelancers (especially in the Gen Z age bracket) know many opportunities are always available online. All it might take to land the next assignment is a single email or application. To keep potential candidates connected with your company, you’ll want to develop trusted relationships with valued contractors.

For example, these tactics are often effective:

  • Assign a steady, interesting flow of work opportunities
  • Communicate regularly and directly with active members
  • Gather ongoing feedback with periodic surveys 
  • Offer new assignments that expand on relevant skill sets
  • Provide loyalty incentives
  • Host annual awards to recognize excellent performers 
  • Increase pay rates to ensure top members are appropriately compensated

 

Worksuite: A Talent Network Solution

If you want to develop and manage your own talent pool, a specialized solution like Worksuite can make the process much easier. This platform includes essential features and metrics employers need to build and maintain a compliance administration and quickly identify top candidates whenever contractors are needed. Here’s how customers use Worksuite to support freelance talent strategies: 

1. Customize Onboarding Workflows

Worksuite partners with you to create an onboarding process that meets your exact needs. This includes capturing all the contracts, documents, tax information, and banking details needed before new freelancers are assigned to any project.

2. Add and Invite Freelancers to the Platform

Use sourcing and onboarding tools to reach out to prospective talent, and add qualified individuals to your detailed, searchable internal talent pool hub.

3. Ensure Contractor Compliance

Before assigning work to a freelancer, you must ensure they’ve received proper background checks and are compliant. This prevents costly legal problems down the road, especially when hiring global talent.

With Worksuite, background checks are managed through our partner, Checkr. This saves time for you as a hiring company while giving you peace of mind that every contractor you hire is legitimate. Worksuite also coordinates compliance administration. So, whether you’re working with 10 freelancers or 10,000, you know all NDAs, contracts and tax documents are in place to meet local and international regulatory requirements.

4. Publish a Searchable Talent Directory

Posting profiles of everyone in your talent pool gives your team a highly accessible overview of every contractor in your database. You can dive in deeper to see more details for any individual. Also, freelancers can access and edit their own profiles to be sure their information is always up to date.

5. Assign Groups, Tags and Rankings 

In addition to using the platform’s overview capabilities, you can easily organize freelancers in your dashboard. This gives HR and hiring managers full transparency into a member’s work history, background information, experience, skills, and abilities. 

You can also segment members into custom groups that make sense for your business, so you can easily search and select ideal candidates for any assignment at a granular level.

6. Rank, Rate, and Review Freelancers 

Talent rankings, ratings, reviews, and internal notes help your hiring team easily find any freelancer’s performance record at a glance. This helps you quickly decide who should be assigned to an opportunity (and who would not be an ideal candidate).

7. Track Key Metrics 

With Worksuite, you can set up metrics that reflect the quality and quality of deliverables your contractors produce. Here are some examples of metrics that help customers identify attractive candidates: 

  • Highest-rated members
  • Most engaged members
  • Talent active on multiple assignments (vs. only one assignment)
  • Percentage of assignments canceled prior to the start date 
  • Percentage of assignments rejected by members
  • Average number of assignments per member
  • Individuals who have not been assigned to any projects within the last 12 months 

8. Communicate Regularly With Network Members

You can manage all communication with network members directly from the Worksuite platform. Also, you can send personalized bulk messages using your organization’s filters. This helps freelancers stay engaged with your business, and keeps them up-to-date with your news and job opportunities.

9. Archive Talent Records

With Worksuite’s archive feature, you can remove access to the platform for freelancers who haven’t worked with you in more than 12 months. This helps keep your talent database current, so you know who’s still interested and available to work with your organization.

 

EDITOR’S NOTE:
To learn more about how Worksuite tools and services can help you start or grow a high-quality freelance talent network, contact Worksuite directly.

Are You Cultivating a “Culture-Add” Talent Strategy?

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In recent years, I’ve been encouraged by a groundswell of employers that are choosing to embrace “culture-add” people practices. In fact, several months ago, I wrote about it in a Sage Masterclass article.

Because this concept is central to the future of work, I’ve continued to ponder, read and discuss culture-add issues with others. Now I’m convinced this topic deserves much more than just one blog post. So let’s explore it further here. I hope this underscores the need for a shift to a culture-add recruitment and retention mindset. But more importantly, I hope it inspires constructive change.

What Does “Culture-Add” Mean?

The term “culture-add” speaks to a paradigm shift beyond traditional “culture-fit” talent strategies. On the surface, the culture-fit approach seems appealing. However, it ultimately leads to one-dimensional groups, teams, and organizations. And history tells us homogeneity can have dangerous consequences:  blind spots, groupthink, and poor decision-making.

In contrast, a “culture-add” approach actively seeks people with diverse perspectives that enhance teams and organizations. As we learn more about the significant benefits of a diverse workforce, culture-add hiring is emerging as an important way to strive for differences that make a positive impact.

As I noted in my previous article:

Most of us know that employees who align with a company’s values and fit into the culture generally have higher job satisfaction, improved job performance, and frankly, stick around longer. However, we are resting on our laurels if we use this as our rationale for continuing to use the culture-fit model.”

Embracing Organizational Change

We all know humans tend to resist change. In fact, the old adage, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” was suitable for a long time. It still holds some merit, so let’s not dismiss it completely. Tried-and-true processes can potentially save us from all kinds of turmoil — emotional, logistical, financial, and more.

However, if we want to innovate and grow, we must also be able to adapt. No doubt, changing an organization’s cultural fabric can be daunting. But it is necessary for long-term viability.

As Stephanie Burns says in a 2021 Forbes column, Why Evolving Your Business Right Now Is Critical:

Anyone who has wanted to cling to how things were will be in for a surprise this year, as COVID-19 entirely shifted the original paradigm. However, it’s also presented an opportunity for businesses and individuals to evolve into new ways of being.

COVID hasn’t just turned the world on its head, it’s accelerated trends that were already happening, such as the shift to remote work and the collective desire for more convenience…

Still, some founders don’t want much change. This could be due to fear of the unknown or fear that leaving their old business model, which had worked so well for so long, could be catastrophic. However, we’re reaching a critical impasse where businesses that don’t evolve may very well fade out of the picture. Evolution is a natural part of all of our lives, and our businesses are no exception.”

Leaders would be wise to heed this important advice, even if it seems overwhelming. It’s time to change. Our work cultures are constantly shifting. We, too, should remain prepared to embrace new ideas, processes, and people who can make us better.

Culture-add hiring can support this process by inviting more diverse minds and voices to the table as we dream up fresh ideas and orchestrate change. This reminds me of a related term — new blood. We need new blood to thrive.

Connecting Culture-Add and Diversity

This conversation leads us directly to the benefits of diversity. There’s an excellent article on the NeuroLeadership Institute blog, Your Brain at Work: Why Diverse Teams Outperform Homogeneous Teams. The entire piece is worth reading, but here’s a noteworthy excerpt:

Diverse teams are particularly good at exposing and correcting faulty thinking, generating fresh and novel ideas, and accounting for a wider array of variables in planning.

Part of the reason this happens is due to what scientists call cognitive elaboration — the process of sharing, challenging, and expanding our thinking. In essence, diverse teams compel each other to think more deeply about their reasoning and interrogate the facts more objectively.

They share counterfactuals as they go, they don’t take things for granted, and there is minimal ‘social loafing’ — or just accepting things at face value. In short, diverse teams tend to come to better conclusions because those conclusions have been road-tested more thoroughly.”

The science of diversity in teams is truly fascinating. It tells us that recruiting and hiring leaders can help by feeding teams with talented people who can accentuate the benefits of diversity.

Of course, diversity and inclusion don’t end with hiring. The next step is fostering a workplace that makes a wide variety of people feel valued. This is not an easy task. However, it is essential. So let’s look closer at what to consider…

Tips For Building a Culture-Add Mentality

1. Actively weave a sense of belonging into your workforce

As you build a more diverse organization through culture-add hiring, don’t be surprised if cliques and segmentation develop based on geographical, cultural, and other distinctions. That’s natural! But challenge your people to also learn and share what they have in common with others. Allow space for these common interests and goals to surface.

The Why Diverse Teams Outperform Homogeneous Teams article offers a compelling reason to make this a priority:

The benefits of diversity aren’t likely to accrue if we simply put together a team of diverse individuals and assign them a task. The environment in which they’re working should be inclusive — one in which all members feel valued and as if they have a voice.

In that inclusive environment, the benefits of diversity are far more likely to materialize. If not, employees will leave the organization, or worse, stay but not contribute. Diversity without inclusion only creates a revolving door of talent.”

Vigorously work on building a sense of belonging so people of different ages, backgrounds, and lifestyles feel celebrated for their differences. After all, you’ve brought them in to add to your culture, so allow them to shine.

2. Prepare to fully retrain your recruiting and hiring staff

This tip could stand alone as an article, white paper, or college thesis. But to be brief, let’s use an example to illustrate how deeply culture-add hiring upends the traditional approach:

Previously, when Bob hired someone at XYZ insurance company, he considered a candidate like Stan an excellent fit. That’s because Stan lived in a similar neighborhood, was married to a well-liked woman, and had kids who were high achievers. If Stan also golfed on the weekends and enjoyed a steak dinner, even better! He’d fit right into XYZ Insurance and would have a fulfilling career.

As mentioned previously, this model once made a lot of sense. Cultural similarities and a genuine “he’s one of us” mentality created a comfortable atmosphere where longevity was often the result. Unfortunately, homogeneous organizations were also the result.

Today’s businesses face new challenges that require a different approach. Your talent acquisition team can start by taking the initiative to reassess the criteria they use to find people (where, how). Then you can reframe the recruitment conversation from end to end.

Instead of looking for people to fit a standard outdated profile, allow questions and conversations to emphasize and embrace differences in candidates. What can they add versus how do they fit?

Begin by asking yourself and others in your organization to talk openly about how hiring is being handled, and what kind of outcomes this approach is creating — for better or worse.

If a culture-fit model still drives your talent decisions, don’t be ashamed to admit it. But if that’s the case, you’ll want to start making changes soon. Because I assure you, your competitors are already moving toward culture-add for the win.

Are Job Candidates Ghosting You? Try This Recruiter’s Advice

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Spooky season is upon us! People are carving pumpkins, dressing in crazy costumes, and swapping scary stories. So, in the spirit of Halloween, we’re taking on a truly horrifying subject. This is so frightening it can make a hiring manager’s hair stand on end at the very mention. That’s right. We’re talking about candidate ghosting. Beware!

Is Ghosting For Real?

Oxford Languages defines ghosting as “the practice of ending a personal relationship with someone by suddenly and without explanation withdrawing from all communication.”

When somebody ghosts you, they stop replying to your messages, they don’t answer calls, they stop all forms of communication. There’s never any explanation—they simply disappear without a trace.

Originally a dating term, ghosting is becoming increasingly common in business, especially in the context of recruiting. For example, a 2021 survey by Indeed found that 28% of job applicants had an employer—10% more than in 2019. And today’s reality seems much worse. In fact, a U.K. poll earlier this year found that more than 75% of job hunters admit to ghosting in the past year. Scary statistics, to be sure!

Why Do People Act So Creepy?

There’s no single reason why candidates ghost potential employers. But ghosting clearly seems more common when job vacancies are prevalent in a particular sector. 

When more opportunities are available, applicants have less incentive to keep in touch. They will often receive viable offers more quickly, so when they do, they’ll accept the most attractive option and move on.

However, ghosting also happens when vacancies are few and far between. We’ve seen it up close at our own recruiting agency, even in niche roles where very few opportunities exist. 

In a discussion with our team, one brave team member confessed to ghosting a prospective employer in the past. She explained, “I was pretty far into the interview process when a few issues raised concerns for me. These were mainly about time off, travel expenses—things that probably should have been resolved up front.”

The truth is, we can make some educated guesses about a candidate’s motivations, they can ghost us for any reason. Without an explanation from the candidate, you’ll never know for sure what happened—and that’s what makes it so frustrating.

The Business Impact of Ghosting

Probably the worst impact of ghosting is that it wastes time. You could spend months sourcing credible talent and conducting interviews. You may even get to the stage where you’re negotiating a package. And then without warning—poof!—that top candidate goes silent. 

Ghosting is not only time-consuming—it is expensive as well. Consider this:

The average U.S. cost per hire is $4,700 for a non-executive role and $14,936 for an executive, according to Zippia. Most roles are filled within roughly 42 days, but it can take much longer when ghosting comes into play.

And it’s not just about the extra cost of a delayed hiring process. It’s also important to take into account the business cost of an unfilled role, which can cost employers dearly in terms of lower business productivity, quality, and responsiveness.

How Can You Combat Ghosting?

Although it’s impossible to shut down ghosting altogether, we’ve learned some techniques to help employers prevent candidates from vanishing into thin air.

1) Invest in the Relationship

Put yourself in a candidate’s shoes. As one recruitment specialist told the BBC earlier this year, “Candidates are being approached all the time with an abundance of jobs to choose from […] if they have multiple applications on the go, it can be easier to simply ignore one of them.”

If a candidate is in contact with multiple recruiters or hiring managers, it’s easy for several to fall off of the radar. But if you develop a working relationship with candidates, you’ll remain top-of-mind. Just as you would with a friend or colleague, make sure you stay in regular contact with candidates. Show that you care by touching base when you say you will and by keeping them updated throughout the hiring process.

2) Be Transparent From the Start

Before you move forward, strive to clarify what a candidate is seeking in a role, and reflect on whether your offer will meet those expectations.

People may feel uncomfortable telling you they’re unhappy or unsure about an aspect of a role. Instead, they may find it easier to simply move on. So be sure you understand their job requirements from the start of your working relationship.

In particular, don’t keep the details of an offer secret. For example, if a candidate is interested only in working remotely, an in-office location will likely be a dealbreaker. It’s best to be upfront about every aspect of the role before you make an offer. This saves time for both you and the candidate.

3) Establish a Long-Term Connection

Smart hiring managers and recruitment specialists help candidates recognize the value of maintaining a relationship throughout their careers. Rather than just completing an immediate transaction, recruiters can introduce candidates to influential people within their industry and help build their professional network over time.

Ghosting can cause unintended reputational damage. So, if you help candidates see the long game, they’ll be less likely to abruptly end your communication. 

4) Respond Kindly to a Rejection

We’ve seen employers lash out at candidates who decline an offer. This is a surefire way to encourage more ghosting! If a candidate rejects a job application, remember they’re doing you a favor by responding at all.

Keep responses polite and professional. Thank the candidate for their transparency, wish them well, and keep the door open for the future. It’s a surprisingly small and very well-connected world. So think about how much goodwill a gracious response can help your organization, in the long run.

5) Ask People Not to Ghost

Sometimes the best way to encourage candidates not to ghost you is just to…ask! Tell people upfront that if they change their mind about the opportunity at any point, you would really appreciate a heads-up.

This approach has often worked for our team. It lets us be more proactive in filling roles for our clients. Because we have spent time nurturing trust with our candidates, they tend to be candid in sharing their thoughts.

Of course, this may not work every time, but it can’t hurt to try.

6) Recognise When You’re Being Ghosted

…and move on. Don’t assume that a candidate will eventually get back in touch with you to seal the deal. If a candidate is wasting your time, then your energy is better spent on finding a more suitable applicant elsewhere.

Similarly, you should never put all your recruiting eggs in one candidate basket. With ghosting on the rise, it’s crucial to have at least one active candidate at any given time. But ideally, you should keep two or three more high-quality candidates in the running for an open position, as well.

7) Don’t Ghost

You may have been ghosted, but there’s never a reason for an employer to be a ghost. Employers who blow off applicants can quickly develop a bad reputation for ghosting and wasting candidates’ time, too. 

If we expect candidates not to ghost, we must treat them the way we would like to be treated. Recognizing the time and effort unsuccessful candidates have put into their applications is a must.

Employers should keep all candidates informed of the outcome of their application, whether it is positive or negative. Otherwise, that negative candidate experience may come back to haunt your organization in the future.

All this Ghosting Talk Is Kind of Scary!

But don’t worry, you made it to the end. And now you’re much better equipped to avoid those wicked ghosts. Poof!

Great Hires Are Better Than Frequent Fires: How Smart Recruiting Helps

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Sponsored by: RocketReach

Hiring teams know just how hard it is to find candidates who hit the mark with both soft skills and technical skills.  Ideally, a new hire brings the majority of the hard skills required to do the job well. But soft skills are equally important, if not more important, depending on your company’s philosophy. In combination, hard and soft skills allow for a highly productive team and culturally rich environment.  So, how do you identify these powerhouse candidates? This is when smart recruiting tactics can make a strategic impact.

Why? Finding and placing high-performing candidates should be every HR professional’s primary goal. But if recruiting focuses more on an individual’s experience than their ability to enhance your culture or have the right attitude to learn, that hire could likely be a mismatch long term. How can you avoid this? To illustrate, let’s look closer at how we approach hiring at RocketReach…

Smart Recruiting: Why Prioritize Soft Skills?

Of course, every job depends on a core technical or business skill set. However, we over-index on culture and behavioral skills because a candidate’s character matters, here. Well, not just here, but in all successful, people-first organizations.

A candidate with great skills requires less on-the-job training. But someone who’s a great cultural fit often possesses untrainable qualities that embody an organization’s values and vision. So it’s wise to get a read on each candidate’s potential to adapt to your culture and perform well with the team. 

What exactly is at stake? Well, according to a new SHRM report, over the past five years, 20% of Americans left a job because the company culture was bad. In fact, the cost of this turnover is estimated at more than $223 billion.

Here are several more findings to consider: 56% of Americans now say they feel less-than-fulfilled at work, while 26% say they dread going to work each day. In today’s talent market, finding an ideal candidate may not be easy. But hiring a strong candidate who also fits your company culture is arguably just as important (if not more so!) as hiring someone just because they have the desired level of experience.

How Smart Recruiting Leads to a Stronger Culture

Clearly, it’s important to build and sustain a people-first company culture. But how can smart recruiting help determine if a candidate is (or isn’t) a good “fit”?

1. Understand Your Work Culture

When considering your company’s culture, don’t just analyze intangible items like general employee vibes. Also include your leadership structure, core mission, and vision, office environment, feedback and performance review processes, as well as overall interpersonal communication styles. These and other factors contribute to the relationships within your team and how the company is investing in its people. They also influence employee retention and how others perceive your organization.

Harvard Business Review agrees that a carefully crafted positive company culture helps develop workforce well-being. At this point, we all know how important culture is for working professionals. Every employee touchpoint, from onboarding to offboarding, influences how your organization’s culture affects your employees. As a result, people rank workplace well-being higher in importance than monetary compensation or material benefits. So, culture deserves to be top-of-mind with each new hire. 

2. Identify Characteristics That Map to Your Culture

Once you’ve clarified your company culture, let’s assume you want to sustain it. Using your analysis, you can identify the characteristics of current employees who are thriving. You can also compare and contrast those characteristics with previous employees who are better suited to a different culture. 

On the other hand, if you’d like to improve your culture, you can start identifying candidates whose soft skills align with your desired organizational direction.

For example, say your workforce is fully remote. This means collaboration is probably more challenging than in a traditional office environment. You may want to focus on candidates who demonstrate that they’re self-starters with a strong sense of resourcefulness, self-efficacy, and proactive ownership

Or, if your company’s mission and values emphasize diversity and inclusion, you may want to focus on candidates who are open-minded, adaptable, and have a curious approach to problem-solving. Try targeting candidates who seem resistant to change and more accepting of those with different backgrounds and ideas.

Of course, the idea of cultural alignment isn’t new. For example, a popular 2005 personnel study still cited today concludes that when employee characteristics align with company culture, their job satisfaction and performance are also stronger.

3. Interview With Alignment In Mind

After you understand the qualities a candidate needs to be successful in a given role, it’s time for interviews. Along with questions that evaluate hard skills, what are some questions you should ask to determine a candidate’s soft skills?

  1. What about our organization made you want to apply for this position?
    Pay attention to the enthusiasm and focus of each candidate’s answers. Did your benefits seem particularly attractive? Was it your company brand or careers page? Or was it the job description, itself? Do the candidate’s personal values align with your company’s? Each answer is a clue about the individual’s perspective, motivations and interests. This can determine how closely a candidate’s values align with your team’s and how you can sell them on these things down the line if they are a great fit.
  2. What does your ideal next role look like?
    This can tell a recruiter tons about the type of environment in which a candidate will thrive. Do they envision working independently or in a group? What main responsibilities does this person want to own and enjoy most? Are they hoping to grow in mentorship or people management?? This can show you if your current team and environment fit the candidate’s needs.
  3. If one of your colleagues disagreed with you in front of a group during a board meeting or a meeting with leadership, how would you handle this?
    Sharing a hypothetical question about a challenging situation and asking for a suggested solution can reveal someone’s ability to listen and collaborate, think critically, and have the right attitude under pressure.
  4. Tell me about a time when you felt an employer’s culture didn’t suit your needs. Why do you believe it wasn’t the right fit for you?
    Sometimes a direct approach is the best approach. Pay careful attention to see what the answer reveals about the potential fit with your current culture (or the culture you’re working to achieve).

There are a million ways to ask interview questions that focus on soft skills and culture. But whatever questions you choose, make sure you tailor each to your company’s values and needs.

Hiring managers will understand the characteristics that align with an open position and the overall company culture. This frees you to get creative and keep interviews candid and human. The less “cookie cutter” your questions are, the better they will serve your talent strategy in the long run. More importantly, ensure that your interview teams are trained to over-index on culture and company values – that way everyone is looking through a people-first lens. So whether you’re conducting a pre-screening interview, or you’re in a final-round group interview, put your culture front and center. 

Traditional Hiring Practices Are Inefficient for Hiring Leaders

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There hasn’t been a time in recent history when the development and application of smart hiring practices has been more important. Companies are struggling to hire the best and the brightest while facing a unique set of challenges. We’ll explore if we are meeting this inflection point effectively — and what companies can do to improve their response.

Our Guest: Lou Adler

On the last Worktrends Podcast, I spoke with Lou Adler. We discussed hiring practices and how businesses can take it to the next level.

‎Lou Adler is a well-known hiring expert, who turned the recruitment industry on its head through his performance-based recruiting model. With over 40 years in the recruiting industry, Lou’s company, the Adler Group has trained over 40,000 hiring managers and placed 1500 executives for many of the fastest-growing companies.

He is a top LinkedIn influencer and author, known for The Essential Guide for Hiring and Getting Hired and the Amazon top 10 best seller Hire With Your Head, Using Performance-Based Hiring to Build Great Teams, translated into multiple languages.

Hiring Decisions: Are We Making Progress?

You contend that hiring results haven’t improved much in the past 25 years. What is the basis for this claim after tens of billions have been spent on new HR tech?

Well, the biggest claim is… I look at the Gallup satisfaction report, which comes out monthly and it hovers around 30 to 33% of people who are actually satisfied with their jobs. And that number hasn’t changed in 25 years since they started taking it.

So as far as I’m concerned, things have not only not gotten better, they have gotten worse. And I contend, I know the reasons why, but that’s least sufficient proof to say, “Hey, maybe we do have a problem.”

The Great Resignation & Job Satisfaction

Let’s talk about the great resignation. In all of the implications, what are you seeing here? And do you have suggestions for companies, recruiters, and job seekers around this?

To me, and it goes back to the underlying problem of why people are dissatisfied and it really comes down to the point that people take jobs and they don’t really know what the work is. And they don’t know what the style of the manager is, they don’t know the quality of the team, and they’re not a hundred percent sure of what the expectations are.

The satisfaction is driven by the work itself, the people, the company, the manager, the projects, the impact they’re making, and people give that to a shrift. They focus too much on the start date, not enough on the actual work they’re doing.

So to me, that’s the underlying problem of dissatisfaction. And it’s gotten worse because people are now trying to hire faster for more money. So now you have the great resignation, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

The Solution: Recruiters Need to Understand the Roles

Recruiting, with no understanding of the role, won’t help us recruit and retain the contributors. It’s time to change the mindset about how we approach discussions with candidates. Quick hiring, without deep consideration of the roles, is fueling negative outcomes. 

I have the knowledge that I believe is correct, but I think you have HR leaders and companies that have a strategy designed, “Hey, let’s fill jobs as fast as we can.”

And yet I believe the process of making that decision, “Should I hire this candidate?” And from the candidate’s perspective, “Should I take this job?” That is a much more detailed, thorough evaluation. That’s an investment on the company’s standpoint in hiring this person and an investment on the candidate, “Hey, should I invest my time in this company?”

And I don’t think the tools that both sides use to make that decision are evaluated properly. I think people have competency models. They’ve got behavioral interviewing. I think that’s a band-aid solution, and I don’t think they’ve really addressed the core problem.

The Solution: Take the Time to Define the Work

There are steps to improving hiring. However, more time on the front end of the process is necessary. This requires a close look at critical performance objectives — and incorporating these into a method, a “scorecard”, that can direct the entire recruiting process.

If you want to implement performance-based hiring, you have to only do two things. Number one is you don’t take a requisition filled with skills, experience and competencies. Instead, you take a requisition that lists the five or six key performance objectives the person taking that job needs to do over the course of the year to be considered successful.

We call that a win-win hiring outcome. Meaning the candidate says, “I’m so glad I had this job over the year and I’m enjoying this work.” And hiring manager says, “I’m so glad I hired that person.” So, defining the work is that core thing.

The other bookend is, don’t accept or don’t hire anybody unless they meet the standards on a tool. We call it the Quality of Hire Talent Scorecard, which determines the 10 best predictors of on the job success. If you just put those two bookends in, don’t hire anybody who doesn’t meet these performance requirements and define those performance requirements up front, you’ll figure out what you’ve got to do in the middle to get there.

In Summary: When Hiring, Emphasize Key Performance Indicators & Consistently Apply That Strategy

Overall, we cannot hope to improve hiring decisions without taking the time to understand the specifics of the role. The ensuing process should not be a race to hire, but a race to capture the important aspects of the role and communicate this effectively to candidates.

The issue to get to that though, requires a lot more work. It’s not just, “Will you take this offer at this point in time?” I have to understand the job, I have to understand the environment, the candidate has to understand, “Is this the right career move? Is it work that I’m intrinsically motivated to do? Can I work with this team? And can I work with a manager’s style?”

I hope you found this episode of #WorkTrends helpful. I know that I found the discussion fascinating.

Subscribe to the #WorkTrends podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. Also, for more great conversations, be sure to follow #WorkTrends on LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram!

5 Strategies for Defining Your Employer Brand

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Vanilla is one of the most popular flavors in the world. Just ensure it doesn’t become how people describe your employer brand.

Today’s job candidates and workers are often compelled to stay with one company versus another because of the company’s purpose and value. In other words, companies need a strong, direct, authentic employer brand that keeps employees from quitting and joining the Great Resignation. In most cases, a vanilla employee experience won’t cut it anymore.

A Modern Employer Brand

Instead of a basic, old-school employer brand, you need one that’s modern. You need a brand that reflects what your organization stands for and what talent can expect, even if it turns some applicants away.

Companies with substantive employer branding often embrace not being a good fit for everyone. Their employee value proposition statements illustrate their workplace’s true “give and get” nature. With this model, when a team member is willing to “give” in one area, they can expect to “get” something in return. It’s a reciprocal relationship that’s offered up plainly and unabashedly.

If this sounds unusual, it’s because only now are organizations strategically revising and advertising their employer brands more deeply. As employees become more critical of their work environments, many leave their longstanding positions to find companies that align with their values and goals. Especially in the ever-changing workforce, it’s important to learn from others’ mistakes so your company prospers rather than plummets.

Communicate a Meaningful Change

Even massive employer branding face-lifts, like Facebook’s rebranding to Meta, are not enough. Such a change can be perceived as surface-level and doesn’t create or communicate any meaningful change. And because in recent years, candidates have begun conducting employer brand research and digging deeper, transparency and authentic connection are key. Candidates and employees want sincerity. Candidates want to know what your company stands for to decide if it aligns with their passions and purpose. In other words, they want you to lay everything on the table as part of your employer branding.

Where, then, do you start? Below are five employer brand research tactics that will help you define and establish a genuinely distinct employer brand that reflects not only where your company is today but also where it will be tomorrow.

1. Assign a range of leaders to an employer branding committee.

As with any initiative, your employer branding efforts require commitment. An employer branding committee will help construct your employer brand from the ground up and serve as a strategic resource moving ahead.

To get the most out of your committee, including team members from across departments and verticals such as talent acquisition, marketing, diversity and inclusion, and sales will ensure that you aren’t overlooking any key issues as you flesh out what your employer brand means.

2. Host an employer branding kickoff meeting.

After inviting critical players to the table, hold a workshop to allow everyone to get on the same page regarding your employer branding goals. Hold this workshop in person, online, or both. After all, quality employer branding should be geographically agnostic.

During the event, review your employer branding elements. Try to get a handle on how all departments and groups see your organization. Are there disconnects, such as between your mission statement and the experience of workers as measured by employee insights like exit interviews? These are the areas to start cementing your preferred employer brand.

3. Conduct interviews with members of your leadership team.

A huge reason for misalignments between the employer brand you want and the employer brand you have is that leaders’ aspirations don’t always match up to your employer branding expectations.

As part of your conversations, find out what your company leaders demand and admire about their employees. Attempt to get a sense of what working for them looks like so you can revise your employer brand accordingly. Remember that you want your employer brand to be transparent when presenting your organizational work life.

4. Complete focus groups with a cross-section of employees.

Now that you’ve heard from the people steering the ship do a little research to learn more about the daily experiences of employees. Hold about a half-dozen two-hour sessions with up to 10 workers in each session. Use these focus group sessions to find out why the employees chose your organization and what motivates them most — and least. Try to understand the “give and get” exchanges happening. Don’t be surprised if you realize that your employer brand is more complicated than you might have thought.

5. Gauge the market’s view on your employer brand.

At this point, you should start to have a fleshed-out idea of your employer brand. How does it match up to your competition? Ideally, you want your employer brand to gain attention because it’s compelling or engaging. Therefore, spend time investigating the employer brands of your talent competitors.

Check out Glassdoor ratings, social media posts, and other markers of general brand sentiment. Be sure to check out job descriptions, too. Everything you learn can be folded back into maturing and solidifying your employer brand.

Final Words

Years ago, employer branding seemed easy: Pop a ping-pong table in the breakroom, offer beer on tap, and you were done. In 2022, high performers are looking for something deeper and more substantial out of their employee experiences. They’re looking for companies with employer brands that are straightforward and real and that offer workers a chance to be a part of a company they know they can trust and believe in. Developing a research strategy and research infrastructure for employer branding enables you to be that for them.

Work Sucks, But It’s Our Fault

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Burnout and dissatisfaction at work are nothing new. In fact, a recent Gallup study found that more than one-half of American workers feel disengaged at their jobs. Too often we look at work as a necessary evil. We have to do it to pay the bills, but it’s not really something we’re passionate about. 

Meanwhile, business owners and leaders are left scratching their heads wondering why their employees are unhappy and unengaged. The business suffers as a result. So what’s the solution? How can businesses create a culture that engages and motivates employees where productivity and creativity actually thrive?

Our Guest: Dr. Tiffany Slater

On our latest #WorkTrends podcast, I spoke with Dr. Tiffany Slater, CEO and Senior Human Resources Consultant for HR TailorMade. Dr. Slater believes that the people you work with are the single most important element to building a thriving future for your business. Happy people make the world a better place.

What does it mean that people suck and why should we blame ourselves? Dr. Slater explains:

I know that sounds crazy as an HR person for me to say that but you have to say the whole thing together.  People suck and it’s our fault. As leaders, it is our responsibility to make sure that our team has everything that they need to be successful. And when they’re not successful the first thing we have to do is look at ourselves and ask if we did all that we could to make sure that they were successful. So that’s why people suck because a lot of times we don’t do our part.

Employee Performance

There are so many factors that play into a person’s ability to perform at their best. So how can business owners or leaders identify those factors and ensure that people are performing at the highest levels? Dr. Slater:

Make sure the work environment is conducive to being successful as a team member. I think the most important thing is that we create an environment that people actually love. The days are gone when people are just happy to come to work for a paycheck. People want to like what they do and where they do it.

Dr. Slater adds:

Make sure that people understand what value they add to the organization. Making it very clear what an individual’s role is in the overall success of the organization motivates people to want to work at their highest level.

Hiring People Who Don’t Suck and Firing People Who do

Hiring the right people can be challenging, time-consuming, and expensive. Equally as challenging is knowing when to fire someone vs investing the time to discover ways to help them perform at a higher level. So how do we hire people who don’t suck? Dr. Slater:

We hire people that don’t suck by making sure that we ask the right questions up front, and making sure that upon their onboarding we have a plan already designed to support their success.

And when do we fire people who do? Dr. Slater adds:

We shouldn’t just fire people that suck. So obviously there will be times when it’s necessary but that should not be our first response. We should always look to discover what we can do to help that individual to perform at a higher level. And if we’ve done that once or twice then we should start considering if it’s the right fit and if they truly just suck.

Joy in the Workplace

Bringing joy into the workplace leads to better business results and higher employee performance. Dr. Slater explains.

If you will create a joyful work experience for your team they want to stay. They want to work in your organization. Additionally, they want to help the organization to be successful because they understand that the organization’s success is also their success. So creating joyful work experiences is truly the key to a successful business. And I would be willing to bet that it is the key to making the world a better place because happy people make the world a better place.

I hope you found this recent episode of #WorkTrends informative and inspiring. To learn more about Dr. Tiffany Slater and HR TailorMade, please visit https://www.hrtailormade.com/.

Subscribe to the #WorkTrends podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. Be sure to follow our #WorkTrends hashtag on LinkedIn and Facebook, too, for more great conversations!

7 Tips For A Successful Remote Hiring Process

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Gone are those days when people used to travel to their workplaces. According to a Pew Research report, about one-fifth of workers having the flexibility to work from home are doing so. 

With the onset of the pandemic, global employment methods and the work culture changed forever. By December 2020, 71% of the working population were working remotely. Yet, even as the pandemic threat subsided, many professionals chose to work from home. In November 2021, a report by Gallup showed that 45% of full-timers were still working remotely, either part-time or full-time. 

This sudden paradigm shift to remote work has affected the work culture of almost all organizations worldwide. Today, recruits and even legacy employees demand a flexible hybrid working model. This pushes companies to rethink their business model to incorporate the shifting dynamics of a remote workforce. Companies must design a cohesive culture in a digital environment, and the change should begin right from the recruitment process. 

This article will address the importance of remote hiring in the modern industry and offer actionable solutions to its complexities. 

Why is Remote Hiring Important?

We’ve just emerged from a global pandemic that forced people everywhere to stay confined within the four walls of their homes. In 2020, as governments imposed lockdowns across countries, most organizations chose to operate remotely – this sudden transition was anything but smooth. Although challenging, corporations could stay afloat by adopting radical remote hiring and working strategies. This is when the reliance on digital collaboration tools like Zoom, Google Meet, Slack, etc., skyrocketed massively. 

Soon, companies realized that remote hiring offers numerous advantages, especially for global employment. With the possibility of remote work on cards, most corporations can now hire international employees. 

As the modern workspace is no longer limited by geographical location and borders, organizations can tap into a broader global talent pool. This is a win-win situation for businesses and job seekers. Since companies can source talent from anywhere globally, they can save money on employee relocation costs and forego the hassle of arranging for work permits and visas. On the other hand, skilled and qualified people can apply for their desired roles in top companies without being restricted by geographical boundaries. 

As remote work became the norm, many corporations realized that retaining talent is now relatively easier. With employees working from the comfort of their homes, they can maintain a better work-life balance and be more agile and productive. Remote or hybrid working has had a direct impact on the well-being of employees, with a recent Forbes report claiming that it boosts employee happiness by as much as 20%. 

Thus remote hiring is pivotal for international hiring since it helps build a diverse team comprising skilled and qualified people who are satisfied with their job. 

Guidelines for a Remote Hiring Process

Although companies can source talent internationally now, there remains a shortage of skilled workers, particularly in specialized areas. In addition, upwork reports that around 78% of HR managers consider that skills will become more niche in the ensuing decade. Consequently, about 91% of managers have already resorted to more agile hiring strategies. 

Cultivating a work culture that is both diverse and inclusive starts with remote recruiting. Businesses must adopt an open mindset and implement innovative hiring approaches to build a competent remote team. 

While there’s no shortcut to hiring best-suited candidates virtually, employers can follow these guidelines while remotely hiring employees. 

1. Invest in Remote Hiring Pre-Work

In collaboration with the Harvard Business School, a recent study by Accenture revealed that a significant portion of qualified employees is deterred by online job portfolios put up by employers. 

Hence, employers must switch up their job promotion tactics. For instance, they can create attractive job descriptions highlighting a specific role’s key skills and responsibilities. Hiring managers can also accurately describe their company’s remote policy to maintain transparency across job platforms. They should also include any logistical requirements, such as expected timezones or the frequency of monthly office visits. 

It’s crucial to create tailormade job ads for different platforms. Pasting the same hiring advertisement for all job profiles will mean you risk the chance of losing out on a potential talented applicant.

2. Importance of Video Interviewing 

Today, freelancers and full-time employees feel more comfortable with remote employment. Hence, employers can no longer ignore the importance of video interviewing for remote hiring. Usually, employers/recruiters cannot meet the remote applicants face-to-face, and thus, they have to evaluate a candidate’s skills through video interviews. 

However, video conferencing comes with its challenges. For instance, there can be audio-video glitches or internet disturbance during the interview. Employers can easily overcome these issues by creating a solid interview setup for remote hiring, including a reliable internet connection, double-checking the tech before logging in, etc. Also, it helps to have a Plan B ready if there’s any glitch during a video interview. 

Tip: Be punctual and present in the chatroom when the applicant enters. Slowly ease into the interview process through casual chatting. 

3. Be Transparent 

Recruiting international talent can be a tricky process. However, being transparent about your company’s mission and your expectations from the employees is a commendable start to the employer-employee relationship. This will help you lead by example and gain your employees’ trust. 

4. Prioritize Collaborative Hiring

Fostering teamwork is a pivotal addition to your company’s work culture. Ensure to involve all the relevant teams while hiring employees remotely. It allows your employees to get involved in the core operations and makes them feel valued. 

Collaborative hiring also allows you to acquire valuable input from different team members, making the whole hiring process more comprehensive. Ensure that your Applicant Tracking System (ATS) can facilitate team collaboration and accommodate multiple users. 

5. Integrate Technical Skills Assessment 

All employers must evaluate applicants’ hard skills, especially for highly competitive niche roles. For instance, recruiters may assign projects or coding problems to assess a candidate’s real-world skills for tech roles like data scientist or web developer. 

Project-based assessments are a foolproof way to test a candidate’s competency and skills. For example, a 2021 HackerEarth developer survey states that nearly 40% of working developers prefer to sit for video interviews that provide remote editing tools. 

6. Provide Details Pre-Interview

When recruiters fail to offer detailed information about a role, most candidates are unprepared for the interviews. This makes the entire interviewing process futile. 

You can avoid this by providing applicants with all relevant details related to the job during the pre-interview stage. Also, putting up details online will ensure a level playing field for all candidates. Another great idea is to conduct career fairs before the scheduled interview to help candidates comprehend what you expect from them. 

7. Hire People with Remote Work Experience

This might sound odd, but remote working isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. With minimal to no supervision, remote workers are autonomous – they are their own boss. Unfortunately, this may lead to sluggish outputs and missed deadlines. Founder of Baremetrics, Josh Pigford, explains it aptly, “….. It’s a skill set. You have to know how to work remotely.” 

Thus, hiring people with some remote work experience might make an employer’s responsibility of supervising and managing employees easier in the long run. 

To Conclude

Employers must meticulously plan their remote hiring process to fit the needs of the modern remote workforce that operates across borders. From advertising job vacancies to onboarding remote employees – every step of the hiring process must be well-thought-out. 

We hope these tips help align your remote hiring strategies with your company goals.