THE FUTURE OF TALENT ACQUISITION

As 2024 begins, we thought we’d discuss what we see as “the future of talent acquisition” in the coming year.

Most people focus on the following:

The rise of using AI in recruiting.
The continued growth of remote work. (Yes, it’s going to continue to grow, even if employers may not “like” it as much as their employees do.)

Instead, we’d like to focus on areas most recruiting pundits don’t:

Looking for great talent anywhere (because they can work from anywhere), rather than recruiting talent near your company/branch.
Focusing on upskilling/reskilling in order to retain great employees, thus keeping their work ethic, deep knowledge of your company’s “way of doing things/its ethos” and saving you considerable expense in hiring someone new, getting them up to speed, etc.
Looking for talent in “non-traditional” pools.

Great talent needn’t live near you

Time was (pre-2019), most of your employees likely worked within a 60- to 90-minute or so commute from your office or branch.

Then the pandemic showed that team members could work from home with the help of technology and provide their employers with great results coupled with the same – or even additional — productivity. Most employees who can work from home want to work from home, even it’s two or three days a week.

But this can be a boon to you: if you feel comfortable never seeing an employee much, there’s absolutely no need for you to hire someone within commuting distance. Which opens up a terrific opportunity: you can hire anyone who lives practically anywhere.

Your talent pool thus has GREATLY expanded!

Which means that you’ll undoubtedly find someone with the exact skills you need. In short, you may – ever again – have to “settle” for the “good enough” employee.

Upskilling/reskilling: training (and therefore retaining) great people

Even as you could conceivably find someone with the exact skills you need who lives far from your location, 2024 and beyond also will see companies more and more reskilling/upskilling their current employees.

Here’s why this is smart (quoting the complete paragraph from a December 2023 Forbes article):

“In an August 2023 Bain & Company survey of more than 4,700 people in nine major economies, nearly two-thirds of respondents felt that different skills and behaviors would be required for their company to effectively address today’s strategic challenges and opportunities—including, most notably, ESG-related topics. Furthermore, they expressed a need to be better prepared. For example, 59 percent identified AI training as necessary for their long-term career progression.”

The need for companies to meet the business challenges from 2024 on “is too great and too broad-based to be met without making the most of the talent already in-house.”

(Note: ESG stands for Environmental, Social and Governance. The term describes a “framework that helps stakeholders understand how an organization is managing risks and opportunities related to environmental, social, and governance criteria.”)

Recruiting from “non-traditional” talent pools

Our workforce is rapidly aging and retiring. The youngest boomer turned 60 in 2023. That youngest boomer will be 65 just five years from now. Many of them will have retired by 2030.

Generation X is smaller, yet the oldest among them will turn 60 this year. Many of them will also start to retire in just a few years.

And millennials? Hard to believe but the oldest among them will turn 50 in 2030, just SIX years from now.

In short, a large pool of talent just won’t exist in the coming decades. Where will workers come from?

THAT is the question!

Therefore, it’s smart to start looking now at “untraditional” talent pools:

Retirees looking looking to make some extra money. (Could these be a great source of part-time workers?)
Those who’ve spent years at home raising small children and/or those who have taken time away from work to help care for aging parents.
Those who have worked in “unskilled” positions who are looking to be trained in emerging technology. (These folks could be great for on-the-job training as they’re “unskilled” work may not have paid much and they well could be looking for a way to gain higher-paying skills.

The times, in other words, definitely are changing and our recruiting mindset needs to change with them.

Debbie’s Staffing can help you find terrific people for your part-time, temporary, contract-to-hire, and direct-hire needs.