“The war for Talent” was a term used by Mckinsey as early as in 1997 and thereafter several books have been written on the subject by various renowned authors. In today’s world technology plays an important role in this battle of acquiring talents.
Technology has had such a large impact on every sphere of our world that the new age world has become synonymous with technology. Today youngsters get exposed to latest technology platforms right during their early days of childhood. From the perspective of attracting new talents, technology certainly opens up a completely new way of reaching out to the new geeks of the town along with additionally engaging with them early without even putting much investment in physical resources.
Paradigm shift in attracting & engaging talent
Technology has impacted the talent attraction & engagement process in multiple ways; to name a few:
- Accessibility of Information – In today’s world, it is not just employers seeking information about prospect employees; but the prospect employees also do their first hand research about the Companies on various platforms. This means that employers need to be proactive and ensure that not only their career sites are updated with all necessary information and their value proposition, but they are adequately represented across Social Media and other online platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, Glassdoor, Indeed and so on. While this could be a great opportunity for the employers to get mindshare of the prospects in a cost effective manner, the employers still need to be vigilant on the negative posts on the online platforms and respond to them in a logical manner, so as to sustain the reputation of a brand and attract new talents.
- Innovative ways to engage – One of the biggest trends to engage with talents nowadays are online video platforms, wherein both employers and employees can engage with each other in a flexible manner at their own pace, as per their own time and convenience. Employers have started to pitch prospect talents via such platforms by uploading Company videos, which rightfully showcases value proposition of the brand. Similarly employees can also upload their video interviews and then send a link to the prospective employers, thus making it more personal and real.
- Technology enabled employee screening and selection – For Companies, which need to do hiring in bulk (for eg: IT Companies, banking and financial services including insurance, pharmaceuticals etc.), there is an evolving trend of system based screening, which evaluates basic functional competencies, behavior assessment through psychometric tests and similar assignments through an online interaction in a controlled environment. Such processes are customized basis existing successful employee profiles and historic trends on what has worked well for a Company during the past. This process helps in bringing consistency in the selection process especially when the geographical distribution is high. There might be a risk of leaking of questions to the prospect employees, which are otherwise meant to be surprise questions. But employers can be mitigating this risk by creating multiple set of questions which can be chosen randomly during the selection process. Many companies have successfully implemented this process and have done away with the face to face interview process completely, thereby enabling significant savings in resources and improved efficiency.
It is interesting to note on how technology has evolved over past few years and has brought in some innovative practices which has enabled organization to save costs on talent acquisition and build efficiencies. However, in spite of the benefits of digital interface, in-person meetings are still considered as a preferred way of interviews, as it helps in qualitative assessment of the prospect candidates. A combination of technology and personal interface can thus prove to be the right solution for employers at least in the near future scenario. Hence while employers can pitch for and engage talents over the digital platform during the first rounds of interviews, the final round can be done by meeting the prospect employee in person.