Organizations are constantly faced with the challenge of making quick hires and that too in a market with massive shortage of talent. For managers to get the right talent at the right moment, they will need to invest in proper recruitment processes and systems.

Indian economy is growing at a tremendous pace today and is expected to see a growth rate of 8.5% in the next six months. Consequently, talent acquisition and recruitment have seen a concomitant growth. Indian companies are hiring and will continue to hire at a robust pace in the next two quarters. Globally too, India is expected to map high in recruitment, next only to China, according to a recent survey by Manpower Employment Outlook.
Talent acquisition and recruitment are therefore key factors as right talent is increasingly being seen as crucial to pushing bottom line figures and company growth. Organizations today realize the importance of recruitment and more specifically talent acquisition, in the current dynamic business environment. The pay-backs of investing in the right people and getting these people on Board is a key objective not only for HR, but managers per se who are held accountable for strengthening their talent pool.
Traditionally, HR has been viewed as being solely responsible for people management. However, today the outlook on hiring is more comprehensive and forms part of the overall organizational strategy. This evolution which is a result of the strong conviction among organizations today that right talent leads to better corporate performance and consequently talent management, includes talent development and talent retention, has become central to a company’s philosophy.
Organizations are constantly faced with the challenge of making quick hires in a market which has massive demand and a shortage of appropriate talent. The biggest challenge for organizations is actually getting the right talent at the right time. And they have begun to realize the need to put in place proper recruitment processes and the importance of talent acquisition systems. Companies recognize the necessity to be prepared for the future, in terms of hiring talent or at least getting in touch with talent that is key to their business.
At this point, it may be worthwhile to define how talent acquisition is viewed as different from recruitment. Recruitment is basically filling a vacant position when a person leaves or is promoted to another function. Recruitment search ends when you find a candidate who is qualified for the job in question and interested in the job. Talent acquisition is however a more complex process. It is regarded as a more pro-active approach and a holistic way to seek talent that will contribute to the overall business success of your organization. Talent acquisition requires good networking skills to go out after the right talent, which would include tapping ‘top performers’ who are not actively looking for a change of job. Hence, talent acquisition is the corporate hiring mantra for top level hires today.
With the downturn in the economy last year, dynamics of the recruitment market also witnessed a change. Organizations are re-looking their hiring strategies and the focus is on getting the right talent, rather than a quick hire. With the recruitment pace now on a high, organizations are however still keeping their focus on getting the right talent and hiring with care.
Responding to the situation, most of the solution providers have also had to re-look their strategies and are falling in sync with the changing market dynamics. Technology has already taken the forefront and the international market has seen a plethora of innovations. India, though a more traditional market, has also witnessed changes and innovations on many fronts. Job-matching, also known as e-Harmony of recruiting, has been a popular tool of job portals offering a way to do quick quality hires. Job-matching enables recruiters to eliminate irrelevant candidate profiles–and instead focus their time and effort only on relevant candidates. Jobfox and MyPerfectGig are some international portals who utilise this innovative technique.
In international markets social networking is increasingly being recognized as an important tool of the talent acquisition system and India too is following suit. A complete integration with social networking sites such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter is currently being offered by many international solution providers, and it is expected that the Indian market will follow suit.
These networking sites have also been constantly innovating themselves to fit into the recruitment space. Recently, LinkedIn launched the Next Generation career pages for companies, making it easier for them to use LinkedIn as a medium to establish themselves as employer of choice and enhance their brand image.
Hence, dynamics of talent acquisition and recruitment are re-defining the role of solution providers too, who need to constantly innovate to meet these changing requirements.