Having been in business for nearly 70 years, the folks at Kelly have plenty of experience helping clients tackle the challenge of talent from multiple angles: contingent workforce strategies, business process outsourcing (BPO), recruitment process outsourcing (RPO), and more. But while a lot of companies offer BPO and RPO solutions, KellyOCG has an interesting take on how organizations should be thinking about all the pieces that contribute to talent in the modern world: talent supply chain management (TSCM).

Ok, so maybe it’s not wholly new. Anyone familiar with Peter Capelli’s work (honestly, you all should be) has probably heard the term before. In layman’s terms, TSCM is a forward-looking approach to HCM that monitors internal and external labor and talent trends in order to optimize efforts to acquire, develop, and retain talent through multiple channels. Essentially, it’s workforce analytics meets integrated talent management with a heavy dose of contingent workforce management.

While there are several things that contribute to success in talent supply chain management, KellyOCG has targeted three things in particular:

Diverse Sourcing Strategies and Staffing Models

When we talk about sourcing in talent acquisition, we’re usually focused on where and how to source. Even then, most sourcing strategies focus almost exclusively on full-time employees. According to Brandon Hall Group’s latest research in talent acquisition, nearly one-third of companies aren’t using contingent labor at all – and 30% of those that do use contingent labor rely on temp workers to fill gaps while looking for permanent solutions.

KellyOCG thinks there’s a fundamental question we should be asking ourselves, and I agree with them. “What kinds of talent should we be sourcing?” As presented in its model for TSCM, there are five categories of talent: Temporary staff, independent contractors, service providers, alumni/retirees/interns, and full-time employees. By focusing only on the latter, we’re limiting our options – and our operational capabilities. It leaves organizations with a static talent supply chain, which isn’t agile, adaptive – or competitive. Each category of talent has its place in a modern talent supply chain, and finding the right people requires diverse sourcing strategies.

Alignment across HR, Operations, and Procurement

This one’s a doozey, and has plagued organizations for decades. KellyOCG correctly called out the business imperative of a strategic talent plan that spans the organization, giving departments direct insight into near- and long-term goals so they can work together to effectively manage the talent supply chain accordingly. And because effective TCSM relies on ongoing collaborative efforts, governance and ownership are also critical for maintaining alignment.

As cited in Brandon Hall Group’s most recent State of Talent Acquisition report, however, 64% of organizations are operating without even a high-level strategy in place to guide their hiring decisions and initiatives. Nearly one-quarter of organizations aren’t planning for talent needs of any kind. Lacking both renders any effort to build a steady supply of talent next to impossible, as evidenced by data from our Talent Shortage and Hiring Practicesreport wherein “building talent pools and communities” was rated as one of the greatest challenges in talent acquisition today.

KellyOCG certainly has its challenges on this front, but the team is tackling it head on – both in thought leadership and with its implementation and service delivery model.

Effective Workforce Planning and Analytics

As KellyOCG sees it, workforce analytics and planning are the lynchpins of any effective corporate talent strategy. I agree, but the unfortunate reality is that data-driven recruiting is still just a pipe dream for most organizations. According to Brandon Hall Group’s 2014 Workforce Management Study, more than half of organizations still have no workforce planning capabilities or only focus their planning on near-term operational needs like scheduling.

The most immediate limitation of effective workforce planning and analytics capabilities is a lack of technology – but this is changing rapidly as more vendors are investing in this critical area. In fact, KellyOCG gave a live demo of its analytics and reporting tool that I would say ranks among the top five solutions I’ve seen to date.

While it’s clear there’s much to be done before the concept of TSCM catches on in the mainstream, I won’t be surprised to see more high-performance talent acquisition strategies leveraging best practices in supply chain management just as they have with marketing. As I continue digging into the data from my Talent Shortage and Hiring Practices research, I’ll be looking closely at how organizations are thinking about talent supply and demand – and how they’re rising to the challenge.

–Kyle Lagunas, Talent Acquisition Analyst, Brandon Hall Group
@kylelagunas

The post Key Practices in Talent Supply Chain Management appeared first on BrandonHallGroup.

The goal of this study was not only to gain a better understanding of what’s driving the perception of a worldwide talent shortage, but also to gather data on how organizations are innovating in order to compete for top talent on a global scale.

I’m thrilled at the response – thanks in part to survey distribution partners like HireVue, iCIMS, and SilkRoad. The survey garnered responses from 355 leaders in talent acquisition and human capital management working in 42 industries, spanning 31 countries. Today I’ll be presenting initial findings at SilkRoad Connections 15 in Orlando. I wanted to share a couple of key points with my readers here:

Shortage or No, Talent Attraction Continues to be a Challenge

Regardless of stance on whether there is a pervasive shortage of talent or not, one thing is clear: attracting talent is the leading challenge for employers today – with 64% of respondents listing it as one of their greatest challenges. Finishing a distant second was building external talent pools, cited by 46% of respondents. Making competitive offers to top talent was third (40%).

While some are diversifying sourcing strategies, few recruiting teams are making any significant gains in employer brand awareness. The concept of talent attraction, though easy to understand, is difficult to operationalize – especially in reactive recruiting environments. Until hiring organizations can establish a strong understanding of the scope and function of employer brand – as well as the impact of candidate experience – attraction will continue to be a challenge.

Most Organizations Don’t Develop Their Talent Pools

Many respondents said building talent pools is a major challenge – and a key area for improvement in the war for talent. But less than one-quarter of respondents actively practice any major form of candidate engagement:

Most organizations lack established best practices for nurturing candidates with industry-relevant content, company-related updates, and value-add conversations. They therefore have a lot of work to do before they can realistically expect high-quality talent to engage with their recruiters, hiring managers, or even their employer brand outside of the hiring process. The unfortunate reality is that the dynamic talent communities that feed into a steady pipeline of quality candidates require dedicated resources – time and energy not the least among them. The majority of hiring organizations just aren’t there today.

Upcoming research reports will dig into data points more extensively, and draw on additional information from interviews in order to provide deeper insights into the rapidly changing talent economy. We’ll also offer actionable insights on how today’s hiring organizations can innovate in order to compete more effectively.

For now, I think it’s clear that the conversation needs to shift gears – moving away from a perceived shortage of talent, and toward the very real shortage of innovation in talent acquisition that exists today.

–Kyle Lagunas, Talent Acquisition Analyst, Brandon Hall Group
@kylelagunas

The post What Ails Talent Acquisition? A Shortage of Innovation appeared first on BrandonHallGroup.

Today Cielo operates in 68 countries, makes 115,000 annual hires with more than 100 clients, and boasts a 99% client retention rate. Impressive statistics, to be sure, but what impressed me more (and always does) is what’s driving this success: Cielo’s culture and industry-leading best practices.

From a commitment to delivering a positive candidate experience, to expertise in employer brand, Cielo’s trademark “We become you” operating model continues to set the standard for RPO in a modern talent economy. As Founder and CEO Sue Marks pointed out:

“Talent attraction is not just recruiting any more – and it certainly is no longer HR. It’s marketing, branding, SEO, PPC, Big Data, and predictive analytics.”

Without question, talent acquisition is changing at the speed of light, but whereas many other solution providers in the space are reacting to these changes, Cielo’s expert team seems to be a step ahead.

We talk a lot about innovation in this industry, but innovation is often just another square on our buzzword bingo cards. We talk about recruiters as talent advisors, but measure them based on requisition management and efficiency metrics. We talk about the importance of mobile readiness, candidate experience, hiring manager relationships, social talent acquisition – there’s no end to the list of things that matter today. But while many of us are paying lip service to next practices, Cielo is systematically moving the needle in talent acquisition in three ways:

• Its commitment to continuous and meaningful innovation
• Its investment in innovative tools and technologies
• Its execution and delivery of innovative talent acquisition practices

Each of these is represented in Cielo’s big announcement from the conference: The debut of SkyRecruit – its new cloud-based talent acquisition platform. Designed with recruiters, candidates, and hiring managers in mind, SkyRecruit is 100% mobile (which is great for penetrating emerging markets like Latin America and Asia Pacific). It features tools for effectively building, nurturing, and managing a pipeline of talent, with modules for advanced practices like CRM and event management as well as basic functions like interview scheduling and video. It’s a powerful compliment to the ATS – and the first of its kind in RPO.

Of course, running a rapidly growing global RPO has its challenges. Supporting clients in 26 different languages across an incredibly diverse talent landscape is no walk in the park – and Cielo clients in attendance this week were very open about some growing pains (most notably among first-time RPO adopters, where change management can be a real can of worms).  But rather than rolling out a list of complaints, people spoke candidly about what was working and what wasn’t – and how they were partnering with Cielo to work through it all. Quite the departure from your typical RPO/client relationship.

As Brandon Hall Group nears the end of our Talent Shortage and Hiring Practices survey, it’s exciting to see a company enabling a more modern approach to talent acquisition on a global scale. I look forward to seeing Cielo’s continued growth and success.

–Kyle Lagunas, Talent Acquisition Analyst, Brandon Hall Group
@KyleLagunas

The post Cielo: Moving the Needle in Modern Talent Acquisition appeared first on BrandonHallGroup.

PeopleMatter’s annual event brought together HR leaders from organizations in service industries, primarily restaurant, retail and hospitality – though their CEO Nate DaPore characterizes their target market more broadly as organizations with a mostly hourly workforce, high turnover, and distributed locations. They also tend to work with a lot of franchise organizations – sometimes with the franchiser, the franchisees, or both. They have a fairly unique combination of offerings reflecting the needs of this audience: modules for hiring, learning, and scheduling, and the event’s big announcement of partnering with Reliant Talent Management Solutions to offer performance management as well.

Given the industries they serve, it’s not uncommon for users to be new to talent management and workforce management technology. In conversations with many of their clients, the typical starting point was paper or spreadsheets. And indeed, our recent HCM Technology Trends study (listen to the HCMx Radio show discussing the HCM Technology Trends survey here) found that 52% of organizations indicate that their current talent acquisition solution was a first time automation, and 45% say the same of their learning solution.

Knowing how important this transition is, the product team is very focused on the user experience and takes care to make their cloud-based solutions as user-friendly as possible. This is obvious in the platform’s responsive design, simplified workflows, and modern user interface. They also take very seriously the specific requirements of the niche market they serve and are continually looking to build new capabilities into the code base for all users.

Of course, there are plenty of products with updated UX and responsive design. A few other things stood out to us from #PMC15:

• 6-Minute Candidate Assessments. PeopleMatter acquired the assessment company PeopleClues several years ago and touts the assessment capabilities of their hire module as a differentiator. They spent several years developing a shortened pre-hire assessment tool that can be completed on a mobile device in 6-7 minutes while still yielding valid results. While we haven’t seen the full validation studies yet, their clients (many of whom struggle when it comes to assessing candidates quickly and effectively) spoke highly of this feature – which is included in the Hire module.
• Top-Notch Customer Service. Another big announcement made at the conference was the “#1 in Customer Service” award PeopleMatter received from TechnologyAdvice. While any accolade is a nod to the viability of a solution provider, this award is especially important considering the number of first-time users they serve. From the first steps of implementation, and throughout every transaction thereafter, PeopleMatter takes seriously its responsibilities to its client partners.
• A Commitment to Compliance. In most service-oriented organizations, line managers can’t afford to waste time making sure they have the most up-to-date tax, worker verification and HR forms. PeopleMatter shows an ongoing commitment to helping clients stay compliant by keeping forms up-to-date within the system ensuring the right one is available every time.

PeopleMatter’s solution may not be at the bleeding edge of technological innovation, but it knows the market it serves and is committed to helping them make the transition to better business results through technology. And their focus on security and reliability, their R&D processes, and assessment capabilities are quite state-of-the-art. With four global data centers, a robust customer feedback process, and a disciplined development strategy led by VP of product development Kay Lucas, the organization is clearly positioning itself for continued growth in both product offering and technology scalability.

-Kyle Lagunas, Talent Acquisition Analyst, Brandon Hall Group

The post Reporting in from PeopleMatter Collaborate ’15 #PMC15 appeared first on BrandonHallGroup.

If you’re like me, and typically work with US-based companies, you may not be aware of the state of things in India. As in the West, the country is going through a major renaissance – in the way they conduct business, the way they find business, the way they manage business – and human capital management is evolving rapidly as a result. But unlike in the US where HR leaders have been largely resistant to embracing innovative technologies, India is adopting HR technologies at warp speed.

As you might imagine, this is shaping the scope and function of HCM in some very interesting ways. In order to compete on a global scale – for business and for talent – Indian organizations must be able to acquire and develop talent quickly and effectively. The challenges of attracting and retaining talent and employee engagement are just as prevalent there as anywhere else, but there’s one key distinction:

Whereas many in the West seem comfortable with “good enough” HCM practices, such a notion is completely alien to India’s HR leaders.

Of the 450-some who attended #SHRMTech15, not one was content to be average. The hunger to know more, the urgency to innovate, the drive to be better was inherent both in the questions they asked in each session, as well as the candid conversations that filled every spare moment of the day. Namaste, indeed.

My role as an analyst takes me to a lot of conferences and events – too many, at times – but I can say with confidence that I’ve never attended an event that featured this level of enthusiasm and interest among its audience. The enthusiasm was contagious, and perhaps this is why I found myself just as engrossed in every session. Or maybe the folks at SHRM India simply put together a world-class event. Either way, there were a few personal highlights:

• Point solutions will win over integrated suites – for now. The question of integrated suite or best-of-breed point solutions is as prevalent among Indian HR organizations as it is in the US. There are benefits and drawbacks for both, but in a country globalizing as quickly as India, immediate needs rule supreme. For now, I believe Indian organizations will be best served by augmenting the HCM capabilities they need most – be it performance management or talent acquisition.
• Mobile matters – big time. In India, mobile isn’t just a popular platform; for many candidates, it’s the only platform they have to access the Internet. From a talent acquisition perspective, organizations lacking mobile-optimized career pages are severely limited in their ability to attract high-quality candidates who will struggle to complete an online application from their smart phones. But from a human resources perspective, BYOD practices aren’t optional – they’re inevitable. Those unfamiliar with rules and implications of a mobile-powered workforce are putting their organizations at serious risk.
• Innovation is within reach. Throughout the conference, attendees were constantly comparing themselves to global poster children of innovation – the Microsofts, Googles, and Amazons – and asking, “How can we ever compete?” To that, I say this: Innovation can occur in any organization, of any size, in any industry. The notion that only those with big brands (and big budgets) can drive and sustain innovative HCM practices is simply untrue. Many of our award-winning clients have made a difference with nothing more than the dedication and hard work of a few forward-thinking individuals. Whether you’re running a customer service center in India or an IT help desk in Boise, innovation is within reach.

If I’m lucky enough to score an invitation to SHRM India’s next HR Technology Conference, I fully intend to be there. This rapidly evolving market is full of energy rare in this industry. For now, I’m going to have to revisit my research agenda for the next year to be sure I’m keeping tabs on things in India.

–Kyle Lagunas, Talent Acquisition Analyst, Brandon Hall Group
@kylelagunas

The post HCM in India: An Urgency to Innovate appeared first on BrandonHallGroup.

My question (simplified for the sake of this post) is “Why?” Our latest research survey – which you can participate in right here – undertakes some serious data gathering in order to get to the bottom of this.

It’s no secret that competition for talent is high – and has been for years. And while there is ample evidence supporting the existence of skills gaps in certain industries and regions, our research indicates these gaps may not be as pervasive as some recruiters seem to believe.

According to Brandon Hall Group’s 2014 State of Talent Acquisition Report, 78% of organizations rated their talent acquisition efforts and capabilities as less than highly effective. Many reported a lack of maturity in their existing talent acquisition process, with 64% relying on reactionary recruiting process and operating without even a high-level strategy in place to support hiring initiatives in the near- or long-term. This does not bode well for organizations competing in today’s talent-driven hiring climates.

Some organizations – including many participants in our HCM Excellence Awards – are taking action to combat real talent shortages and skills gaps. They’re overhauling sourcing and assessment practices, investing in modern talent acquisition technology, improving planning capabilities, and investing resources in employer branding and candidate experience. As a result of their efforts, they’re making gains on all fronts. They’re attracting more high-quality candidates, they’re retaining more new hires, and they’re closing their skills gaps one step at a time.

But for every one organization taking action, many more are still stuck in the endless cycle of source-assess-hire-repeat – and hemorrhaging talent. It’s far more than a talent acquisition issue, which is why this survey is the beginning of a massive undertaking.

In order to understand the root causes and contributing factors, I’ve already begun discussing this issue (as well as my hypotheses) with industry leaders, technology providers, economics professors, and even labor lawyers. Already, my head is spinning with all of the dots that need to be connected before I can present something coherent – and something useful.

But first things first, right? I’d love to know what you think. Is there a worldwide talent shortage? If not, why are recruiters struggling to find qualified candidates in a global talent economy? How does a reactionary recruiting model impair an organization’s ability to find, engage, and hire quality candidates?

Take 15 minutes, and share with us your experience – what are your pain points and how is your organization tackling them? In return for your completed survey, we will make a summary of results available to you, invite you to a brief webcast during which we will review the results summary, and offer you a piece of research from our existing library.

Thanks in advance for your help!

–Kyle Lagunas, Talent Acquisition Analyst, Brandon Hall Group
@KyleLagunas

The post Piecing Together the Talent Shortage Puzzle appeared first on BrandonHallGroup.

I’ve been thumbing through research I’ve done over the years, and found five that I think are worthy of discussion – in Mumbai, as well as in the US. I thought I would start by sharing initial thoughts here on the Brandon Hall Group blog.

3 Trends Shaping HR Technology

Disclaimer: I usually shy away from “The Most Important Tech Trends” conversations – not because I don’t have an opinion, but because there are just too many things going on, too many change drivers, too many questions and considerations. There are a number of megatrends that we’re still wrapping our heads around in human capital management technology. For the sake of the post, I’ll dig into a few of these trends and how each is shaping HR technology.

Trend #1: Cloud Computing

Cloud computing is one of those all-encompassing technology trends that is driving change in the enterprise – and in our everyday lives. Cloud computing enables users to store, access, manage, and share information via a network of remote servers that are hosted on the Internet, rather than on a local server. Document management is a great example. Anyone with a Google account can store, access, manage and share documents uploaded to Google Drive by logging into their Google account online. Because all of the information sits on Google servers, you can manage them online using Google’s document management tools – with no need to download either the files or the tools. Neat, right!?

How Cloud Computing is Shaping HR

While accessibility is certainly a major benefit of cloud computing, there are two more reasons this trend is sweeping HCM: affordability and scalability. Most cloud solutions are offered as part of a subscription-based software-as-a-service  (SaaS) pricing model, which means organizations aren’t required to make such significant capital investments up front. This has made modern HR systems far more affordable for small and mid-sized organizations, many of which have been managing HCM process with homegrown systems – or with no system at all. And because cloud-based systems are less customizable, they’re also easier to scale, easier to update, and easier to improve. This influx of HR tech users, combined with fast-paced innovation in cloud-based technologies, is powering a renaissance in HCM, with demand only increasing for more advanced tools.

Trend #2: Consumerization of IT

This one is a doozey – as it is the parent of many other important trends (including a few of those listed here). In layman’s terms, the consumerization of IT has two facets: On the surface, it entails the pervasion of consumer technology (social media, smartphones and tablets, etc.) in the workplace. Digging deeper, it involves the transformation of enterprise technologies to look, feel, and function more like consumer technologies. Consumerization of IT is the macro trend that’s behind other micro trends in human capital management such as social and mobile (and even cloud, depending on how you look at it). The basis of both of these trends is the leveraging of consumer technologies to improve performance of enterprise processes.

How Consumerization of IT is Shaping HR

I’ve written about this on the blog before, using SmartRecruiters’ mobile hiring app as a prime example of consumerized HR technology: … “the app looks, feels, and operates like a consumer app. By focusing on must-have functionality and wrapping it up in a sharp user interface, they are hitting on the most important components of consumerized IT. They’ve created an app that hiring teams will likely want to use – which you don’t often come across in enterprise technology.”

This represents a fundamental shift in HR tech design and development: Today’s primary end-user isn’t just the HR administrator; it’s also the employee – and employees have vastly different expectations from the technology they use. They want user-friendly interfaces, they want access via their device of choice, and (most importantly) today’s end-users have low tolerance for the clunky, poorly designed systems they’ve been forced to use in the past.

Trend # 3: Social and Mobile Technology

While the other two are macro trends, social and mobile technologies have also had a huge impact on the enterprise. From the way we do business to the way we find business – they’ve changed many things. Both are opening new channels of communication, enabling us to interact with the world around us in ways we’ve never had before. Of course, this poses challenges as well as opportunities – especially in the enterprise, where information is a valuable currency.

How Social and Mobile are Shaping HR

In recruiting, mobile and social have changed the way we source talent, the way we assess candidates – not to mention the way candidates assess us. As social recruiting continues to gain traction, recruiting best practices have less to do with job postings and more to do with consumer marketing principles. As a result, the clear line that used to separate how hiring organizations interact with customers and how they interact with prospective employees is fading.

Likewise, the number of candidates using mobile devices to search and apply for new job opportunities is growing exponentially – especially in international markets where a mobile device is sometimes the only access people have to the Internet. As a result, mobile-friendly career sites with simplified application processes have become an essential component of successful Talent Acquisition strategy. Though mobile recruiting is still in its infancy, it’s becoming a major consideration for employers and solution providers alike.

I’ll be digging into each of these trends and their impact on the scope, role and function of human capital management in my keynote later this month. Considering the event is two weeks away, I’ve got my work cut out for me! In the meantime, keep your eyes peeled for our latest research in talent acquisition.

–Kyle Lagunas, Talent Acquisition Analyst, Brandon Hall Group
@KyleLagunas

The post Preparing for Mumbai: Thoughts on Top HR Tech Trends appeared first on BrandonHallGroup.

This last topic got me thinking. Brandon Hall Group defines data-driven recruiting as planning for talent needs, sourcing candidates, and making hiring decisions based on data rather than on anecdotal information. Data-driven recruiters use historical data on source channel performance to allocate the sourcing budget, or monitor changes in baseline talent acquisition measures to evaluate the impact of employer branding efforts. But even as more hiring organizations wrap their heads around next practices like measuring employer brand and improving candidate experience, data-driven recruiters are the rarest creatures in the industry – more rare even than the purple squirrel riding a unicorn.

While we talk a lot about how quickly technology has evolved over the last decade – and we love to discuss use cases for social analytics and so-called Big Data in talent acquisition – the reality is that many hiring organizations are still on their first generation applicant tracking system. In fact, very few organizations have reached a point of maturity where data-driven recruiting is even feasible.

When I conducted our talent acquisition benchmarking effort, I asked hiring organizations to select the phrase that best described the maturity of their talent acquisition efforts. The options were pretty straightforward:

• Casual: We source new talent when the need arises, and rely on traditional methods for assessing, hiring and onboarding. We aren’t tracking any performance metrics.
• Developing: We do our best to identify and plan for talent needs, but our existing process is outdated and consistency is a challenge. We have some performance metrics in place, but have difficulty tracking them.
• Stable: We have a high-level talent acquisition strategy that loosely defines hiring priorities, tasks and workflows. We track performance metrics to monitor efficiency and efficacy, but there is room for improvement.
• Optimized: We have a clear talent acquisition strategy that is part of a larger talent management strategy. We regularly assess talent needs and plan accordingly, tracking performance of each stage of our process closely to ensure maximum impact.

As you might imagine, very few fell into the Optimized category. What may surprise you, though, is the number that fell into the lowest categories of maturity.

64% – more than half of the organizations polled – described their talent acquisition efforts as either Casual or Developing. For organizations that fall in these categories, immediate talent needs are enough of a challenge. Lacking even a high-level strategy in place to inform best practices and identify near- and long-term goals, requisition management is about as far as recruiters get. Even then, they’re still relying on outdated and inconsistent process pervasive in reactionary recruiting. Not exactly the ideal scenario for data-driven recruiting.

To be sure, data-driven recruiting is still a relatively nebulous concept for most. There’s more and better technology to support data-driven recruiting, sure, but success depends as much on a dedicated culture of measurement as it does on having the right tools in place. My friend Kelly Long, HR Chief of Staff at Rackspace, has a team of six dedicated to analyzing HR data – six analysts! – and they still struggle to make sense of all the data they have.

As I gear up for the next several months, I’m also finishing up research on maturity and impact of talent acquisition – including key recommendations for improved maturity. You’d better believe measurement and analytics are at the top of that list. Stay tuned!

–Kyle Lagunas, Talent Acquisition Analyst, Brandon Hall Group
@KyleLagunas

The post The Truth about Data-Driven Recruiting appeared first on BrandonHallGroup.

The second was at a far more intimate event put together by my friend Craig Fisher at SXSW – TalentNet Interactive, where I joined Crystal Miller and Carrie Corbin to talk about employer brand management.

Both featured great conversations in and out of the presentations, but there were a few questions we weren’t able to answer – two of which were especially interesting. For the blog this week, I will attempt to answer them:

1. How would you research internally the key contents to build an employee value proposition?

Employee value proposition, or EVP, is strongly tied to the paradigm shift in talent acquisition where talent attraction has become as important as talent sourcing in effective talent acquisition.

Our research in recruitment marketing underlines the role EVP plays in building a compelling and unique employer brand. In short, an organization’s ability to offer a strong EVP is an indication of its viability as an employer of choice. But as many can attest, building a clear and authentic EVP is no small undertaking. We have research planned on best practices in just that, but for now I’ll offer some thoughts on what not to do:

• Don’t start by evaluating how your compensation model compares to other employers in your area. On that note, while it’s important to understand the role compensation plays in EVP, I find “competitive” benefits and pay are usually anything but competitive.

• When identifying key contents of EVP, start with what’s unique about your organization – the culture, the people, the work, the industry, the location. When evaluating new opportunities, prospective employees don’t envision themselves in the day-to-day. Rather, they try to imagine what their lives would be like working in your organization – how joining your team would change their lives (their routine, their commute, their work/life balance, their quality of life).

Although the process of defining and building EVP offers an incredible opportunity to stand out from the crowd, it’s likely you’ll uncover some things that are less than flattering. To that, I say this: “No pain, no gain.” Any of our Excellence in Talent Acquisition award winners can tell you that.

2. Is there a technical way to measure “source of influence”?

Now this is an interesting question – something I’ve wrestled with for some time. For context, my co-presenters from last week’s webinar (Marvin Smith of Lockheed Martin and Troy Heinritz of CDW) addressed the common practice of treating social media as a source of hire rather than a source of influence. While we’re hardly the first to make the distinction, questions like this tell me that the idea is finally gaining traction in the mainstream.

As I’ve said before, measurement is the key to high-performance everything – and social talent acquisition is no exception. The challenge, of course, is that capturing quantifiable data on how social influence impacts talent acquisition performance is incredibly difficult – especially without a dedicated system for just that. It’s not impossible, though. The most obvious example of the technical measurement of influence is employer brand sentiment.

We partnered with Glassdoor last year to dig into a specific component of influence: employer brand. The report, which can be downloaded here, identifies three primary categories of impact – including Volume & Exposure, Engagement, and Baseline Measures. By monitoring changes in each category, you can spot correlations – thus quantifying impact. To be sure, this requires a certain level of sophistication, but the most effective hiring organizations are already doing this. I think it’s only a matter of time before it’s more commonplace.

I’ve gotta say, I absolutely love both of these questions. They’re both seeking quantifiable information on two of the most complex components of high-performance talent acquisition strategy – and that tells me that the needle is moving in the right direction.  Or so an analyst can hope.

–Kyle Lagunas, Talent Acquisition Analyst, Brandon Hall Group

The post A Quick Q&A on Recruitment Marketing appeared first on BrandonHallGroup.

Earlier this week, our analyst team had a lively discussion on the all-encompassing, incredibly complex nature of employee value proposition (EVP). While the concept of EVP has been around for a while, we’re getting renewed interest in research that redefines employee value proposition in a modern working world. I think this is directly related to the increasing emphasis hiring organizations are placing on employer brand.

As employers big and small are wrapping their heads around the power of brand and its impact on the ability to attract (and retain) high-quality talent, EVP is coming back in vogue. The reasons are many, but often come down to the fact that few hiring organizations have an innately strong employer brand. The rest have to think long and hard about why candidates would be interested in working for them.

The challenge for many is that generic claims of “competitive pay and benefits” and “exciting opportunities with room for growth” are subject to intense scrutiny these days. Anyone curious to know more can check out reviews on sites like Glassdoor (and usually do). Those who fail to deliver on these promises aren’t just struggling to retain new hires – they’re struggling to attract other viable candidates.

At Brandon Hall Group, we break employer brand into two pieces:

• An employer’s public portrayal of the various elements of its unique EVP – from the language used in job postings and advertisements to the message conveyed by recruiters across various channels and mediums.
• The combined sentiments of candidates, employees, customers and clients (past, present or future) regarding an organization’s viability as an employer of choice – usually (but not always) based on first-hand experience.

It’s not exactly brain surgery, I know, but you would be surprised how many hiring organizations fail to grasp just how great an impact reputation has on candidate behavior. This is because reputation validates image, and an image that over-promises and under-delivers isn’t something candidates are likely to engage with. Add in even a mediocre candidate experience, and you have a recipe for talent acquisition failure.

This is why I’m excited at the renewed interest in EVP – it means hiring organizations are waking up and taking charge to change course. We’re going to be digging into employee value proposition over the next few months in order to identify all of the contributing factors and components, as well as the external influences that inform the relative validity and attractiveness of an organization’s EVP.

The challenge will be finding universal truths for EVP, as its complexity lies in its subjective nature. But our hope is that with the right research and tools available, more companies will invest the time it takes to discover what truly makes their organization unique – and why candidates should care. Armed with this kind of insight, building a strong and compelling employer brand is a piece of cake.

In the meantime, I’d love to know what you think about employee value proposition: Why do you think it’s back in focus? What components of a modern employee experience inform EVP?

–Kyle Lagunas, Talent Acquisition Analyst, Brandon Hall Group
@kylelagunas

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