Changing Job Seeker s Decision Journey and Impact on Organizations: Aligning Talent Acquisition Strategy to Match Talent Trends

Transcription

1 White paper Changing Job Seeker s Decision Journey and Impact on Organizations: Aligning Talent Acquisition Strategy to Match Talent Trends - Badri Ravi Abstract Dynamic socio-economic factors and advanced digital platforms have created a shift in the way talent approaches career progression and job search. This has enabled talent to scout for opportunities more often, effortlessly search information, connect with people who could provide first-hand experiences, and crowd source information on organizations. However, organizations have been slow to adapt and are paying the price in terms of escalating talent acquisition costs and the inability to attract top talent. This paper details the new talent phenomena and its impact, and discusses how organizations can transform their acquisition strategies to win the War for Talent.

2 Introduction Recruitment has been around since the days of the Roman Empire, when monarchs had to staff large armies to further their ambitious geographic expansion plans. They too had to deal with talent crunch, screening methods, referral programs, and employer brand, in addition to the burden of a sluggish bureaucracy. Although fundamentally recruitment remains largely unchanged, the way talent approaches jobs has evolved - and organizations need to keep pace. Improved connectivity and digital platforms have changed job seeker behaviour, blurring the line between active and passive job seekers. With only a small fraction that is active or passive, the large majority of talent is active-passive - which means they explore opportunity like active job seekers but remain dormant like passive job seekers. Even when talent stops short of responding to a job post, they conduct extensive research on the organization, going beyond compensation and benefits using search engines to look up recent news, blogs, awards, achievements, leadership, and so on. Social media has emerged as a convenient information source to get first-hand data from both current and former employees. Career Progression Decisions Talent Behaviour To be effective, recruitment processes must align with the way talent consumes information on jobs, forms opinion, and takes next steps. There are three phenomena that greatly influence talent acquisition: Job explorers ZMOT effect Hyper connection Job explorers During the days of the institutional man, there were active job seekers, responding to postings on job sites, and passive job seekers who were not interested in exploring opportunities in other organizations. The passive ones, generally considered to be of better quality were more in demand. With the end of the institutional man era, active and passive 69% Are Method to measure this trend for your organization: 1. Number of people looking at open jobs posted on your organization s career page, Facebook career application, LinkedIn job posting, Jobsites 2. Impressions on social post that distributed job links 3. Number of times jobs posted on social media is being shared on average 4. Engaged followers on career specific social media pages job seekers are in a minority as compared to talent who actively explore jobs but are dormant / passive about applying. Research data indicates that 69 percent of talent routinely explore job opportunities. (1) Hence organizations need to make the most of this tendency of talent to explore opportunity and their need for relevant information. of Talent ROUTINELY search for new opportunities. you GEARED? 5. If your organization publishes video job posts then number of views the video receives 6. Surveying people who just started at your organization to find out if they were following your organization s open positions 7. Number of searches on Google for opportunity and career related content Source: (1), CareerBuilder Candidate Behaviour, 2012

3 ZMOT effect Zero Moment Of Truth (ZMOT) is a term coined by Google to describe a phenomenon where shoppers respond to advertisements (stimulus) by going online to research the product. For instance, when a new mobile phone brand advertises on TV, Radio, and the Internet, people go online to learn more before they visit the store to experience the product. Similarly, when talent receives stimuli in the form of job listings, and advertisements, they respond by going online to know more about the organization - their ZMOT. According to a study, talent explores (on an average) 14.5 sources to understand the potential of every job opportunity. (2) A negative opinion formed during the ZMOT can result in the talent being lost even before hiring manager can get to talk about the opportunity and the organization. Method to measure this trend for your organization: 1. Monthly survey link to talent that interviews with your company to understand what content they stumbled upon (If any) and its quality 2. Number of hits on organization s career page and career related PR content received 3. Corporate recruiters could be provided template mail which is supported by web analytics tool which provides information on clicks on various links 4. Survey recruiters to understand how many candidates request for specific information and links on the company 5. Number of people looking for your organization on sites such as Glassdoor.com Hyper connection Social Media has changed the way people connect and how they use these connections to mutual advantage. This hyper connection amongst talent is helping them establish connections in the organization to get first-hand opinion on their potential employer. For instance, LinkedIn allows secondary contacts by way of introduction, enabling talent to connect with future colleagues eliminating the need for first level contacts. While websites that provide employer ratings make it easy for talent to crowd source information about the organization, hyper connection also offers them access to opinion expressed by disgruntled employees. Employers need to realize the significance of this trend and ensure that employees send out the right impressions about the organization to the talent community. Clearly, although organizations are doing much to keep employees happy, there is a gap in ensuring that the workforce is able to talk about their experiences. Helping employees positively articulate the benefits through consistent communication and demonstration of the organization s commitment to Employee Value Proposition (EVP) is a good starting point. Several other initiatives could include helping employees communicate their experiences on social media by creating twitter hashtags for employee events, encouraging employees to talk about their awards on social platforms, making employee referral job posts social media friendly, and so on. Method to measure this trend for your organization: 1. Surveying people who just started at your organization to understand if they reached out to employees for their experience 2. If your career page allows one to click to visit company s Facebook/LinkedIn page, then number of clicks on those icon (The social sites shows friends who also like/work with the company) 3. Monitoring mentions in social media 4. If employee referral platform allows sharing of jobs by employees on their social network then count of the job share Source: (2), CareerBuilder Candidate Behaviour, 2012

4 Organizational Response A Reality Check What are organizations doing? Job Explorers Recruiters are advertising jobs in different platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter ZMOT Effect Organizations have created career pages Organizations are creating media rich content for employer branding and distributing it on social media Hyper Connection Organizations are on social media and some also advertise jobs What is missing? Organizations are not communicating Employee Value Proposition in their jobs. Job description is still an Achilles Heel Organizations are not facilitating connections between talent explorers and recruiters/ employees/hiring managers Organizations are stuck with old ATS that do not have CRM capabilities Organizations are not creating platforms to facilitate content co-creation between employees, talent, and company to allow quick content creation and better distribution Videos are more focused on work-life balance and employee benefits instead of motivational aspects such as autonomy, purpose, and mastery Organizations are not helping employees proactively reach friends on social media for referring connections Organizations are not supporting employees with good content to share with their connections Lack of training programs or policies that guide employees on leveraging social media to spread employer brand Changed Job Seeker Decision Journey In the past, organizations had the relative comfort of specifically addressing two distinct talent sets - active job seekers and passive job seekers. The emergence of the hybrid active-passive set and interest among all talent segments to explore opportunity and company information has left organizations under prepared. Passive Job Seeker Job Explorers Active Job Seeker Study the job description Google the company Jobs released by company Search social media content Check financial performance ZMOT Read reviews See career page Hyper connected talent checking with their connections Check employer rating Watch videos Apply for the opportunity Remain Dormant Candidate Decision Journey

5 Combined impact of new trends on candidate career and job decision journey Clearly, while a large majority of talent explores opportunity, all segments use search engines and check with their connections to understand the opportunity and the organization. They use these findings to make the decision to apply and join the organization. The combined effect of these trends on talent acquisition is even more profound. With various sources contributing content that defines the employer brand, talent perception about the organization and employer brand has become more fluid. This communication reaches a much wider talent base more quickly and influences their behavior and responses making the employer brand come alive and impacting talent acquisition. Talent is constantly Looking for Jobs When they find Jobs they Google to Gauge the Opportunity Talent is interconnected and find people who can share first hand experience Employer Brand Coming Alive Impacting Talent Acquisition Talent acquisition is undergoing a paradigm shift resulting in the extension of the talent supply chain, which once began from talent attraction through recruitment to development. However, today it has been extended to include listening to the talent community, connecting with them and engaging them to create authentic employer brand experience for talent. Traditional Outlook Listen Connect Engage Attract Recruit Develop Contemporary Outlook Extended value chain in talent management

6 Although the employer brand has always had a pride of place in the HR philosophy, its creation and communication needs to change, to be impactful amidst the dynamic talent trends landscape. In the new paradigm, the employer brand Listens to the talent community on social media and meaningfully engages one-on-one instead of only relying on the PR machinery for pushing content to Talent Resonates with talent and is available on different platforms so that message is communicated on platform most preferred by Talent Creates an environment with clear and friendly social media policies where employees can create content, connect with the talent pool and spread the employer brand Invests in technology and capacity that allow organizations to engage with a large talent pool Total Engaged Talent Application Received Screened Offered Offer Accepted Onboarded Talent Acquisition - Recommended Approach Distribute jobs as widely as possible using technology and ensure job descriptions also present the organization s EVP, the ability to provide a purpose, mastery and autonomy at work. Enable every job post to be shared on social media Continuous audit of online employer branding content and feedback of new talent on content quality. Encourage employees and talent to write blogs and reviews. Continuous communication of EVP among employees and swift grievance resolution Leverage CRM (Customer Relationship Management) capability in ATS (Applicant Tracking System) to engage with candidates efficiently & effectively on Social Media, , etc. These and more capabilities are built into the Recruitment Process Outsourcing services offered by Infosys BPO to build a sustainable talent acquisition program that delivers the competitive edge to client organizations.

7 The Benefits Benefits of recognizing these trends and taking proactive steps have multi-dimensional benefits: Business Managers Customers Investors Job Seekers Gradual increase in quality of hire Reduced talent acquisition costs since the organization attracts talent directly eliminating expensive vendors Reduced attrition since the organization attracts the right job seekers Employees will experience more of their contacts calling on them enquiring about the organization and jobs Customers benefit from higher productivity and lower attrition in the vendor organization Tight people strategy results in project execution excellence and client delight Turn-around time improves significantly since organization acquires talent and mobilize resources quickly Increased productivity resulting in improved margins Transparency in the recruitment process resulting in better ability to understand the organization and its prospects High esteem value in working for the organization and employee brand visibility results in improved awareness among investors Intangible benefits of build strong EVP and EB culminate into tangible output by way of margin, allowing organization to invest more on intangibles and build competitive advantage-people Clear, crisp and accurate information about the organization and its USP A talent sensitive environment that adapts to changing scenarios, to provide the best working environment Enhanced experience of applying for an opportunity The Way Forward The trend of talent actively sourcing information on potential employers from Google and their network on social media, and getting more circumspect about where they apply for a job is impacting the organization s capability to attract top talent and control talent costs. Hence, organizations will have to ensure that talent is served with most appropriate information and to achieve this, organizations will need to assess the organization and create strong EVP. Also, companies need to invest in an ecosystem that co-creates content with employees, leadership and engaged talent pool for target talent pool and foster connections within the talent community - to ensure that the best talent is attracted to apply.

8 About the Author Badri Ravi Consultant- Solution Design, HRO Practice, Infosys BPO Badri has more than 8 years of experience in acquisition, retention and management of talent. A free thinker and blogger, he specializes in helping clients and the HR community build transparent and people-friendly organizations where everyone feels a sense of achievement and oneness. Badri has a Master s degree in management from Great Lakes. About Infosys Infosys is a global leader in consulting, technology and outsourcing solutions. We enable clients, in more than 30 countries, to stay a step ahead of emerging business trends and outperform the competition. We help them transform and thrive in a changing world by co-creating breakthrough solutions that combine strategic insights and execution excellence. Visit to see how Infosys (NYSE: INFY), with $8.25B in annual revenues and 160,000+ employees, is Building Tomorrow's Enterprise today. Infosys BPO, the business process management subsidiary of Infosys, provides a broad range of enterprise and industry-specific services. We deliver transformational benefits to clients through our proprietary Process Progression Model TM (PPM). These benefits include cost reduction, ongoing productivity improvements and process reengineering. For more information, contact infosysbpo@infosys.com Infosys Limited, Bangalore, India. All Rights Reserved. Infosys believes the information in this document is accurate as of its publication date; such information is subject to change without notice. Infosys acknowledges the proprietary rights of other companies to the trademarks, product names and such other intellectual property rights mentioned in this document. Except as expressly permitted, neither this documentation nor any part of it may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, printing, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of Infosys Limited and/ or any named intellectual property rights holders under this document.