Talking Talent

As companies all fish for new talent from the ever shrinking talent pool, employment branding is essential.  In a recent issue of Human Capital Magazine, Adrian Dolling, General Manager of HR at BMW Group Australia said:

“People just want to say ‘I work for BMW. I want a business card with that logo on it’. We’re not always the highest payer in the market; we’re not always the easiest place to work, even though we have quite progressive policies. But the brand translates into employees wanting to work for the company”.

So, how can your company boost its employment brand so that you have the ’sorting’ rather than ‘attracting’ problem?

• Recognise that every company has an employment brand – even if you’ve done nothing to foster yours.
• Don’t just pay lip service to the phrase: “our people are our most important asset” – word of mouth marketing is your greatest employment branding tool.
• Find out what your employees value from your company and what they see as your company’s internal strengths and weaknesses.  How will you address these?
• Determine your Employment Value Proposition and then articulate it in all your relevant communication.
• Examine your job application process and ensure it’s a positive brand contact for potential employees.
• Look at developing value adds such as strong CSR or environmental policies, or an employee reward system.

You don’t need a big marketing budget to launch an employment branding campaign.  Start by seeking out your employees and asking them: what’s important to you?

The next generation marketplace - with the convergence of applied artificial intelligence, super fast networks, wireless systems, supply chain engineering, business process change and real-time communications - will require organisations to ask the hard questions to determine their core competencies, strategic positioning and corporate identity.

Of course, it is the Internet that has given rise to a marketplace without borders. In the not-too-distant future, supply chains will possess the super efficiencies of knowledge management and customer data mining, and will be linked to marketplace-to-marketplace commerce. AI enabled decision support systems will be deeply personalised, connecting vendors, suppliers and producers to an elegant network of commercial efficiency for customers.

Real-time anywhere wireless communications will explode competition and open markets worldwide. New marketplaces will revolve around one minute product offers, predicative demographics, Internet product development polls and other ‘net-economy innovations. Prices will become highly elastic, moving targets based on the conditions of the moment.

The enterprise will come to think of itself not as an organisation but as a network, and not just a network of technology but also a network of people.

It will be an exciting time for those businesses agile enough to capitalise on fluid flexible markets and a dynamic and digitally cash-ready customer base.

But are Australian companies have the skills and leadership know-how to navigate the changes the borderless world will have on business?

Results from a recent Talent2 survey suggests that Gen Ys are getting nervous.  The current economic uncertainties have got them thinking about potential employment insecurity – something they haven’t experienced in their working careers.

Y Genners in Australia are worried about their jobs and one-third believe employers will lay off staff. 

But Gen Y wasn’t the only category of workers concerned about their jobs - more than half of the 2,700 survey respondents expect downsizing within months.  And of course, if unemployment does rise, Gen Ys, Xs and Baby Boomers will all be vying for fewer positions.

So, what does this mean for the Gen-Ys that are yet to experience such a downturn? Put simply, it just means you need to work hard.

Smartcompany has a list of survival tips to ensure long term success in an economic downturn:

• Head down, bum up – this is the time to knuckle down and contribute. Forget the demands for more Friday night drinks and staff discounts – just do your job to the best of your ability.
• Teamwork – team players are vital, particularly in times when morale may be down, so keep up your spirit and think of the team, not yourself.
• Communication – stay close to what is happening in your business, areas of opportunity and areas for improvement. If needs be, put your hand up for the difficult tasks. People want to see employees roll up the sleeves, not run and hide.
• Lead – not in a style reminiscent of Mussolini, just lead by example.
• Exceed expectations – deliver what you say you will and even a bit more. If that means you have to put in extra, then do it.

Of course, anyone serious about their career should already be doing these things.   And if you are, then your company will be looking at ways to retain such a valuable employee!

Seth Godin has a suggestion worth considering: change the HR Department to a Talent Department.

His argument runs that in days of yore, factories consisted of people and machines. The goal was to use more machines, fewer people, and to design processes so that the people were interchangeable, low cost and easily replaced. The more leverage the factory-owner had, the better. Hence Personnel or HR. It views people as a natural resource, like lumber.

“Like it or not, in most organizations HR has grown up with a forms/clerical/factory focus. Which was fine, I guess, unless your goal was to do something amazing, something that had nothing to do with a factory, something that required amazing programmers, remarkable marketers or insanely talented strategy people.”

He says his suggestion to change HR to Talent makes some people uncomfortable because “it seems like spin, like gratuitous double speak. And, if you don’t change what you do, that would be true.”

“But what if you started acting like the VP of Talent? Understanding that talent is hard to find and not obvious to manage. The VP of Talent would have to reorganize the department and do things differently all day long (small example: talent shouldn’t have to fill out reams of forms and argue with the insurance company… talent is too busy for that… talent has people to help with that.)

Microsoft and Google both have a very healthy focus on finding and recruiting Talent. McDonald’s recently announced that they want to hire people who smile more. The first strategy works, the second won’t. Talent is too smart to stay long at a company that wants it to be a cog in a machine. Great companies want and need talent, but they have to work for it.

What happens when a successful US-based computer programmer, who lost his lucrative job to outsourcing, travels to India to try to get it back? 

Tim Ferriss, on his fabulous 4-Hour Work Week blog, has found some videos which share the amazing experiences of this computer programmer as he discovers it’s crazy to throw around terms like “slave labor” and “stealing jobs” without understanding the realities of this unusual world where best jobs start at 6pm and end at 3am…

No marketer would ever use home-brand packaging to sell a premium product, says Gillian Kelly on her blog “Dare to be you - personal branding”. “The cost of the potential losses in sales revenue alone would be obvious, and yet on a daily basis, highly qualified professionals sacrifice potential income through poor resume packaging.

“It’s not the design or resume template that is at fault, but peoples’ tendency when using templates to lose sight of the fact that the resume is actually a marketing document. To sell a product, marketers realise they must know their customer. They invest time and effort in developing branding and copy content that will appeal and inspire action by the customer to buy. This is just as true for applicants. Just as every product has its unique selling points, so do individuals, and time must be invested in designing a resume that will truly reflect your relevant selling points and will operate as a catalyst to mobilize employers to make contact.

“Fancy templates on their own won’t do this. Pretty may catch the employer’s eye but what then? A good resume will do that and a lot more. It will capture their interest, immediately showcasing the amazing skills and benefits you can offer their company. It will funnel them down through your resume on a journey packed with achievement and genuine contributions to your past employers. It will paint the picture of a consummate professional, who has faced commercial challenges and soared… and yes they will be caught, hook, line and sinker… motivated and intrigued to talk with you to see if you would be able to offer the same contributions to their company.

“So before you pick a template and just start to type. Stop. Pause. Take time to really consider:

• Who will be reading your resume. Put yourself in their shoes. What do they want? What skills and experience do you offer? Why would they want to ring you? 
• Evaluate the template design. Does it reflect the image you want to put forward? Will you stand out from the pile of resumes, professional and distinctive or just blend in?
• Assess your writing and personal marketing skills.Do you have the skills to really showcase your achievements? Would you be better investing in your future through the skills of a professional resume writer?

“When you know this, then you can start the resume process because I guarantee if your resume is plonked into a template with no thought given to the content - it will more likely than not be just you reading it!”  Gillian says.  On the other hand, take the time to consider the employer in your resume, your branding and resume image and you are one step closer to that ringing phone and job offer!

While the talk around town continues to focus on ‘the war for talent’, the ICT jobs market remains reasonably stable.

The Australian Computer Society’s 2008 Remuneration Survey is just out, revealing a 5.1 percent increase for ICT professionals in the private sector, up half a percentage point from 2007.

And the society predicts similar results next year.  So much for all the worry about recession.

Public sector remuneration experienced an increase of 4.1 percent, but education sector employees reported an average increase of 3.6 percent, slightly lower than last year.

According to the ACS, most ICT professionals salaries have increased marginally faster than general cost of living increases in Australia. The Australian Bureau of Statistics reported an increase in the consumer price index of 4.2 percent over much the same period.

The positive salary results for ICT professionals reflect the strength of the ICT sector, and the ongoing demand for skilled ICT workers.

Jobvite, a provider of next-generation recruitment solutions, has published results of its 2008 Social Recruitment Survey.

Social recruitment is the practice of leveraging social and professional networks, online and offline, for talent acquisition.

The survey shows that the majority of companies (78%) are tapping social networks to find employees. The most common method of social hiring is leveraging employee networks through referrals - 75% of companies surveyed do so.

64 per cent of companies are making contacts through online social networks, predominantly LinkedIn (80%) and Facebook (36%).

When asked which techniques they plan to use more next year, 68% of recruiters said they will increase their use of referrals and employees’ networks. Overall, responses reveal that recruiters are already engaging in social recruitment using a range of methods, both online and offline.

But Jobvite says that most have yet to implement a comprehensive social recruitment strategy that fully leverages companies’ most valuable social networks – those of their employees.

The interesting thing here is that there is implicit endorsement in social networks as a recruitment tool. So, while most employers don’t want their staff flicking to Facebook and sending IM to their friends during work hours, at the same time they are encouraging employees to cultivate potential candidates.

Creativity hubs such as YouTube represent the future of how we identify and sign up new talent. 

Recruiters in the US are already hiring dedicated staff to scour outlets of online creativity such as YouTube to find “the next big thing”.  And now the trend has caught on with mainstream audiences and four in five employers in the US are receptive to receiving visual CVs.

Video resumes are not new.  Time magazine says that some businesses were offering video resumes in the United States in the mid-90s.  But as they weren’t easy to store or distribute, video CVs never really took off.   Then YouTube arrived on the scene.

A quick search of YouTube for “video resume” throws up more than 32,000 hits.  And it’s no longer budding film directors who are selling themselves on video  - everyone from sales manager to business analysts are shooting their own video CVs to give themselves the best shot at their dream job.  Yep, right here in Australia.

While multimedia-savvy Gen Y candidates are the most likely to fly the video resume flag right now, it’s only a matter of time before we all grow accustomed to the concept.

But the video CV does bring with it some challenges, as well as some opportunities.

For the employer or recruiter, the video CV offers the chance to assess a candidate’s compatibility immediately, which leads to a faster and more streamlined selection process. 

And in any professional role, where presentation and communication ability are an integral part of the job, a video resume will quickly demonstrate a candidate’s strengths.

However, this method of recruiting does have its downside: employers can see a candidate’s age, gender, race and appearance at the very first stage of an application, which may increase the risk of discrimination claims.  But don’t forget the upside: candidates who may not be so impressive on paper can add some real oomph to their application with a video CV.

For employees, the challenge is to make your application stand out from the crowd.  This doesn’t mean looking too cool for school.  One video CV swirling through cyberspace shows a candidate lifting weights, serving tennis balls and ballroom dancing.  It didn’t impress his prospective employers, but it certainly made them snigger!

So, start by looking the part you wish to play.  What role are you pitching for?  Dress as you would for an interview, and present yourself and your CV the way you would to a prospective employer.  Rehearse your script, take care to look at the camera and speak slowly and clearly.  Be funny, lively, personable and professional – but keep it short (just one to three minutes).  Most importantly, focus on your professional endeavours, not personal ones!

Video CVs are a snapshot of a potential employee and serve as another layer of filtering before recruiters settle on their preferred candidates for face-to-face interviews.  They’ll never replace paper CVs entirely, but let’s not forget humans are visual creatures.  We absorb much of our information and communication non-verbally, so it’s a fair bet that video CVs will become the way of the future!

Gillian Kelly, on her “Dare to be you - personal branding” website has posted a really interesting piece on job search in the new millenium. 

Those job seekers who have been out of the job search market for a few years will gain a lot from her advice about why paper resumes are just one of the many tools in the job seekers toolkit these days.  For me, her most important point is the swelling awareness for candidates to have strong personal marketing and to be able to specify, quantify, document and articulate their employment value. Can you?