Staffing.org - Library

Library Article

9/1/2009

Mapping the Brave New World
David Earle

If the CEO told you tomorrow that for the next three years the company’s compound growth target was 20% (from a base of $7 billion) and you already employed 46,000 people in 150 countries; and if he also told you that his special concern was the readiness of the company’s top 100 managers, for which you were now personally responsible, reporting directly to him, could your department handle the assignment? In short, are you ready for 21st century recruiting and talent management?

This may appear to be a stretch assignment, but today’s large company CHROs routinely face challenges of equal magnitude and complexity. Unfortunately, in many cases our research shows they have inherited out-of-date, legacy systems and processes that are essentially obstacles, not efficient job tools. Without the luxury of time to stop and retool, they plod through workarounds while describing their jobs to us as akin to changing the tires on a car while it’s rolling. Sound familiar?

The example above is real. Here are the tools we hope the CHRO has available, and the questions she is able to answer as she steps up to these responsibilities and possibly puts her career on the line. The challenges at your enterprise may not be of equal magnitude today, but if you anticipate (or hope) they may be tomorrow, you’ll need these same tools and answers.

Brand Analysis – A clear understanding and expression of your company’s culture, prospects and advantages as an employer – i.e. why candidates would chose you over a competitor – plus a compelling expression of those ideas in the marketplace.

Up to Date Job Descriptions – Not the bland, formulaic ones from two years ago, but the detailed, interactive, media-enabled ones of tomorrow that will stand out from the tens of millions of competing job descriptions on the Internet.

Organization charts – Comprehensive maps of both today’s and tomorrow’s organization.

Critical Skills Inventory – Skill sets of the most important professionals and managers on staff today, including location, demographics, turnover rate and time-to-replace figures. (If turnover is 10% hiring targets will be 30%, not 20%.)

Critical Skills Projections – Estimates of the number of new, critical, and/or hard-to-find positions that will need to be filled.

Total Workforce Projections – Staffing locations and timetables for hitting sales targets of $8.4 billion, $10 billion and $12 billion over the next three years.

Sourcing Analysis – Efficiency and effectiveness comparisons for all sourcing channels to determine where resources are best allocated.

Staffing Efficiency Metrics – At least three years of comparative internal trend data - time, cost, funnel ratios, etc.

Staffing Effectiveness Metrics – At least three years of internal data for candidate quality, hiring manager satisfaction and retention.

Vendor Analysis – Efficiency and effectiveness ratings for all third party vendors including their ability to scale up to meet new targets. Evaluation of current contracts and relationships.

Structural Analysis – To determine whether the current staffing structure will help or hinder growth. Will additional decentralization be required? Which functions will be affected?

Technical Analysis –To determine the adequacy of electronic support systems including ATS, training and development, knowledge management, workforce collaboration, performance measurement, analytics, talent management, and succession planning.

Cultural Analysis – To assess the shift in cultural gravity as the workforce grows, and the impact of that shift on governance, compensation, advancement and retention.

Training and Learning Analysis – Assessments of the relevance and efficiency of the current training curriculum and its delivery.

Job Market Analysis – Analysis of current and projected labor markets by geography, job level and skill level, factoring in moves by competitors.

Partnership Analysis – To understand the quality of the key relationships with internal operating managers and hiring managers and determine which need improvement and/or additional alignment.

And that’s just for the larger company goals. There’s another level of data required to manage the development of the top 100 managers, including:

Detailed personal dossiers of knowledge, skills, abilities, strengths, weaknesses, prior assignments, personal characteristics, personal networks and networking ability, and leadership qualities.
A job development plan for each individual, including job rotations, formal education, coaching and mentoring, stretch projects, and compensation.
A list of back-up candidates for those who may not make the grade or be hired away. A dashboard that sums all this up for the CEO.

And on top of all this, there is:

Past Budget Analysis – To provide fact-based guidance and ROI-based rationales for additional spending.

Our surveys consistently show about a 10% chance that companies of any size consistently track all 10 core efficiency metrics for past staffing and efficiency and effectiveness, much less the predictive data necessary for future staffing success. With global competition increasing, worker mobility increasing, adverse demographics and business cycles shortening, that discrepancy highlights the widening best practice gap between staffing winners and also-rans.

Welcome to the new world of staffing: a world where the map is being rapidly redrawn. It’s unquestionably a data-centered world, dependent on the same quality metrics, measurements, assessments, and evaluations as are used to make decisions in finance, sales, R & D, or manufacturing. Some of these will describe what has been, others will describe the world to come. You will have to be equally fluent in both.

The bar has been raised considerably over the past few years and will continue to rise. Recruiters will need to raise their games to stay competitive. In this particular instance, the CHRO has a distinct advantage. She is working directly with a CEO who knows what he needs, has identified talent acquisition and development as a key success driver and wants to be directly involved in HR decisions. Such top-down support raises the chances of success considerably. May you be so fortunate.