Looking for Talent? Rethink Your Strategy!

Recruiting and retaining talent is as strategic as conquering new markets and building customer loyalty. For most executives, this is one of three business priorities in 2019, along with innovation and digital transformation[1].

Rethinking Retention

Improving rewards for employee loyalty is common practice. But is it effective? According to the 2016 HR Barometer from Ordre des conseillers en ressources humaines agréé (CRHA) – not really. While seventy-five percent of organizations claim to offer their employees advancement opportunities, one in two doesn’t feel they have any! Even worse, the Barometer also reveals that, on average, fifty percent of employees plan to change employers within three years.

Besides its strain on wages, a poorly managed advancement policy can turn your employees into mercenaries, tempted to go with the highest bidder in a tight labour market. You can increase your policy’s effectiveness by making better use of the data and opportunities that a modern talent management system provides in order to:

• Customize performance evaluation and performance-based pay
• Better communicate and highlight individual or collective rewards
• Anticipate departure risks and better target your motivational activities
• Identify critical resources and better prepare their succession

Rethinking Recruitment

Lost talents and vacant positions hinder your business’s development. You must rebuild teams as soon and as fairly as possible since recruitment mistakes come at a price. According to the Conference Board of Canada in August 2015, the average hiring cost for a senior executive was estimated at $43,000 and $13,300 for technical staff.

The most crucial talent is that of the recruiter and nothing can take the place of their judgment. Yet, a modern HR management system can significantly increase their success and capabilities:

Reduce the Need for External Recruitment

It’s obvious that focusing on internal talent and favouring mobility can reduce the need – and the cost – of recruitment. But how can you fully benefit from it without a way to know about your internal pool’s ambitions? Are new training sessions needed? Is an internal movement possible without creating a gap in other departments? In an organization of hundreds or thousands of employees, the managers’ intuition and informal collaboration are no longer enough to organize internal mobility. A modern HR management platform is a major advantage and a need.

Accelerate and Optimize External Recruitment

The labour market has gone digital. Employers and candidates now meet through job sites (80%) and search engines (63%). Your job offers must be visible on these channels and as close to the interests of applicants as possible. But how can you identify the best ones for a particular position or profession? Is it possible to avoid publishing – and paying – for ads in fifty forums when ten would be enough? How can you save administrative time, simplify advertising offers, and process responses more quickly? A modern management solution should allow you to better target candidates, measure your offers’ impact, and reduce search costs. It must also facilitate administrative management and streamline your entire process to respond quickly to each opportunity. This is especially important since speed is what your candidates will be expecting from you.

Adopt the Right Technologies

Many tools enable you to increase the efficiency of the recruitment and talent management process. Still, choosing a solution to take on your business’s particular challenges is sure to give you an edge. If like many HR managers, you’re looking for precision in your business’s recruitment process, insight in the performance and motivation of your employees, as well as the flexibility to support your strategy with smart processes to streamline your HR processes, then Cegid’s Talent Management solutions are for you.

[1] PWC 20^th Global CEO Survey