MARS, a local start-up incubator, recently tallied the investments in the Toronto tech ecosystem in September 2018 as 1.4 Billion. The list of investments was unique and astounding and will mark a turning point in the ecosystem. And Toronto is still on the running for a huge Amazon investment.
So if you think recruiting top talent was difficult in the past couple of years, get ready for the war. Many companies will be unprepared and will suffer accordingly. But there are a few things any company can do to prepare.
1. Retention. A good defence is as important as a good offence. Ensure that your top talent is paid at going ‘market’ levels, is well-led and engaged in the business. The majority of people leave their companies due to their current manager but compensation and other perquisites will also factor into any employment change decision. A recruiting organization will create a “pull” but the current employer has to make sure that the organization is not providing a “push” that starts the process.
2. Watch your employment brand carefully. The way companies market themselves to prospective employees will have to be carefully monitored and it must reflect the reality of working at the organization. If you think Glassdoor was important in the past few years it will become even more critical in the next few years. And employees are very sophisticated in how they parse the information on the site to understand if it is genuine feedback.
3. Review your recruiting process to ensure that it is reasonable, competitive, and as fast as possible. I spoke with a VP of Human Resources last week who said that in her recent job search she was initially screened by a very junior level recruiter who could not communicate the overall goals of the HR department. It left a very weak impression of the organization and she did not pursue the opportunity. She did, after all, have several choices. Most importantly companies are going to have to speed up their recruiting processes. We often see companies that schedule many redundant interviews that don’t add value to the process, put recruiting as a very low priority in their calendars and are slow at providing feedback. More and more frequently this results in candidates leaving the process or choosing other opportunities. In a candidate’s market hiring companies will have to move quickly and efficiently to attract the talent they want and need.
Recruiting is going to take on a much more important role in company evolution and employers will need to ensure that they have the right processes to successfully attract the talent they will need for the next stage of growth.
About the Author
Paul Hudson has been helping companies attract and select senior executives for over 20 years. Even he can’t believe that he has been doing executive search that long.
Contact Paul by email at [email protected] or call (1) 416-365-9494 EXT 222