Strategizing Talent As Part Of New-Normal

"Talent acquisition needs to be done exceptionally well for businesses to thrive."

Talent acquisition is one of the key functions in building an organization. Identifying the right talent and having the right process to bring talented professionals on board is a very significant business function.  

HR is at the core of the organizations' efforts to aid the economic recovery, and Talent Acquisition teams are at the front end. How Talent Acquisition teams can attract, engage and hold talent that is available in the market will be important, as talent acquisition has the potential to upend this and aid economic recovery.

Addressing The Need

As the industries assess and hit the road to recovery, talent acquisition teams are focused on understanding the needs of the organizations and finding the best talent for the changing dynamics of jobs.

"Through rigorous research on regional trends and targeted, Talent Acquisition teams are more into motivating actions. They are analyzing needs, forecast job gaps, generate talent intelligence reports, develop sustainable campaigns to reach out to talent, and more to address talent constraints, resolving them proactively and efficiently," stated Vipul Singh, VP & Head of HR and Communications, ADP.

As global efforts to recover the economy get accelerated, experts are of the view that a global Talent Acquisition network will be key to implementing those on the ground. 

Talking to an industry expert from the airline industry, Raj Raghavan, Sr. VP Head HR, IndiGo believes that "hiring is a critical component of the human resource function. Talent acquisition needs to be done exceptionally well for businesses to thrive." 

Now, hiring the right talent is different but retaining them again becomes a challenge for organisations. Hence, Raghwan explained their new talent management tactic, quoting their past mandate. "We used to hire 8000 people a year during the pre-Covid days but have always had a very high bias toward promoting people from within. We have reasonably strong performance management and talent management culture coupled with competitive compensation and employee engagement program. But, the greatest lesson which the pandemic has taught us is that the key is to their retention is how we influence each of them that results in enhancing the workplace experience of an employee. Hence, we learned on asking the best use of our reduced number of staff, by upskilling them further and taking utmost care of their experience within the organizational framework."

Retaining With Best Practices

There is a range of best practices to help you retain your workforce, some fairly straightforward, and others more involved. But it all comes down to one thing: doing what's best for your unique team.

"At Vedanta, we hire the best from the top institutes globally as well as within India. Over the years we have developed one of the most robust and industry leading talent development programs and at every level. The programs are tailored for our top B-School hires with VLDP (Vedanta Leadership Development Program) tailored for our top B-School hires, to identification & structured anchoring of Top 100 women leaders across the Group with V-Lead (Women Leadership development Program) and lastly with the largest talent identification and development program, focussing on their graduate development pool with V-Reach – Graduate Development Program," stated Praveen Purohit, Deputy Group CHRO, Vendanta Resources.

More than the bonuses, employees today need their job satisfaction along with other necessary benefits. Therefore, experts have shared examples where the management has chartered on a new ESOPs scheme objective to build a sense of ownership amongst key leaders of the group and to reward sustained superior performance in the organization. 

Road Ahead

Further, Singh foresees that the future of hiring will be determined by technology and how courageous the companies can get to take risks and experiment with it to enhance their hiring game.

According to a survey, 47 per cent of Indian recruiters who never used virtual tools started using it during the pandemic, and are most likely to continue. While we have already seen an influx of Virtual Hiring and onboarding practices, we could see a lot of investment and attention into:

  • Collaboration tools with facial recognition
  • Assessment platforms integrated with Digital Employee Application
  • Remote assessment applications
  • Improving Employee Value Proposition and communication strategies to attract the best talent
  • Enhancing diversity in hiring
  • Learn about the needs of new roles such as Diversity Champions, Wellness Officers, Wellbeing Champions, and more.

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