Can treating your talent pipeline like a supply chain help overcome the challenges of finding, hiring and training people?
by Sophie Mackenzie
Global supply chains are in the news as the festive season approaches, and many are worrying about empty shelves in supermarkets and whether purchased gifts will arrive on time. But for some HR professionals, the global supply chain crisis is provoking thoughts of a different kind: could lessons from logistics be applied to the talent pipeline?
Just as those making plans for the holidays are fretting about availability of their favourite treats and gifts for the children, employers in the US and UK are beset by a shortage of skilled staff to fill vacant roles – and Australia is expecting to be hit next. In the wake of the pandemic, the ‘great resignation’ has seen people in the US leaving employment in record-breaking numbers, according to a Washington Post article citing Labor Department data saying that 3% of the US workforce quit in September. Some may have been pushed by burnout and employers’ inflexibility around returning to the office; some pulled by the prospect of a better work-life balance or more lucrative opportunities elsewhere – and the problem is exacerbated by high rates of retirement among the baby boomer generation.
Nuts and bolts
“Think about, say, ball bearings,” suggests Joseph Fuller, professor of management practice, and Matt Sigelman, president of the analytics software company Burning Glass, in an article for the Harvard Business Review. If a car manufacturer were to rely on coordinating with its suppliers on a short-term basis at the beginning of each month, rather than years in advance, they point out that “anybody with even a rudimentary grasp of business will recognise that idea as absurd”. But, “More or less, this ad hoc approach to sourcing is how most companies today are trying to meet their demand for talent,” they write.
And, with retailers’ just-in-time supply chains being placed under strain as British shoppers head to the tills early to stock up for Christmas, their argument seems compelling. A short-term approach to stocking supermarket shelves may work well in normal times, but it is a recipe for disruption when it comes to recruitment.
“When labour is scarce, wages go up,” argue Fuller and Sigelman. “But hiring also takes longer, and that matters greatly, because it compromises output.” The result? The employees who are left behind are placed under even more pressure, making them in turn more likely to look for opportunities elsewhere.
In the pipeline
The answer, argues recruitment analyst Maddie Shepherd in a 2020 blog post for Recruitment.com, is to invest time and resources in the creation of a long-term talent pipeline, which she defines as “a cohort of passive candidates who you have previously engaged with and who are fit to fill future roles that might open up within your company”.
“Building a talent pipeline has one great benefit: it saves you time you’d spend on sourcing candidates, decreasing your overall time-to-hire,” explains Nikoletta Bika in a post for the hiring software platform Workable. And a pipeline “full of exceptional candidates waiting to fill upcoming vacancies is an ideal scenario”, agrees the author of an article for the soft skills training provider Making Business Matter, which offers a comprehensive guide to attracting candidates to a talent pipeline and maintaining positive relationships with them, including the importance of employee advocacy and other social proof.
A multi-step process
“Managing the flow of skilled workers into the market is a multistep process that requires careful orchestration,” write Fuller and Sigelman, warning that once employees leave your organisation, others won’t simply appear to replace them. “A complex modern economy requires sophisticated, expertly managed supply chains. It’s time to start building a good one for talent,” they write, going on to recommend three strategies employers can adopt to avoid “shortage as a permanent reality”:
- Work actively to draw from a broader talent base
This means recruiting from a wider set of feeder jobs and a wider set of geographies. Some candidates with unconventional backgrounds may not have all the skills needed for a job. Can the rest be trained? Employers will also need to re-evaluate job requirements to determine which are truly necessary and which are ‘nice to have’.
- Invest in ‘growing their own’
In many companies, employees find that the best way to move up is to move out, driving up turnover. Employers need to invest in their workforce in the same way that they invest in R&D, preparing staff as soon as it becomes apparent that important new skills are emerging. Building from within also means showing workers how they can move up within the company, giving them a reason to think twice about the attractiveness of jumping ship.
- Implement fundamental principles of supply-chain management
As with other suppliers, companies need to share detailed job specifications with colleges, universities and training providers, meet regularly with them, provide them with access to relevant experts and technology, discuss their emerging requirements, evaluate their reciprocal performance, and offer data-driven feedback.