And the only constant is…

Change. If you think about a lot of the recent truly transformational change in the world it revolves around the consumer. Uber is as much about the consumer experience as it is about getting from point A to point B. Streaming music and movies isn’t just about the entertainment. It is about how the consumer wants to experience that entertainment. That changing consumer should make you think about your candidates. You’ve got 1-2 minutes to engage that candidate and it better be a positive experience. According to our research, 72% say if they have had a bad experience they would never apply to that company again. And the downstream impact on whether they will continue to buy from your company, well, go sit down with your marketing team and talk about the cost of acquiring new customers for all of those your TA processes are losing!

What about the evolution of the hiring manager? Gone are the days where stacks of resumes magically appearing on the manager’s desk. Now instead of passively sitting back, weeding through some resumes and acting only as the decision maker on who to hire ---- your manager has to start to become more of a marketing expert. Does your manager have the pizzazz to attract top talent? To get him/her interested in joining your company and that manager’s team. Your company website with all of its fantastic info won’t act as the draw - only 4% of job seekers apply for your jobs on a career site.

Managers are playing much more of a role in securing great talent for their team. Using their networks, writing great content that will attract the best talent, blogging, being a presence in social media -----because like it or not ---- to get the talent you need to succeed, you will have to attract a generation that wants to change the world. By 2020, 40% of the workforce will be millennials. Is your hiring manager ready to attract their attention? Because an HR person is not going to be able to tell a story in a way that help them see how they will change the world!

If your two primary customers have changed, have you? You are the “human” expert. Your role is to connect this new candidate with the new hiring manager in a way that results in a positive outcome for both. You must develop a marketing mindset within your recruiting organization. Just as you successfully led your team from “post and pray” recruiters to “passive-talent” sourcers, now is the time to take them into the land of the consumer and build campaigns that attract consumers to your brand in a way that makes them want to become part of the organization. And your hiring managers, do they see their new role? Do that want that new role? Unlikely, so your job becomes about convincing them how critical they are to the process. In a future blog we’ll talk about the role of RPA in recruiting --- and there is a role --- but that “human” expert will never become unnecessary.