This Week, In Recruiting - Issue 59

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Open Kitchen: We Need to De-Collaborate Work

Hiring for experienced workers, with in-demand skills, for on-premise work opportunities might be the hardest challenge in recruitment today.

In fact, I suspect it has already become a fool's errand and we should probably give up trying to do it. Instead, focus should be on designing jobs which require less collaboration intensity - to de-collaborate work - so they can be 'remoted away', offshored or automated. The on-premise hiring that remains should be focused on the only significant demographic which still wants to do it - entry level talent.

Clearly, these are outrageous claims, so today's Open Kitchen will be an attempt to explain my thinking. Please do critique my argument in comments, so that we might advance the discussion through civilised debate. Or uncivilised, as you prefer, let's be f8cking having you also ??.

1. Experienced Workers Demand Remote

[Image: Global Tech Talent Trends 2022, Landing Jobs]

We don't need further evidence to know that this is the general case.

LinkedIn reported two weeks ago that for the first time ever on this platform, remote jobs adverts drew in the majority of job applicants (over 50%), despite only constituting 20% of the job adverts. The significance of this milestone has been understated - in absolute terms, I don't think we will ever have more applicants for on-premise vs remote job adverts ever again. Indeed, I suspect that remote dominance will continue to accelerate so that it becomes an increasingly forlorn hope to advertise for on-premise jobs at all.

This is one of the few instances where we can actually 'do our own research' and test the premise - simply post the same job ad with a change of location condition and tell me what you get. The only uncertainty will be how many more applicants you get for the remote job ad vs the on-premise version.

Significantly, the only exception to this, are adverts for entry level job opportunities. For people entering the world of work for the first time or rather, anyone who has yet to build a sufficiently deep professional network-in-domain (so this applies to career changers, returnees to the labour market etc), on premise is recognised as the superior mode as it accelerates professional learning through the intense social exchange of in-person mode of work.

If we are indeed 'agile' - i.e able to rapidly update strategy due to inputs from a changing environment - we would immediately shift our recruiting resources to hiring early entry workers and shift our thinking as to the relationship we have with experienced workers and what we want them to do.

2. Innovation Advantage of In-person Teams

[Image: Apple CEO Tim Cook. Roy Rochlin/WireImage/Getty Images]

'We need workers back in office in order to foster creativity' storyline was dismissed early on as rhetorical technique (i.e.b/s) by a managerial class fearful of loss of control, authority, status and even raison d'être. Whilst I think these motivations are generally the case (so sorry managers!), there is also substance to the claim that in-person teams may have an 'innovation advantage' compared to remote, or God forbid, 'hybrid' teams.

New terms we've had learn recently:

• 'Vocal synchronicity' - the ability of teams to rapidly synchronise who-speaks-when in order to facilitate faster and greater collaboration.
• 'Osmotic information transfer' - the passive absorption of non-directed information, critical inputs to accelerate learning, especially for noobs to the domain.
• 'Digital body language' - the impact of the non-verbal non-communication we impart when our connections to each other are entirely via Zoom.

Again, this is kind of test-able in our own workaday. Has anyone been able to come up with a 'planned innovation' via an calendarised and agenda-ed Zoom meeting? Has anyone tried to replicate osmotic information transfer by having the cameras on 24/7? Tell me what happened if you have.

This is not to say innovation cannot occur in a remote only set up, only that in-person teams have the 'innovation advantage' due to the constant availability of ambient information (overhead conversations in office), obvious increase serendipity (unplanned meeting in the corridor of a critically important future collaborator) and much higher rate of ideological iteration through unstructured communication at desk.

3. De-Collaboration of Work

All of this is hugely problematic if we maintain the idea we require innovation throughout every part of the organisation. As recruiters we will be instructed to 'hire for creativity' as if creativity is entirely an individuated character trait, when its effective expression may be contingent on the structure of relations with others. We may end up hiring creative people, but then wonder why we aren't getting innovation manifest in the organisation. It will be because we have isolated our new hires (with their consent, mind you!) into mode of work which is a natural suppressant to innovation.

What do we do about this conundrum? We need innovation but can't hire experienced workers to the working mode which optimises for it. Three options:

• Most employers are going to roll back and say 'back to the office' - and attempt to force innovation by dragooning reluctant employees back to the desk. There will huge attrition as a result (are you experiencing this already?), and then the ongoing failure to back fill these posts as they are now unattractive on-premise roles, will lead to under resourced teams which will have zero scope for innovation.
• Some employers will invest in technological solutions to improve remote innovation. Yes we are talking immersive tech, Metaverse, AR / VR, gaming or gaming-like experiences which provide the conversational spaces analogous to in-person comms. Mark Zuckerberg has made a multi-decade, multi-billion dollar gamble on this - that remote is here to stay, back-to-office will fail and that we will reach for something better. I think something better will happen, but how soon, how many and how significant?
• But in the end, this is what we are going to do - design more jobs that minimise the requirement for collaboration, facilitating the hiring of experienced remote workers but accept that they be specialist single-taskers with limited scope for innovation, who can nevertheless execute / operate the innovations made primarily from an on-premise core, which will be constantly infused by a pipeline of home grown entry talent. It's some dystopic sh1t eh?

4. Future Teams Might Look Like This

[Image: This presentation has been designed using resources from PoweredTemplate.com]

Where the three stakeholders of early entry talent, core innovators and remote operators might operate as a kind of progression of life stages. Starting your career, you want to be in on-premise, and do this as often as you can. At mid career, when you are an effective individual contributor, you may either be invited to be core innovator or decide to migrate out to become a remote operator. There is no reason, by the way, why this is unidirectional remote operators may well be able to come into core innovator, contingent on their commitment to on-premise.

5. Why this is Necessary for Recruitment

Recruiters can now have a clear target on how to recruit for external hires - remote operators will be task based, so out go interviews, culture fit requirements etc. All we care about is - what the core traits required to perform the task and assess only for this. These unbundled jobs will become increasingly more remote until they are effectively - the old language - offshored. Incidentally, remote workers will themselves increasingly become 'fractional' workers - doing this or similar tasks for multiple employers, with or without our knowledge or consent, as this comes concurrently without our ability to monitor or enforce.

Recruiting Innovators will be far more challenging - technically still possible but practically unviable - we are never going to be able to predictably do it. Under resourced teams are not going to remain stable enough for long enough to sustainably wait for us recruiters to miraculously hire the ideal candidate. The only way these teams keep going is to constantly pipeline early entry talent into innovation teams, replacing attrition not with external hires but with home grown understudies. Our much maligned managers (genuinely sorry this time ??) will transform into coaches / psychologists / trainers / career developers for these on-premise teams.

None of this is new btw, Kevin Wheeler has been banging on about this for a decade. But we needed the tension of experienced worker demand for remote vs employers demand for innovation, to bring about this reformulation of organisational structure.

So that's my argument. I may have Covid. I think miss the beach.

Anyways, out of the kitchen, onto the lounge ??

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What's in the News?

Beamery acquire internal mobility platform Flux

Interesting move by talent relationship management firm Beamery, expanding its service offering from external hiring to internal mobility by the acquisition of Flux. It's whole-of-lifecycle relationship management. Great explainer video by the Saidov brothers in this - check it out, above.

If you are a recruitment service provider or technology business and have any news to share,?comment below,?this is your application to get into next week's addition of This Week, In Recruiting. Make sure to @ mention me so that I see it

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What's On Offer?

Nothing much it seems, as everyone slumbers slowly into the summer. Surely some vendor has something to offer to the community? Free advertising for your wares here if you do

[Image: my kitchen]

If you are a recruitment service provider or recruitment technology vendor have any?exclusive?offer for the community,?comment below?with your offer in order to be included in next week's edition of This Week, In Recruiting. Make sure to @ mention me so that I see it.

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What's Going On?

Become a Modern Agency Talent Wants to Work With, Tues 3 May, 10am EST / 3pm BST / 4pm CEST

It's fun times for Recruitment Agencies but you know what? You cannot rest on your laurels despite your record year, because every recruitment business is having such a year. Now is the time to expand into new verticals and embed deeply into the ones you already operate in. Going to chatting with Andre Mileti, Sales & Strategy Director (Bullhorn) on what modern agencies have to do in order be the company in-demand talent wants to work with. On tomorrow, so register here

Founders Focus - Ep25 - Up close and personal with Alex van Klaveren, CEO of KANDIDATE, Wed 4 May, 12pm BST

It's my favourite thing to do each with - deep, interpersonal interviews with the founders of recruiting businesses changing the way we work today. Alex van Klaveren, CEO (KANDIDATE), follows a unique path of being a hiring manager who set up a recruiting business. What was the trigger, what have you learned, what are the leadership and entrepreneurial lessons you can impart? And what, is the future of the industry? All this and more on Wed 4th May, 12.00pm BST. Register here

Brainfood Live On Air - Ep153 - Programmatic Job Advertising, for Dummies, Fri 6 May, 2pm BST

I asked the question openly on both LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter networks and the underwhelming response from recruiters was they did not know much at all about programmatic job advertising. This is astonishing to me as it's a no-brainer, but also as an operator of an old school job board (Brainfood Jobs Job Board, ICYDK), it is explicable why recruiters don't know - it's above the pay grade of most of us who post and manage vacancies. Anyways, education is always the solution, so I have dragooned (my favourite new word) Robin Stander, VP of Sales at Appcast to deliver the programmatic job advertising 101 for us. This is going to be beginner friendly, so sign up if you don't know anything about it. Friday 6th May 2pm BST - register here

HR Berlin Spring Fling 2022, Thurs 19 May, 16.00 - 21.30pm, HRpepper Management Consultants, Tempelhofer Ufer 11, 10963 Berlin, Germany

So it looks like I am in Berlin later this month - for the first time in nearly 3 years. I miss that city, mainly for the amazing HR and Recruiter community there, so I am looking forward to seeing as many of you as I can at this event hosted by the triumvirate of The Secret HR Society, HR Leaders Berlin, and The Purple Squirrel Society! Free to attend - and somebody better be paying for drinks - so register here and see you there!

If you have an event, webinar or podcast going on next week and want it featured on next week's newsletter,?comment below?with the link and event details. Don't forget to @ mention me so that I see it

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Who's Hiring?

Global Talent Sourcing Leader, Vaia Talent, Remote EU

Technology Solutions Consultant, Cielo Talent, Remote EU

Senior Recruiter, Cielo Talent, Berlin, Germany

Recruiter, Cielo Talent, Plymouth, UK

Lithuania Tech Talent Partner (Lithuanian speaker), Join Talent, Remote Global

Talent Sourcer - EMEA, Microsoft, Remote Europe

EMEA Recruiter, Microsoft, Remote Europe

Recruitment Coordinator, Join Talent, Remote Global

US Tech Talent Partner, Join Talent, Alamo, TX, USA

Tech Talent Search Partner, Join Talent, Remote Global

Global Lead of Employer Brand and Loyalty, Getir, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Sales Recruiter, JLL, Atlanta, GA, USA

Talent Acquisition Sourcer, JLL, Miami, FL, USA

GTM / Sales Recruiter, Stream, Boulder CO or Remote USA

Manager - Recruiting Operations, McKinsey & Co, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Manager - Recruiting, McKinsey & Co, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Senior Talent Acquisition Specialist - Technology, Jet2, Leeds, UK

Tech Recruiter, WeAreKeen, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Mid-Senior Tech Recruiter, WeAreKeen, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Business Recruiter, WeAreKeen, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Tech Recruiter, WeAreKeen, Berlin, Germany

Business Recruiter, WeAreKeen, Berlin, Germany

If you want to get your job featured, post jobs on the Brainfood Jobs Job Board?here

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Who's Moving?

Michael Brown joins Snyk as Global Head of Talent Attraction having worked and advised a number of tech startup and scale ups such as Toast, SHYFT Analytics, Lumafield to name but a few. Vast experience for someone has young looking as Michael! This should be a great hire.

Andrew Wiseman joins Precis Digital in Stockholm as Head of Talent Acquisition. I think I first connected with Andrew when he was at Casumo in Barcelona, maybe pre-brainfood days. Great to see old contacts move their careers forward like this!

Georgie Maudsley joins MongoDB as Senior Enterprise Sales Recruiter, after spending 4 years building out sales teams for Gartner. Great to see this change of pace into tech from a fellow University of St Andrews Alum.

Chaitra Murthy joins Meta as Tech Recruiter, after 3 years at Google, completing a relocation to the UK along the way I believe. Some super charged career moves being made here - I never did this, I was incremental mover, probably a bit soft tbh ??

Jeremy Roberts joins WHATJOBS? as Global Agency Sales Director, having previously lead agency sales with companies such as TotalJobs, Jobsite and CV-library, as well as a stint with my old client, Incisive Media. Few people with a better contact book than Jeremy.

Finally, some promotions to celebrate: Toni Williams-Long goes up to Director, People and Organisational Development at the West Midland Police, Adriana Evtimova goes up to Senior Recruitment Partner at the Trade Republic and last but very far from least, the legendary Sam Berthoud goes to up Head of Account Management at hackajob. Congratulations all!

If you have made a senior exec appointment to your business,?and feel the wider community needs to know about it,?comment below?with the details and see it featured in next weeks issue.?Don't forget to @ mention me in it so that I see it

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What Are You Doing?

Christy Spilka, VP Global Head of Talent Acquisition (iCIMS) joins Board of Directors at ATAP, perhaps the No1 industry body in the US for Talent Acquisition professionals. Anyone who has ever met Christy will know that this will mean an infusion of brains, energy and practical experience onto the board. Great addition to the board.

Steve Gard is in the UK bringing his message of candidate centric recruitment to the masses. If you don't know about the Circle Back initiative, you should it is an industry pledge by recruitment companies for minimum standards in candidate feedback. Catch Steve whilst you can over the next few weeks.

Rayvonne Carter, Webinar Coordinator (Aggregate) is looking for contributors for Human Resources Today. If you have a presentation or an idea which you want to amplify, this is your chance to do it. Reach out to Rayvonne directly here.

Emma Pearce, Head of Brand Events (Personio) is looking for speakers, hosts, moderators and panel guests for a series of events planned in the UK for 2022. Great opportunity for new voices, especially for those in under represented groups. If you have something to say about HR and Recruiting and want to say it in front of an audience, get in touch with Emma and say so!

Sarah Langton, Global Head of Recruitment at Clifford Chance, is the new chair of the RL100. Is there a more effectively leadership community in the UK TA right now? Probably none better than RL100 and Sarah's move to the position of Chair can only solidify that status. Great move.

Jim Berrisford, Sales Director UK and Ireland (VONQ) is taking part in The Distinguished Gentleman's Ride to raise funds for Men's Health and Mental Health Awareness. Worthy cause folks and a great excuse to see Jimbo wear his handlebar moustache doing his Easy Rider impression. Donate here, tenner will do.

Finally, the one and only Bill Boorman is participating and part organising the Around The World In 80 Artists Exhibition at Elekrowerks in Islington, May 5th. Should be a fantastic night of street art + comedy - free to get in, so see you there if you are. Grab a ticket here

If you are doing something new,?comment below?with what it is and share a link to where you want people to go. Don't forget to @ mention me in it so that I see it

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End Notes

Bank Holiday today, in the UK, which always catches me out. I hope that our European and US readers can still enjoy this post, whilst the UK try and find some sort of sunshine through the gloom of this spring.

Unpredictable weather is a manifestation of climate change, as centuries of humans inputting carbon into the system begins to see right here, right now impact every on the globe. The current heatwave in India - temps nudging close to 50C - are frightening.

Might be time to plant some trees at least, so expect the Brainfood Forest initiative to be reinvigorated, in time for my birthday next month.

Laters friends

Hung

Hung Lee is the curator of?Recruiting Brainfood, and now This Week In Recruiting. Subscribe to both if you are into recruiting or HR or just interested in world of work.