The [HR] Future is Proactive

Last month, we published a new eBook running down the hottest HR trends for 2023.

Topping the list? How to up your talent and skill programs with some serious strategic mojo. If you’re ready to dive into the world of HR strategy, buckle up — because we always have got some (what we see as) important insights to share.  

In this week’s blog, we pulled an excerpt diving into the adoption of a proactive approach to recruiting. Here’s an excerpt from the EBook.

 Business Partnership Requires Proactive Vision 

Shifting from a reactive to proactive recruiting mindset will ensure organizations can, to borrow a Gartner term, accelerate out of the current, ahem, a bit unstable, market curve. Add in an aging workforce and new demands for a finite set of talent who can both spell and execute AI or RPA programs, and proactivity becomes even more important. 

Along these lines, periods of job rationalization can also result in companies turning to a few key individuals to drive major pieces of their team (often with decreasing support, more pressure, etc.) That eventuality, of course, causes challenges from a business resilience standpoint. 

Source from Within

If you are still facing downsizing or budget compression pressures, here’s a quick reminder that many organizations often miss: your current employees are also your most valuable sourcing pool.

Before you go through a mass layoff and then need to re-hire the same individuals again, use skill adjacency to identify potential candidates for existing requisitions. You get to be broader and more inclusive in your sourcing, while also maintaining a measure of goodwill among potentially at-risk talent pools (and not losing them to competitors if you let them go!) 

Fundamentals Always Matter

This is absolutely the right time to invest attention in fundamental talent programs such as succession planning, mentoring, and reskilling. Always important elements, but never more so than when you are asking critical team members to do more, with less. From a strategy perspective, in a “retrenching” time, companies who focus on opportunities to reskill and upskill employees will be ready to prepare for when customer/order/service volumes get back to pre-recession levels.

Ready to Learn More?

Want to get even more executive insights on Recession-Proof Talent Strategy, New CHRO Mandates, and Transformative Technologies Changing HR get the full eBook here.