TRANSFORMING Teams
By Claudia St. John
5 steps to hiring and retaining talent in 2022 was recently sharing a cab with the business owner of a print manufacturer heading to an industry conference where I was slated to be a presenter on workforce trends and solutions. He turned to me and said, “Okay, then tell me… where the heck did everyone go? Where are the workers and how do we get them to come work for us?” Where indeed! Unfortunately, they have gone to a variety of places and for a variety of reasons. Some have quit their jobs because of continued COVID hesitancy, some because of ongoing child care challenges, some have quit to join new opportunities and the chance to earn more money and gain more workplace flexibility, and some have quit just to take a much-needed break, knowing that when the savings run low there will be ample job opportunities for them to jump back into the labor market. What’s an employer to do? Well, it starts with a shift of mindset and these five steps:
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Step 1: Imagine the talent you want and SWOT them!
Who are you looking to hire? Is it someone with maturity and experience? Someone with less experience but lots of enthusiasm? Someone local or someone remote? We encourage our clients to visualize the talent they seek and work to understand what their desired employees are looking for. What do they want? Too often, business leaders fail to recognize the unique needs and wants of their talent and focus instead on what they as employers want.
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Don’t know what your desired hires want in their lives or in their jobs? Just ask the ones who already work for you and who are in the same demographic what they want and like about their jobs. What are their strengths and opportunities and how can you maximize those assets while minimizing the weaknesses and threats that they may possess?
are and what they want. Use videos, social media and testimonials to tell the stories of employees just like them. Show community. Show opportunity. Show your culture. Maximize social media. Yes, create a TikTok video! Don’t know how to do this? Find someone who does and put your marketing resources here.
Step 2: Shift your marketing
Try this: grab your smartphone and log on to your website and look for your career site. Is it easy to find? Next, look at your job openings. Do they look cool and would a Gen Z be inspired to apply? Remember, 90% of job seekers look for jobs from their mobile devices. Next, try applying using your mobile phone. Not easy? That’s a problem because the vast majority of employees in the first 10 years of their careers are applying for jobs using their mobile devices.
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How much of your marketing budget are you spending to tell your story to attract talent? My guess is very little. I have spent endless hours exploring corporate career sites and company job boards and few of them show any effort to attract talent. Instead, the marketing is often re-constituted sales material that, from a potential employee’s perspective, is boring and uninspiring. Revamp it! Show prospective employees you understand who they
December 2021
Step 3: Remove barriers
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