What War for Talent?

I believe the War for Talent talked up by headhunters  is phoney.  There is enough Talent for any role, it depends how you define the talent required.  Let me give you an example, we are frequently asked to hire sales people, the conversation with the sales manager or sales director frequently goes like this:

"What type of person are you looking for?" - Consultant

"Well, they need to be bright, dynamic, on the way up in their career, an achiever, have a high degree of initiative, creative with an ability to think on their feet, blue-chip background and clearly experience of selling in our space" - Sales Director 'X"

And there you have it, a War for Talent because that's clearly what everyone wants to hire and the type of people who fit that mould will undoubtedly be small but is it what they "want" or more importantly what they "need"?

Let's for one minute suggest that not all sales people are the same and that not all organisations need the same sales people, if they aren't and they don't, why do we prescribe to one "great" type of sales person, surely there must be other types?  We found this to be the case with one FTSE 100 client, upon analysis the types of sales people that performed best in their environment, were not as depicted above, actually their best sales people were neither stereotypically bright or creative, actually it was definitely better that they were not!  For this organisation a better understanding of what made a great sales employee (not a general assumption) opened up a whole world of potential employees previously untapped, they defied the War for Talent, because for them it was phoney.

Oh I hear the cries from the technical people that that theory is all very well but in some technical areas, such as Women in IT, the War for Talent exists because the talent doesn't exist at all.  Actually i kind of sign up to that, they are right it doesn't exist.  So you have a choice, engage in a non-productive vicious cycle of attrition, i.e. we'll just steal other people's talent and they'll steal ours etc. Or create your own, be brave, don't engage in a war, take a different path...at Chemistry Recruitment (http://chemistryrecruitment.com) we have a choice steal other people's recruitment consultants at a price or create our own, as a small business the temptation to "buy" people who can hit the ground running is great, think of all that early revenue!  However for our brand and business it's the wrong choice, so we invest in hiring individuals with the right level of Intellect, Values, Motivation and Behaviours and we then train them on the experience required.  Our retention and individual performance figures speak volumes about how right our choice is, we have a team of loyal, passionate people who have no preconceptions about how recruitment should be delivered, they are fantastic.

Saying all of this hiring great people is not easy, it doesn't have to be expensive but it's not easy...

Cheers

Roger

Comments

[Doug Bates]

Roger, I read your blog with interest but then noticed that 25% of your staff have a recruitment background and that you have a new starter joining who is also en ex-recruiter, making it 3 out of 9, how does this tie in with your stated view of not stealing other people's talent?

[Roger Philby]

Ah you have me :-)...well not strictly. I have 1 person out of 12 who is a lifer recruiter and 2 (including the 1) people who have come from other recruitment companies directly to us. I didn't "steal" them they came to us, tired of how they were doing it and wanting to improve. I do believe that we are an open church and if your profile (intellect, values, motivation, behaviour (not your experience) fits you are welcome. Louise, Elouise, Julia, Lorraine, Rowan, Sue, Teresa, Simon and Catherine are all testament to that. However I also believe that our industry has some fantastic people in and if their "profile" fits why wouldn't we hire them...so far we have found 2...if i didn't say as much in my blog, you'll have to excuse my use of artistic license to make a point :-). Our point to all our clients is that of course true talent to them, is someone with the right Intellect, Values, Motivation, Behaviours and they have done the job before...however when you don't have that luxury of ticking all 5 boxes, the worse thing you can do is hire someone because they have the right experience. I have made that mistake and paid the price!