Hiring for growth?!
Can you imagine having a discussion about hiring for growth a couple of years ago? Back then, you were firefighting an unprecedented deluge of lay-offs, furloughs and a multitude of other previously untapped pandemic-incurred employment curveballs. Talk about hiring for growth was virtually non-existent.
But, wow, look at how the famine has become feast for candidates!
Diverse sectors that drive the US, UK and Australian economies – construction, hospitality, manufacturing and retail – are hiring for growth at high velocity. But people have changed, and their attitudes to employment have changed. Folks all around the world developed a newfound appetite for learning and development when the pause button was temporarily pushed on their lives. And, moving forwards into a post-pandemic marketplace, it continues to appeal to their enlightened sense of how work works for them, rather than the other way round.
As a result, the nature of hiring for growth is changing, too, to keep pace with the evolving employment climate and the terms candidates are dictating. So, rest assured, you’re not alone if you’re having to change tack to attract to the best talent.
SHRM’s Kate Rockwood referred to “… to a 2021 Gallup survey conducted on behalf of Amazon. In that survey, 66 percent of workers ages 18-24 ranked learning new skills as the third-most important perk when evaluating new job.”
Many recruitment professionals are recognizing learning and development is a make-or-break factor for rapid hiring for growth, in a way that’s meaningful and sticks.
So, what do you need to be thinking about and acting on to –
- Leverage learning and development for expedited hiring for growth?
- Position ongoing learning and development at the heart every employee’s forward journey
How Entry Level Learning and Development Ignites Hiring for Growth
Hiring for growth P.D.Q. is less challenging when you can introduce learning and development during your talent acquisition efforts, demonstrating it in reality to your new hires.
Thanos Papangelis, CEO of Epignosis, explained to SHRM, “In this challenging period, we’ve seen that learning and development can make a significant impact on both employee retention and attraction of new hires.”
With this in mind, imagine the employer brand-boosting brownie points of actually showing your top candidates what could be in store for them, rather than just telling them. A superlative LMS empowers you to give candidates an enticing first glimpse at a dashboard for early access onboarding and training modules that could be theirs. It can include –
- Brand, Product and Service Training – No matter the sector you’re in, brand and product training is crucial for equipping salespeople, plus any other facing employees, with relevant levels of information about your products and services. In doing so, you’re priming them to represent your business to their optimum best. In addition, their buy-in and belief in what you do instills them with a valuable sense of ambassadorship.
- Compliance – New hires might need to immediately obtain or update certifications, especially in highly regulated sectors such as construction and manufacturing, or if you’re mitigating skills shortages in hospitality by recruiting from outside the industry.
- Diversity & inclusion – Diversity and inclusion training reinforces your commitment as an employer of people from a rich spectrum of backgrounds, cultures and demographics. Entry level (and ongoing) training is the perfect platform for setting expectations and building on them over time.
Online access to entry level learning and development modules gives new hires the opportunity to undertake their initial entry level training at their leisure, before they’re even officially in post with you. It speeds up the process. But it also serves a greater purpose. In addition – and importantly – pre-start training engages new hires, and has them thinking about what’s next, once they’ve found their feet.
So, how can you stay several steps ahead of them?
How Ongoing Learning and Development Reinforces Retention
Learning and development aren’t over once new hires are up and running. In fact, you could say it’s just starting.
Jennifer Buchanan, Sam’s Club’s Bentonville, Ark. HQ Senior Director of Field Learning and Development, explained to SHRM, “If [employees] are confident in what they’re doing and they can see a clear path for their career, they’re more likely to stay with the company.” After all, losing the talent you worked hard to find isn’t the mark of successful hiring for growth you’d planned for.
An ace LMS helps ensure your retention levels don’t stray outside of natural attrition territory. Besides helping you maintain the status quo, you can improve on it, too. How so? Because glorious LMS software kits you out to deploy and deliver ongoing learning and development, with leading edge features such as –
- Customized learning paths – Having all the information in one place, integrated with any other HCMS you use, makes the formulation of personalized employee-by-employee paths effortless, while supporting
- The overall business needs
- The employee’s learning and development needs, in line with their career trajectory, and other sector specific compliance needs
- The employee’s learning preference, e.g. hybrid, live or remote
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Convenient Microlearning– eLearning offers employees ultimate flexibility, with supercharged effectiveness courtesy of snackable, bite-sized portions of training. Shorter sittings result in higher levels of engagement and information retention in comparison of the tedium of longer sessions, (which can especially grate if they’re busy enough with what’s already on their plate, without having to shoehorn training into an already hectic schedule).
- Measurement of KPIs– An outstanding LMS with superior reporting capabilities provides you with deep insights beyond a record of who’s completed what course, and who scored what. In addition, there’s much for you and your employees to gain, empowering you to analyze how their results are supporting specific projects, team goals and overall business goals. This utility is so powerful for identifying any potential issues at individual, team or business level that might need a closer look.
LinkedIn’s CEO Ryan Roslansky summed great L&D beautifully when he told the Harvard Business Review, “Once you’ve hired them, keep your employees engaged and your company ready to adapt to changing demands by creating a culture of learning. It’s how we’ll start hiring and developing talent for the future, not the past.”
At HireRoad, our Learn by HireRoad software can be leveraged on a standalone basis, or intuitively partnered with Recruit by HireRoad. It’s expertly designed to offer both plug-and-play content, and also the tools to create your own bespoke training to suit, for hiring for growth through retention and ongoing prosperity.
Is better learning and development for hiring and beyond on your agenda? Get in touch. We need to talk.