Data generated through LinkedIn’s Economic Graph which is based on 600+ new data points created every 2 seconds on the platform suggests more employees than ever are changing careers and employers. This includes the GCC region, which is losing critical talent to the United Kingdom, Canada, and the Philippines whilst fresh talent is moving in from other locations, such as the United States other parts of the Middle East and Africa right now.
This phenomenon, termed ‘The Great Reshuffle’ by LinkedIn CEO Ryan Roslanksy, has seen employers scramble to respond to the change by understanding the root causes of their own talent drain and are wondering not only how to find and compete for new talent, but also how to get new talent to perform fast to fill the competency gap.
A unanimous conclusion of businesses on talent acquisition and retention strategy has been the necessity to transform working environments to become more human-centric and support their talent to perform better, faster.
During a recent panel discussion on the Great Talent Reshuffle organized by New Metrics and LinkedIn, Feras Al Majed, Vice President HR, GBM, commented on the phenomenon: “We needed our people to empower themselves, leveraging all of the tools, and allow managers to manage. We have given back the power to managers to make decisions without being dictated by policy and that helped us through the pandemic. That meant giving away certain control but that did not mean we don’t support the business. We empowered managers to take ownership. When managers have accountability and employees are part of the solution, and it is not imposed on them, it helps us gain that attraction. Too often, HR likes to work in black and white, but at times like this you have got to be comfortable to play in the grey.”
A great testimony to the success of adopting human-centric talent strategies is also Alyasra Fashion, a regional major retail & hospitality group. Hani Ismael, the Group’s CHRO spoke about how they approached the challenge so far: “The fear of the unknown was leading everybody’s lives. People’s safety first became our strategy and we acted accordingly. Turned the disaster into opportunity, shifting the business online and exposing people to new ways of working.” This shift in strategy created by consulting employees on the best plan of action and achievable business targets, alongside increased investment in enabling employees to carry the shift through learning and development, allowed the business not only to survive this critical time but also to emerge from it stronger with more engaged employees: The company ended up paying out the highest bonuses in company history in January 2021, which they attribute to the human-centric approach the company adopted during the pandemic.
Success stories like the ones of GBM and Alyasra are compelling cases that can give every company, whether large or small and no matter the industry, the confidence to look at how they can create better employee experiences to drive greater business success and retention.
One way to start is to explore how the organization can accelerate the velocity of the employee experience journey at the front end by looking at the stages of hiring, onboarding, cultural integration, and the way employees are enabled to reach performance and mastery by consulting their employees via engagement or pulse surveys, 1:1s and focus groups.
This will not only make employees feel valued from the get-go but if these co-created improvements are then implemented and well communicated, will also get people to perform faster in their roles, no matter how long they stay with the organization: Whether that is one month as a contractor, one year as a career springboard or ten years as on a long-term career path.
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