Proven Ways to Attract Top Talent

Date Posted: 03/17/2015

With high unemployment, and the job market being tight, job seekers far outnumber available positions. This would suggest that when an overseas employer decides to open its doors for recruitment of Filipinos and other foreign workers, there would be a flood of applications. Yes, there is a flood of applications but you don’t always receive applications from the right kind of applicants and the huge volume of applications mostly comprises the unproven, the not quite suitable, the desperate and the altogether unsuitable candidate.  So where are the talented candidates and why are they shying away when employers want them? This is the underlying paradox in employing people from overseas that has dogged employers for some time now.

Perhaps we must credit talented performers as being savvy and very selective and seeking employers who fit their profile. Therefore it’s up to your organization to make sure they get to know that you are indeed a good employer who can fulfill their aspirations not just with a high salary but also with stable, growth-oriented, skill-enriching careers where creativity and innovation are encouraged.

To attract talented job seekers from abroad with the right profile, you need to promote certain aspects of your organization to attract the best talent, as suggested below:

Promote your organization with a good story.
Develop an interesting and relate-able corporate story, and sell it well so that future employees will want to live your story. Use social media to propagate your story, not just to promote your business.

Publicize your work environment attractions.
Avoiding cliché in portraying your profile, suggest uniqueness in your work culture through broadcasting your ESI (employee satisfaction index) using real stories.

Create a positive work and living ambience.  
Hours at work constituting a major part of our daily lives. Make the office or workplace a complete living environment in showing not just the workplace but also their relaxation areas. Top performers seek out opportunities that allow them to mingle, think and innovate.

Match their vision.
Talented people have a vision to contribute to society beyond pure commercial objectives.  Expect the employer to work in tandem towards this objective. If corporate vision can match such personal vision, you have satisfied staff at your disposal.

Qualifications are not the only criteria for hiring.
Recruit the candidate for his mental attitude and aptitude and not just for his qualifications, which can sometimes be misleading. Value emotional intelligence. It is critical for people to be able to express emotions that impact work quality, and inter-personal relationships that are essential for overall success.

Value transparency.
Promote a culture where everyone is treated as worthy individuals valued for their contributions, without having to face any “look-down on” attitude from above. Maintain impartial transparency in the performance appraisal process as this area is the root of many grievances among employees.

Invest in good managers, not dictators.
Once you attract talent, ensure you don’t lose them due to ineffective/bad supervisors, which is a common occurrence. Keep impartial tabs on superiors and don’t hesitate to intervene when required.

Sell yourself through your employees.
Acknowledge that your own staff is the best group to advertise your work culture. Keeping insiders happy can make outsiders want to share this happiness. Encourage employee referrals with rewards for every hire if their references are hired.

Never stop searching.
Constantly update a database to maintain a pipeline of reserve talent of diverse competencies irrespective of immediate vacancies. Even include those already employed elsewhere. You never know when you may need them.

Target the young.
“There is a great egg-layer in every hatch of chicks.” Identify young potential for future molding into producers.

Avoid wrong hires with repeated interviewing.
Hire only the best without compromise and avoid recruiting ‘maybe’ hires from what is available as these would likely be wrong hires. Be selective in your recruiting decisions as a wrong hire can cause heartburn all around. Always insist on hiring the right recruit only, whatever pressures there may be.

Use a reputable Employment Agency.
When hiring from abroad, use the services of a good and reputable employment agency like Ikon.  Recruitment can be a very complex task if not done professionally.  Many employers worry about making recruitment mistakes and therefore take the prudent step of turning to professional recruitment specialists to help them achieve better results.  So, why not let Ikon help you interview and hire the right candidate from abroad.

Ikon’s extensive database can make the process less time consuming, costly and frustrating.  Ikon can save you money and time.  We have files of pre-screened qualified applicants who can be referred to you immediately.  This saves you the time and energy of reading countless resumes and interviewing unqualified applicants.  Building an ongoing relationship with Ikon gives you the added advantage of having us inform you about highly qualified candidates who become available even when you do not have an immediate opening.  Ikon doesn’t charge you a fee unless you hire the person and that person starts work with you so there is no risk at all on your part.  Ikon also guarantees to replace staff they have placed with you.

Inculcate collaborative work cultures.
Support a working system that is based on collaborative effort rather that individual effort so that the success and failures are not attributed to any individual but to the whole team.

Value your employees.
Don’t harbor the antiquated notion that your employees are replaceable as that would be trashing them before they are at fault. Instead, woo talent by encouraging a culture that offers value creation and show appreciation when this is evidence of good performance.

Relate customer satisfaction to staff quality.
Customer satisfaction is the end result of efforts of high performers, and is therefore precious to them. But if the organization is casual in its address of its customer satisfaction index, high performers feel they are wasting their time, and leave. Therefore, retain customers to retain top talent.

Be value driven.
Actually practicing values viz. open communication, fair business practice, community involvement and prompt grievance redressal, will help you attract and retain top talent who seek values-driven environments.

Review your recruiting practices.
Highly skilled personnel are relatively few in number and are most likely already employed, and therefore difficult, or take longer, to find. Apply different techniques and innovative approaches in your interview processes.

In conclusion, by boosting your organization’s market perception as a great employer with a creative, stimulating and open culture, word will get around and skilled performers will notice you. Pursue the above recommendations seriously, and this will certainly enable your organization to evolve into THE employer of choice.

Need help in sourcing top quality staff?  Ikon – a full service facility – is here for you!  
You can trust Ikon to find the best people for you and be certain that every detail of the hiring process is maximized in finding your ideal candidates. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions for future articles, please email us at [email protected].  

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