Future-Proofing Talent: Strategy, Tech, and the New Rules of Attraction

In today’s fast-evolving war for talent, traditional hiring is just one piece of a much bigger puzzle. Winning companies are playing a longer game - building out interconnected strategies that start long before a job is posted and continue well after onboarding.

Thank you to our guest speakers:

Catalina Schveninger, Partner & Senior EX Consultant, DesignThinkers
Dave Bradey, Global Head of Talent Acquisition, Mars

We discussed:

• What long-term planning will solve the most urgent talent challenges?
• Are employee expectations for the workplace changing?
• How could corporate alumni leaders become more of a strategic partner for talent teams?
• How is the Employer Value Proposition evolving within innovative companies?

Five Things We Leaned About Future-Proofing Talent

The world is more volatile …

 “Open up any news article, turn on the TV, read anything, and volatility is all around us. What used to be traditional and long-term talent strategies still resonate, but they need to be looked at in a much more agile way …”
Dave Bradey

Alumni are your friends …

“You can no longer count on your people sticking around for 10 years, so you need to broaden the talent pools. You need to think about your alumni as people who will refer talent, bring you business and maybe come back and work for you …”
Catalina Schveninger

 Short-term hiring is increasingly common

“The world now has five generations in the workplace. Loyalty is starting to shift. We still have a lot of short-term hiring challenges that are symptomatic of a lack of longer-term planning …”
Dave Bradey

Employee expectations are shifting …

“People are saying no to jobs and to higher salaries if they are not offered the flexibility of hybrid working. Everyone expects a much more personal experience. The expectation to tailor needs is becoming increasingly important …”
Catalina Schveninger

People want easy ways to apply for jobs …

“60% of people applying for a job do not want to fill in the job application form. You only have one thing to do if you're applying for a job and that's fill it in! But people are inherently either reticent or lazy. So you have to make it easy …”
Emma Sinclair

Q&A

Emma Sinclair: What's changed in the talent landscape that makes long-term thinking about talent essential?

Dave: The game should have always been long-term. Open up any news article, turn on the TV, read anything, and the VUCA – the volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity – is all around us. What used to be traditional and long term talent strategies still resonate, but they need to be looked at in much more agile way. Mars is a privately-owned family company that's been around for a hundred years. We’ve always looked at the long term, but certainly the last five to 10 years, the landscape has changed even more.

Catalina: We know that the biggest shift is for talent. Talent now wins more than in anytime in history. Attention spans have shortened, but talent decisions need to have a long horizon. You can no longer count on people sticking around for 10 years, so you need to broaden the talent pools. You need to think about your alumni as people who will refer talent, bring you business and maybe come back and work for you.

Emma: What are some of the challenges of short term hiring?

Dave: The world now has five generations in the workplace. Mars employs 150,000 people across the globe, but their loyalty is staring to shift. We’re a manufacturing company at a heart. Everybody knows our brands. We have a lot of short-term hiring challenges that are symptomatic of a lack of longer term planning. One of our biggest short-term challenges is planning for re-skilling in the long term.

Emma: What are the key puzzle pieces that lead employers to build sustainable talent strategies?

Dave: At the most senior level, it's getting the buy-in. Things have changed, and if you don't have the most senior leaders, it becomes very difficult. We are focused on our HR teams, our operating model, and how we create end-to-end solutions. Even if the talent are only here for a short time, they still want that full experience. We're ensuring our operating model delivers what our candidates, new associates and alumni actually need.

Catalina: We need to integrate our processes around talent acquisition and development. We are more than system thinkers, marketers and data analysts, and need to use that data to focus on filling the jobs at hand. We think: what are the key skills? It doesn't matter what a person has done or what job titles they’ve held previously. It’s all about: can they do this well?

Emma: How are employee expectations shifting?

Catalina: People are saying no to jobs and to higher salaries if they are not offered the flexibility of hybrid working. Everyone expects a much more personal experience, and that's the biggest shift. The expectation to tailor needs, including outside of work, is becoming increasingly important. That requires a lot of listening. People don’t buy into slick videos and great campaigns any more. They want authenticity, so they can talk about their experiences at work or when they leave.

Emma: Does the EVP [employee value proposition] extend to lifelong relationships?

Dave: Absolutely. Mars was historically a private, family company. We only really started talking externally around 50 years ago. The great thing was that we had great stories to tell. Our EVP is about people, principles and development. We are well known for our principles, culture, and our focus on people. Before we make decisions like we're going to buy this, shut this or do this, we always look at how that would impact people. So our EVP absolutely resonates for alumni and at all levels. We have done well because our turnover rates are significantly less than our competitors. We bring smiles to people faces with what we do.

Emma: What are some of the challenges of hiring talented senior leaders back when they've gone to a different sector or a culture?

Dave: When you join a family-owned business, you join the family. The downside is that, historically, if you leave the company, you also leave the family. Now, when somebody leaves to garner new skills, development and experiences, we really focus on looking how we can boomerang them back. We’ve shifted the definition of inclusivity to say: wait a second, we're hiring you back in because you have all these fantastic skills.

Emma: What's been your approach to boomeranging former employees? 

Dave: It’s been very much by continued relationships when somebody leaves the Mars organisation. Mars now operates way beyond Slough. It’s global. The best people that teach the culture and history of Mars are the people who've been in the company. There’s an entire population of talent who wants to engage and may be looking into getting back into full-time roles, some of which are extremely specific and technical. We produce two million Mars Bars a day. We need people to run the equipment to ensure that those two million Mars Bars hit our consumers.

Catalina: I know some really brilliant founders who have a proactive approach to hiring boomerangs. When you are dropping a new product, you need people who know the technology, the tools, the structure and also the company.

Emma: How can alumni program leaders offer a competitive edge in attracting great people?

Catalina: Good employer brand impact, reputation and innovation is a sign that you are a healthy, ethical brand. Your ability to attract people who left is always a good story, because people don't want to go back to companies that didn't treat them well.

Emma: My answer would be: the competitive edge is you're just making it super easy for people to consider you as their next place of work. I always say that alumni success should be measured on business outcomes, not engagement. We know that boomerangs move to 25% when you have a proper digital alumni network. More so when you have one-click apply. Everything in life is about making things easy for people. We did some A/B testing and found that 60% of people applying for a job did not want to fill in the job application form. You only have one thing to do if you're applying for a job and that's fill it in! But people are inherently either reticent or lazy. So first of all, it's making it very easy. Second of all, it's human nature. An alumni network is like a career co-pilot. It's there for the long term. If you’re keeping people close, you're telling them: you still matter to me.