Employers wake up! Your company depends on star talent. Ask yourself this question. What are you doing to get the star talent, not the low hanging fruit? Even in challenging economic times, losing your star talent can be devastating to your organization and it’s bottom line.
What are you doing to take care of your star employees so they don”t leave? If you are faced with a key employee leaving what are you doing to replace that employee with equal or better? Not much as I can tell. As an owner of an executive search firm, everyday I speak to candidates who are disillusioned with their company. These are desirable employees who’s needs are not being met. Why are their needs not being met? Because their talents are not being recognized and rewarded until they come in to resign. Then it is to late. The damage is now done and you are faced with one big headache.
What should I do you may ask? Well the answer is not simple. In most big organizations there are so many layers it is like pealing an onion to get to the heart of the problem. Unfortunately, where to begin must come from the top. Yes the head of the organization must set the tone for the rest of the organization. Most line managers are afraid to make any decision for fear of making a decision that might be wrong and they would lose their jobs. This mentality can be the cancer that starts eating away at the company.
Decision and indecision are prevalent in most companies that I am dealing with. The line manager defers to the HR department for the hiring process. The HR is over worked and drags their feet because they are trying to make many hiring managers happy and, therefore, making no one happy. Now, of course, some organizations are better than others at the hiring process. Those are the companies that let their line managers get involved directly in the hiring process. By doing this, the line manager gets to choose who the person under them will be. Right away you have a formula for success.
In my opinion, before you look outside of your company you should identify who in your organization should fill that key lost spot or newly created position. This will enable you to promote somebody from within and keep that internal candidate from leaving.
In future Best Headhunters blogs, we will go over issues of how you can retain key employees and promote from within if possible and if this is not possible how you can conduct an effective job search process that will help you identify the stars and be able to hire them enabling your organizations to grow. I welcome all your comments so I can address them in our next blog.