In a market characterized by job hugging, talent professionals need to rethink their approach, Jim D’Amico, vice president of talent acquisition at Caliber Collision, an auto repair provider, told attendees April 20 during a SHRM Talent session.
“Where I think leaders are still really missing the boat is that most TA organizations are set up for attraction,” D’Amico said. “We’re in a post-attraction world. We have to focus on seduction.”
Workers are staying put to gain security amid market uncertainty, and recruiters have to do more than offer a job, he said.
“We have to have a reason to seduce them away from that job,” D’Amico said.
Part of that involves upskilling TA teams, said Nicky Gibson, global director of talent, strategy, operations and employee experience at Epsilon, a marketing services company.
“I think recruiters have gotten a little bit lazy,” Gibson said. “We want to upskill them and help them to use the tools that will help make them more successful and more strategic in nature.”
At the forefront of those tools is artificial intelligence, she said.
“Where I see the gap is not understanding how important it is for your future as a recruiter,” Gibson said. “I’m not of the mindset that AI is going to replace people … It’s going to replace people who don’t know how to use AI.”
But that doesn’t mean just teaching basic AI to everyone, said Craig Fisher, founder and lead consultant at TalentNet Media, a recruitment strategy firm.
“Look at the tools that you actually can use,” Fisher said. “If you can use specific tools, be specific about what you’re helping your recruiting teams to learn, because that’s what’s going to help them right now.”
It also means having AI do certain work to free up recruiters for other tasks, D’Amico explained.
“If any of you are recruiters, or have recruiters that do screens, stop it. Stop it right now. The machine can screen,” D’Amico said.
Instead, recruiters should be focused on assessment interviews and what he called “a diagnostic interview of the candidate.” They need to figure out how to cure whatever pain a candidate is coming up against that is making them consider a new role, he said.
“You have to be able to seduce them. Can you take them through the process where they’re going to accept your role? Have you helped remove all the other options from them and convinced them that you are the place that they have to be and not to take the counter?” D’Amico said.