Talent Works Blog

Hunting down future talent is not easy, especially when they are not even looking to change roles. However, TWI took on PepsiCo’s tough challenge

The Challenge

It’s tough finding the top talent in the FMCG (fast-moving consumer goods) sector. Despite the apparent high number of jobseekers in the market. PepsiCo UK was finding that within the soft drinks sector it was hard to find the talent it needed.

Rick Kershaw joined PepsiCo three years ago as head of resourcing, PepsiCo UK & Ireland, with the aim of transforming the company’s talent acquisition process. “At that time we were 90-95% reliant on third-party recruiters,” he explained. “In fact, in the team we had very high-calibre HR generalists but there were no dedicated recruiters. Apart from a few internal referrals, we needed to change to a more direct sourcing approach.” The primary concern, however, he told Recruiter, was to find the best available talent in the market; cost was secondary. Kershaw also wanted to look at attracting passive talent to the business through a more proactive direct sourcing methodology. But with just himself and his new hire, Katie McNab, a specialist recruiter hired as talent acquisition manager, they needed a partner, “an external resource arm to provide the right level of capability that we didn’t have internally”, he explained.

The challenge for this partner was to really understand PepsiCo’s business “the agencies we work with really understand our culture” and to extend the candidate reach deeper into the passive market. At around this time, Neil Purcell, founder and director of talent acquisition and global resourcing specialist Talent Works International (TWI), had made an approach to PepsiCo’s HR department. Kershaw liked what he heard and decided to offer TWI the challenge.

The Solution

We were initially engaged to look at market mapping to create talent pools for open and vacant positions to fill immediate need,” Purcell explained. “This later was to develop into a slightly more strategic focus, based on mapping market functions across PepsiCo’s business to enable them to develop talent pipelines for future hires, focusing on high potential talent.” As the partnership progressed, other aims included reducing time and cost to hire by identifying talent and engaging with them early; identifying industry-leading passive talent rather than just focusing on the active jobseeker; and building future talent pools through tracking key talent.

Finding and engaging with passive candidates is, by the very fact that they are not actively looking to change jobs, a much tougher and time-consuming proposition. “Generally you are engaging with people six, nine or even 12 months before they are looking to change jobs,” Purcell said. “However, candidates are more savvy with engaging with companies before they move on as part of their own career planning.” That said, this resourcing part of direct sourcing is extremely labour intensive, he admitted. The internet, and social media in particular, is not a panacea to this problem. “It’s only good for 30% of the talent market at the most. It’s not the ’be all and end all’,” Purcell emphasised. “It’s one tool but there are other methods. You can only confirm what’s going on [in the marketplace] with true market mapping, by tapping into individuals’ knowledge, getting referrals to develop a true picture of who’s out there.” Once the passive candidate is approached, then comes the lengthy process of building a relationship with them. “It’s rare to pitch an opportunity on the first contact,” he explained.

The most important thing, from PepsiCo’s point of view, was selling the employer proposition to the passive candidate. “We want to be authentic as a business,” Kershaw explained. “The candidate experience has to be positive. And when Neil and his team are explaining the proposition to the passive candidate, when we see them for a role further down the line, they then have the same experience they know what the proposition is going to be.”

TWI’s ongoing role is in providing a future talent pool for PepsiCo, Purcell emphasised. “We are the resourcing arm, not the recruiting arm,” he said. And Kershaw has been impressed with TWI’s overall approach. “They care about us landing the right candidate,” he told Recruiter. “They get satisfaction from the end result and don’t just step away once they’ve ’done their bit’. It’s all about the process.”

And this process continues today. “We have a very honest dialogue with Neil and his team,” Kershaw explained. “We need to know when we’re not delivering on what we’re meant to be doing and vice versa. They’re flexible with what they take on but are honest enough to say if they can’t meet a particular challenge.” Certainly, in this case, it seems that TWI has more than met PepsiCo’s challenges and will be up for taking on many more in an extremely active, not passive way.

Original article:

The Recruiter, 2011, Topping up the talent pool [Article] 13th July 2011, available at: http://tinyurl.com/5u9xn6x

Talent Acquisition is no longer about a succession of transactional recruitment, putting out fires and plugging holes in your organisation. This is not cost effective, nor competitive.

With strong market intelligence and an understanding of what is driving internal and external talent agendas, you are able to hire the best people. Hiring the best people will engage and enhance existing workforces.

However, Talent Acquisition must go beyond hiring. Every project should give a transparent picture of your priority target candidates in the market, why they are or are not interested and what motivates them in their current roles. Your succession plan should be to build a complete Talent Platform of intelligence, market knowledge and sustainable and accessible talent that’s engaged by your business.

Here at Talent Works International we work with our clients to develop and execute this approach.

Through Executive Resourcing, Talent Pooling and Market Intelligence you can:

• Create an available pipeline of Talent to meet hiring needs on a short, medium and long term basis
• Manage risk by resourcing your Mission Critical Positions
• Resource and develop sustainability into your succession plan short, medium and long term
• Benchmark your internal talent pipeline against the external market
• Build long term Talent Acquisition Capability for your organisation

We would be interested to hear your thoughts on identifying, attracting and retaining the very best talent and what methods you find most effective and welcome any comments below.

In March, we carried out a survey to understand the various approaches and strategies that may be adopted for acquiring the best talent within 2011. If you’ve not already seen the full report, you can do so via:http://tinyurl.com/6df4zcg

We found from our respondents that overall, most would be increasing their headcount in 2011 and as such, would be looking to do as much direct sourcing as possible.

As a follow up, we recently carried out another survey, available via:http://t.co/n5KYdUK to asses the various direct sourcing methods and trends behind them.

From our survey findings, industry press and also client trends, we have seen a huge shift in the way companies/teams are resourcing and managing their internal and future talent.

We’ve found that many companies and clients are putting an increasing emphasis on generating talent pipelines in order to secure their talent for years to come. They’re also becoming increasingly conscious of their brand awareness as an asset that should be carefully developed and monitored.

Whilst employment rates are increasing, with the Office for National Statistic reporting that the total number of people unemployed fell by 88,000 over the quarter, the war for skilled capital still remains and many employers are now looking to reach out further to a much wider market than ever before.

This month, we were fortunate enough to open a further two offices, Israel and Miami, which have increased our global coverage and allowed us to be at the very front of our clients needs.

Talent Works International have been proving resourcing solutions for the last four years and have continuously remained one step ahead in ensuring our clients find the right people for the right roles and have a thorough understanding of their market and how their company is perceived.

It’s exciting to see that many companies are now moving towards this direct sourcing method and adapting to the ever-changing market place.

Related Reading:

Matthew Jeffery & Amy Mckee, 2011, A Vision for the Future of Recruitment: Recruitment 3.0, [blog] 14th June, abridged version available at: http://tinyurl.com/3zzfj5g – a very interesting and thought provoking read.

Talent Works International are pleased to announce the opening of our first office in the United States.

The move is part of our continued commitment to support our client’s businesses in identifying and engaging with the world’s leading talent.

The new office will open in Miami this week and will be the first of a number of planned openings in the States.

Neil Purcell, CEO of Talent Works International said:

“After a year of careful planning and preparation we are delighted to announce the opening of our first office in the United States.

The opportunities here are fantastic for Talent Works and we continue to commit to our clients to create a true global model that allows us to support them on an international platform with much needed local support and knowledge.

Miami is a fantastic location as it not only gives us the beginnings of a footprint in the States, but also positions us well for South America which has seen places like Brazil become one of the world’s leading emerging markets.

We hope our move will create some great opportunities for the talent available in the region and if all goes to plan it will see us create 30 new job openings in the next 12 months for our office in Miami and further jobs being created with our planned expansion across the U.S.

We continue to believe that direct sourcing is the way forward for companies around the world and our model is based 100% on helping businesses achieve this through our market mapping and talent pooling solutions.

We are very excited about the new venture in the U.S. and the opportunities it creates for us to build further on our success.

We have made some initial hires in Miami and I can’t wait to start the process in the coming weeks to identify and meet with potential candidates to further strengthen the team there.

Once again, I would personally like to thank the teams at Talent Works and our clients for their continued support in our development and we look forward to supporting you in the U.S. this year and for many to come.”

Further to our previous survey carried out in March 2011, in which we found that many companies were looking to source more effectively by increasing their direct sourcing strategies, we thought we’d carry out a quick market snapshot of the behaviours and methods behind the current direct sourcing trends within in-house recruitment teams.

The majority of companies answering our survey stated that their usage of retained and contingent recruiters had reduced in the last year, which we believe is driven by the current economic climate because the competition for talent is even greater, as the pool of available talent to hire has fallen sharply. Many are now faced with reduced budgets and have to rethink their resourcing strategies and adjust their PSL’s to suit the size of demand, which would support this change in sourcing methods.

From the respondents asked, networking/social media sites, external job boards/company websites and referrals were the top three methods of attracting/identifying prospective candidates.

The results obtained provide a thought-provoking read. If you would like to see the full report, please visit: http://tinyurl.com/6yt9gan – we hope that you too will find this an interesting read and welcome any feedback you may have!

Talent Works International are pleased to announce the opening of our new office in Tel Aviv, Israel.

The new office is part of our continued global expansion which has seen Talent Works open offices across Europe and Asia Pacific in an effort to build a global platform to deliver our Talent Pooling and Market Mapping solutions to our clients.

Talent Works International’s CEO Neil Purcell said:

“Israel has been highlighted as one of the new emerging markets and our presence here has been driven by client demand.

Over the past two years  we have invested in opening global locations to support our clients growing needs around the world.

Businesses want the ability to create global talent pools and we know the importance of getting this right hinges on having teams that understand local markets which has been the driver behind our expansion.

We have quickly moved from being a UK central team to now having offices all over the world to make sure our clients have a global resource, supported locally in their regions.

We have been delighted with the feedback and confidence shown in us by our clients where we now support many in multiple locations across the globe.

I would personally like to thank all of our teams for their continued hard work and also our clients for their ongoing support in our efforts to deliver a true global resourcing solution.”

On Thursday 28th April, Talent Works International announced that we have renewed our partnership with Nicholas Mee Racing (NMR).

Original article:

With two seasons of GT4 racing under its belt, Nicholas Mee Racing – winner of the inaugural, 2009 Aston Martin Racing GT4 Challenge – will be gunning for the title again this year.

NMR’s regular drivers Karsten le Blanc and Christiaen van Lanschot, along with Dan De Zille Butler, rejoining the team after a successful debut at the Silverstone 24 Hours in 2010, will be contesting all rounds of the championship in the team’s updated, 2011-spec V8 Vantage GT4.

NMR is also delighted to confirm that it has renewed its major partnership with Talent Works International. The deal will see the Talent Works logo on the bonnet and doors of the NMR car during 2011. The company plans to use its association with NMR to raise the profile and awareness of its fast growing business and entertain key clients and new business prospects at race meetings during the year. Talent Works’ MD Neil Purcell said “In 2010 we successfully partnered NMR for their assault on the Silverstone 24hr race and we were delighted both with the exposure it generated for us and the positive reaction of our guests at the event. We now look forward to continuing this relationship and winning many races together!”

This year’s nine round Aston Martin Racing-organised GT4 Challenge will be held over seven weekends between April and September and is open to Aston Martin N24 and GT4 cars. Races are between 90 and 180 minutes in length, with re-fuelling plus driver and tyre changes.

Drivers entered for round 1 of the 2011 Challenge at Silverstone on 30th April include Aston Martin’s Director of Design Marek Reichmann, Aston Martin’s Chairman and Prodrive boss David Richards, and Christian Horner, Team Principal of the Red Bull Racing F1 team.

Looking forward to the series, which will visit many iconic circuits including Silverstone, Donington Park, Spa Francorchamps and Dijon, NMR’s Team Principal Nicholas Mee said “Having sadly lost our Chief Engineer Craig Dawson to cancer earlier this year the whole team is especially motivatedto compete strongly for the Challenge. We’ll certainly have our work cut out, but I can’t wait for the season to get underway”.

To find out more about Nicholas Mee Racing visit: www.nicholasmeeracing.co.uk

- Wish us luck for the season!!

Organisations are now beginning to move away from contingency based recruitment and are becoming more proactive by generating talent pools & carrying out recruitment research.

These methods dramatically reduce both, cost and time to hire and provides a pool of the best talent within the market. When a vacancy arises, employers then already have suitable candidates whom they have maintained contact with for this very reason. With the average individual staying anything from 2-6 years in a role, Organisations can expect attrition, which is why a little forward planning makes perfect sense.

Most people are motivated to leave their current role due to: better career opportunities & development, increase in salary/overall package and location. Organisations can surely manage this by understanding what their competitors are offering.

Both Talent Pooling and Marketing Intelligence are key to any business looking to gain insight and advantage through a deeper understanding of their competitors and also, how they themselves are viewed and where they are placed in the marketplace. As we all know people are the lifeblood of any Organisation in ensuring it’s objectives are met and philosophies maintained.

Therefore, finding the right individual, for the right role at the right time can be the difference between enhancing a team or destroying it.

Talent Works International recently commissioned a survey of HR. / Resourcing / Recruitment professionals, to understand their approach and strategies for acquiring the best talent during 2011.

The results obtained provide a fantastic read. If you would like to see the full report, please visit: Talent Works Survey otherwise, we have compiled a few snippets below for you. We hope that you too will find this an interesting read and welcome any feedback you may have.

The overall picture for the UK economy is very positive with most respondents indicating that they will be increasing their head count. Great news for us all, but what with the war for talent increasing, how are they going to recruit them?

The majority of companies stated that they would be looking to do as much direct sourcing as possible. This reflects the trend of the last few years as companies increasingly question the value that recruitment consultants/headhunters actually provide. Instead, they want partners that add value and insight to their overall attraction and resourcing strategy, thus enabling them to become more self- sufficient in the longer-term.

Respondents stated that a significant amount of hiring will be from direct competitors or closely aligned companies. As a result, knowledge about competitors and their talent is an increasingly valuable commodity. Similarly, insight into how they are perceived [as an employer] by the type of candidates they would typically look to recruit provides intelligence that can be fed into developing and maintaining a quality employer brand.

Remarkably, less than 50% of surveyed companies currently build and sustain talent pools. Those that do, quite often tend to consist of internal talent as part of their talent management and succession planning initiatives. Companies should want to give existing talent opportunities to grow and develop but having a talent pool (or pipeline) that does not include external talent is limiting. As and when vacancies emerge companies should always look to fill them with the best talent.

This can only be achieved when there is a comparison between the best internal and external talent.

Whilst only 54% reported that recruitment budgets for 2011 were being cut, anecdotal evidence suggests that even if they were held or increased, compared to before the recession recruiters are having to do more with less’ and be more efficient and innovative as a result.

As with anything, there is always room for improvement and 86% of respondents agreed that they needed to tweak their resourcing strategies. When asked for suggestions, the responses indicate that there is no single aspect, but instead several areas that need to be finely tuned, expertly resourced and individuals supported. Recruitment is not a bolt on to HR, but a discipline and function in its own right that needs to be sponsored at the highest levels of any business. Furthermore, efficient, expert talent acquisition is not only the responsibility of recruitment professionals, but also Hiring Managers who need to recognise and embrace the challenge.

Below are examples of how businesses feel they could improve resourcing for their current roles.

“Mapping out competitors and networking more effectively”

“More aggressive attraction Strategy”

“A greater understanding of the current talent – both what the Company has and what is in the market.”

“We need to work smarter in order to reduce the time and cost – we don’t currently work proactively enough.”

“Reducing process length, i.e. time to hire, more pro-active research into the market”

Talent Works International are one of the first true global suppliers of Talent Acquisition solutions through means of market mapping, talent pooling and recruitment research solutions to the corporate market. We believe that offering a true global solution means providing our clients with global reach but most importantly, local support.

We trust that you have found this snippet insightful and though it is only intended to be a snapshot of views rather than a robust, statistically significant piece of research, we hope it has provided food for thought.