Talent acquisition includes recruiting, but it is inclusive of other strategic elements as follows: •

Talent Acquisition Planning & Strategy – This ensures business alignment, examines workforce plans,
requires an understanding of the labour markets, and looks at global considerations. • Workforce
Segmentation – It requires an understanding of the different workforce segments and positions
within these segments, as well as the skills, competencies, and experiences necessary for success. •
Employment Branding – This includes activities that help to uncover, articulate and define a
company’s image, organizational culture, key differentiators, reputation, and products and services.
Employment branding can help advance the market position of organizations, attract quality
candidates and depict what it is truly like to work for that organization. • Candidate Relationship
Management – This includes building a positive candidate experience, managing candidate
communities, and maintaining relationships for those candidates who are not selected at present
against a particular skill set, but have few more skills. • Metrics & Analytics – It is the continuous
tracking and use of key metrics to drive continuous improvement and to make better recruitment
decisions, to ultimately improve the quality of hire. Within each of these core elements of TA there
are many other sub-activities and best practices. And of course, the selection of tools, technology
and outsourcing partners is a key element of a company’s talent acquisition strategy. In other words,
a leadership program is to leadership development what recruiting is to talent acquisition. Alone,
neither will drive their highest value to the business. Talent Management 37 More Out-of-the-Box
Recruiting Strategies It’s difficult to stand out and attract applicants when recruiting in a highly
competitive market. Technology executives from Forbes Technology Council say locating and
attracting talent, resume distrust, the need for quick hiring decisions, and geographic constraints
have been the top recruiting challenges faced in 2016. Using innovative and creative recruiting
tactics, and finding ways to work out-of-the-box, makes it faster and easier to find and connect with
the active and passive candidates you need in your workforce. Ask for Reviews You may not think
company review sites like Glassdoor have a place in your recruiting strategy, but Centric Consulting
LLC’s Mike Brannan does. As part of showcasing their company culture, Centric Consulting asks
employees to put their reviews on Glassdoor. They believe it’s a good way for candidates to get to
insight into the jobs and the culture. Quit the Cover Letters No one really has time to read through
pages and pages of cover letters and resumes anymore. Jenn Steele, Head of Growth at Recruit
Loop, says one of the innovative screening techniques they suggest is asking for resumes without
cover letters.They suggest asking to “describe in 100 words or less” why candidates want to work for
your company and why they are a good match for the position to more quickly and easily assess
candidate interest and creativity. Targeted Text Ads Get creative with your recruiting message like
Restaurant Binnen in the Netherlands. They needed new dishwashers, not the most sought-after
position in the restaurant industry. Their creative text solution? They printed beer and wine glasses
with a red lipstick impression and their simple “help wanted” message: “Restaurant Binnen is looking
for dishwashers.” Their customers were exposed to their hiring need and their opening was
communicated at the restaurant and with their customer base’s network. This kind of creative
solution applies to almost any recruiting challenge. Need car salespeople at your car dealership?
Print your opening on paper car mats used on test drives. Need pizza delivery drivers? Print it on
your pizza boxes. Need cashiers in your retail establishment? Print it on the bags you use for
customer purchases. Talent Management 38 Creative College Recruiting Business employers aren’t
the only ones benefiting from highly creative recruiting tactics. Colleges are doing more than sending
out recruitment brochures.Illinois Institute of Technology offered free iPads to incoming
undergraduate freshman to attract students. University of New Haven Business School offered free
tuition to a student with an outstanding entrepreneurial idea. BTH, a technology school in
Switzerland, sent a mailing to students at competing technical universities with cell phone parts to
assemble. Properly assembled phones gave the message “Hi! You seem to be technical. Call us at
BTH. 0455385040.” Make Them See It When IKEA needed thousands of applicants for a new
superstore in Springvale, Australia in 2011, their recruitment campaign focused on local residents
and highlighted the benefits of working close to home. Using a GPS-enabled mobile billboard with
Google Maps displaying time and distance to the new store, the store quickly and publicly
communicated its employment value to candidates. This creative strategy garnered over 4,000
applications for 280 openings. Use Your Product to Get Applicants Microsoft used search engine
Bing’s homepage to hide its job ad. For those technicallyinclined Internet users on Internet Explorer
with the browser debug settings enabled, a popup question asks “Do you want to debug this
webpage?” Running the IE developer tools console brings up another popup question with the main
recruiting message “Interested in creating Bing.com experiences? Apply today.” Today’s recruiting
requires a comprehensive strategy that must include highly creative tactics to find and engage
candidates. Targeted and creative doesn’t have to be expensive, but it’s always highly effective. Get
the recruiting results you need with the kinds of creative tactics described here. The alternative? The
candidates go to your competition and your workforce goes undeveloped. Start working on your
out-of the box recruiting strategies today. Talent Management 39 Technology and Talent Acquisition
We are living through an exciting era in technology development—the emergence of interactive,
social media and virtual technologies whose business applications are not yet fully realized.
“Marketing professionals were quick to use these technologies. “The application of these
technologies to talent identification and development has progressed a little more slowly--and in
today’s economy where money is tight and resources are scarce, being more deliberative is probably
a wise approach,” Gorman observes. Social Media • Employers to identify and attract passive and
active job seekers who may be a good fit for their organizations are using social media websites (e.g.,
LinkedIn, YouTube, Twitter, etc.) • These websites allow users to access talent branding videos,
share job histories, tap into networks of friends (and their friends), post and apply for jobs, and even
make employee referrals. • Most people find jobs through personal or professional networks—
moving those networks online through social media websites allows more people to be aware of an
organization’s employment brand and job openings. • Another reason employers are intrigued
about the use of these websites in identifying and attracting talent: they are extremely cost
effective. • It costs little to establish a social media presence, although managing those networks can
be demanding. • The rapid growth of the social media market, with new players regularly entering
the arena, makes it a challenge for employers because it is hard to know where to concentrate their
talent acquisition efforts. Talent Management 40 • Plus, maintaining multiple social media accounts
could easily become a full-time job. Employers are also concerned about choosing the “right”
application for their talent acquisition needs as these platforms develop. • Unfortunately, it will take
time to see what application emerges as an overall or industry-specific leader. Simulations •
Simulations replicate job-related tasks to allow employers to assess a candidate’s skills. • Early
simulations were usually administered in the workplace and imitated actual job tasks (like typing
speed and accuracy) to assess a person’s ability. • Today’s simulations have gone online and have
become more interactive, making it possible to replicate a variety of work environments and to
assess performance in a more automated (less subjective) manner. • Modern simulations are being
used to assess skills in such settings as call centers (data entry and customer service skills) and
manufacturing (computer and logic skills), and to offer candidates “day-in-the-life” glimpses into an
organization’s working environment.