At the end of 2021 and into 2022, companies saw that if employees weren’t getting the things they wanted, they were leaving their companies to find them elsewhere. The Great Resignation has hit many businesses hard, and lots of companies found that recruiting the traditional way was simply not working anymore. Employee expectations have changed; flexibility, a better work/life balance and opportunities to learn are now some of the top requirements cited by people who are looking for more than just a job.
Skills-based recruitment
Skills based recruitment focuses on an individual’s skill set and capabilities rather than academic accolades and achievements. A company will evaluate a candidate based on their skills rather than their background, removing any unconscious bias which sadly still exists in the hiring process. Data shows that even a name on a CV can affect whether a person gets an interview or not.
Unconscious bias means missing out on great talent
Francesca Gino, a professor at Harvard Business School, says unconscious biases “cause us to make decisions in favor of one person or group to the detriment of others” which could lead to the ideal candidate for a job being overlooked. Skills-based hiring helps level the playing field, allowing individuals to be assessed purely on their ability to perform the tasks required of the role and thus have the same opportunities as someone who was perhaps favoured because they attended a more prestigious university, grew up in a more affluent area, or previously worked for a more renowned company, even if in an unrelated field. Despite our best efforts, it’s human nature to feel more comfortable around people who are most like ourselves, meaning if only one individual is selecting candidates to interview from a stack of CVs, a huge lack of diversity in the interviewing process could prevail.
Identifying skill gaps within your company
In order to establish who you need to hire or retrain, you first need to identify the skills gaps within your organisation. With so much evolution in the workplace overall, and within companies individually, roles that your organisation has hired for previously may now be obsolete. Rather than hiring for a specific job title, it may make more sense to ascertain what’s missing from your company, what needs doing, and then explore a variety of options to fill the skills gap. You may find that instead of hiring an external candidate, you already have someone in-house that shows promise in a certain area, and with some tailored learning and development, could be just the person to take on some new responsibilities.
How to find the skills gaps
In order to identify any skills gaps within your organisation, you will need a clear picture of the skills your workforce already has, the skills they are currently working towards, and the skills they intend to acquire in the future. A learning experience platform like Thirst allows your team to take control of their individual learning and development while you oversee how they are improving, and the areas that may need to work more on. With Thirst’s intuitive reporting capabilities, you can see what your employees are working towards and track their progression and growth, enabling you to offer further support where you feel it may be necessary. Through our unique, actionable insights, informative trends analysis and simple to use reporting, you will also get a complete view of your organisation so you can ensure that your business needs are also being taken care of.
Offering training to fill the gaps
With a combination of your internal training materials and courses, tutorials, podcasts, and other resources from thousands of sources across the web, Thirst gives your team the opportunity to broaden their skillset, upskill in a particular area, or learn something completely new that they can apply to their current job or a future promotion. If a member of your team expresses interest in business strategy, Thirst will automatically bring the most relevant content for that topic straight to their unique dashboard. Thirst also learns how your team members digest information most effectively so your readers can read, your watchers can watch, and your listeners can listen.
We believe that skills-based learning is the future for employers, and with our platform, your staff will learn skills relevant to them now and in the future, making them more fulfilled, happier in their work, and more productive than ever before.
See for yourself how Thirst is changing the game of workplace learning. Get started today with unlimited, unrestricted access on a 14 day free trial, no sales calls or payment card required.
A new era of learning awaits, are you ready to transform your team forever?
