Giving the opening keynote speech at digital marketing conference Dmexco recently, WPP’s Sir Martin Sorrell suggested that the arrival of new talent into European markets could be a positive consequence of the current immigration crisis.
He explained that in the major industrial economies, there is a supply problem when it comes to the workforce. The critical competitive factor between companies is and will continue to be talent, and immigration may be a way to help solve skills shortage problems.
This will be music to the ears of companies struggling to recruit for niche or emerging market roles. It may be one of the oldest business clichés, but hiring the right talent, with the right experience, that fits the cultural model of your company is hard - and getting harder.
Data is, of course, the hottest of hot topics right now, and every company recognises that amassing the right information, coupled with organisational ability to manage that information effectively, will contribute significantly to longstanding business success.
There’s a wealth of information to support the importance of great data management. According to research from GE and Accenture, seventy-three percent of companies are currently investing more than twenty percent of their overall technology budget on big data analytics. Of that group, more than two in ten are investing greater than thirty percent.
Across the industries surveyed, the vast majority of companies indicated that Big Data analytics is either the top priority for the company or within the top three.
Given the recognition of the value of comprehensive data management, there is an obvious need to locate and hire employees with mathematics, statistics or hard science degrees, in order to do this successfully.
The reality, though, is that we are not producing enough STEM graduates to support global demand. Couple these pre-existing educational requirements with a general prerequisite of having relevant industry experience and we are collectively taking a constrained group and further narrowing the field of eligible talent.
This hiring precision has implications for human resource departments as well, given that handwringing over perfect candidate alignment delays can result in the loss of good quality employees to other opportunities.
So where do we go from here?
The incestuous hiring nature of the industry may be inhibiting our collective ability to create truly disruptive technologies. As an industry, we tend to hire people, almost exclusively, with experience from within the advertising eco system. This becomes one of the most heavily weighted variables in the optimum candidate profile.
I now find myself looking to the outward valences for great talent acquisition. Finding the right people, who are the perfect fit culturally, and training them up and investing can and will often prove far more effective. We have also weighted curiosity and ambition more heavily in our profile – we want problem solvers.
There is great value in hiring people with a range of degrees and experience. By opening up our consideration set we have removed a set of de-facto horse blinders that had inhibited us from entertaining high value candidates from neighbouring industries.
If we continue to resource from the same pond, product design and innovation will stagnate at a higher rate.
We, as an industry, need to adopt a smarter approach to recruitment if we are to have well-rounded, outward-looking, nimble teams, and ensure a steady stream of new and creative ideas with which to serve our thriving market.
By Joe Reid, MD of Krux.
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