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The Link Between Diversity and Direct Sourcing

Direct Sourcing Talent by Christopher J. Dwyer on 06/01/2022

Today, diversity is no longer a “check-a-box” factor for many enterprises around the world; rather, it has become a cultural movement within business that emphasizes the depth of talent pools, talent communities, and talent networks without bias or barriers. The truth regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I) is that direct sourcing programs (and extended workforce/contingent workforce programs) that are diverse tend to be more successful. If businesses can embed a spirit of inclusion within their direct sourcing processes and act in accordance with this mindset, they can broaden the existing talent landscape and improve upon it with new ideas and opportunity.

And, while established diversity programs previously existed in many enterprises, the events and civil unrest of the past two years have driven many businesses to develop and communicate more purpose-driven goals which are linked to societal, economic, technological, and sustainable shifts. To achieve these goals, a large number of businesses are trying to harness the power of a diverse workforce.

The Future of Work Exchange has long progressed the notion of “Direct Sourcing 2.0,” in which traditional direct sourcing phases and operations are “supercharged” to transform this strategy into a repeatable and scalable (not to mention more digitized) series of processes that can drive true talent sustainability:

As the overall labor market evolves in the wake of rising worker resignations, smart businesses will prioritize the need for deeper assessment and validation of skillsets and place a greater emphasis on the candidate and hiring manager experience. The starting point for most will be to build on their existing direct sourcing capabilities and work to develop Direct Sourcing 2.0 capabilities.

Simply put: much like the greater Future of Work movement, there is so much more to this than just automation and technology. Direct Sourcing 2.0 isn’t just a scalable strategy that is driven by next-generation software, but a program that relies on both technology and humanity to be successful in the face of an evolving labor market.

Layering DE&I into direct sourcing is about changing behaviors and removing hiring barriers and unconscious bias from talent engagement and talent acquisition. Utilizing technology to help guide and enforce a new mindset can be extremely valuable and create awareness that the deepest talent pools are diverse talent pools. Using direct sourcing to hire diverse talent gives HR teams a direct ability to link purpose with DE&I efforts. For example, businesses can opt to tap into professional networks that were already designed for diverse workers from various backgrounds, cultures, and genders and link these to talent curation efforts. Direct sourcing initiatives can also benefit from “diversity automation” that is enabled from direct sourcing platforms that have partnerships and integrations with diverse job boards and networks. They can also offer anonymizing functionality that can hide specific information about different candidates.

Diversity, as stated above, is more than just an objective; it is a facet of the new world of work that sparks new ideas, catalyzes innovation, and enables a business with the necessary skillsets and expertise to thrive in changing times. Direct sourcing, then, can be an effective gateway in developing a more diverse workforce.

The Ultimate Value of Direct Sourcing

Direct Sourcing by Christopher J. Dwyer on 05/18/2022

Successful direct sourcing programs have made a large impact on the quality of the overall workforce by achieving better alignment between an organization’s needs and the best available talent than alternate recruiting methods. However, the competitive advantage in talent recruitment that the early adopters of direct sourcing have gained will begin to yield as more new programs are launched each year.

The 55% of businesses that are currently running some form of direct sourcing programs today are utilizing talent pools and talent communities as a viable means of building talent pipelines, reducing talent acquisition costs, ensuring strong skillsets and expertise, and structuring a truly dynamic workforce. Direct sourcing enables a business to act as its own recruitment firm and leverage the power of its brand to attract desired workers to its centralized talent pool. The process also helps enterprises engage candidates directly, increasing the chance of building stronger, longer-lasting relationships with top-tier talent.

While the pandemic has turned job interviews into a more and, sometimes fully-, virtual process, the human elements of conversation, bonding, and interpersonal connection are not completely lost. Direct sourcing bypasses intermediaries and allows the candidates to develop direct connections (hence, “direct” sourcing) with hiring decision-makers. Candidates that are not hired initially can, nonetheless, become candidates for other positions in the future. By eliminating the agency or middleman, enterprises are better able to tap into a developed bench of previously engaged talent and cut lengthy time-to-fill rates. The same holds true for other candidates that have been vetted in some form and are “known” by the hiring team (i.e., “silver medalists,” retirees, past contingent workers or freelancers, etc.), or were targeted for curation based on their current job experience.

Beyond the candidate relationships, direct sourcing allows a business to leverage (and manage) its culture and brand to attract recruits that are easily engaged for future projects and initiatives. Hearing long-employed (and loyal) HR and business professionals discuss the traits and culture of their organization is a more significant and credible way to learn about a potential employer than through the words of a recruiter with a commission on the line. The informal testimonials of the internal hiring teams can effectively build engagement and ultimately, worker loyalty.

While the talent curation part of direct sourcing typically takes time to develop, most organizations possess an innate ability to identify strong cultural fits and highly-desirable skillsets. Additionally, the ability of internal recruiters, HR, and hiring managers to collaborate and tailor job searches to a unique team, manager, project, or location is unmatched when dealing with outside recruiters. The level of nuance can be akin to the difference between a surgeon and a butcher. The ability to increase recruiting precision can be particularly valuable when businesses are managing specific diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives.

One other notable attribute of direct sourcing is that it avoids the heavy price of fully-loaded talent acquisition costs charged by outside firms. While successful direct sourcing programs reduce talent acquisition friction and costs in the short-term, as businesses continue to devote resources to it, they will find these programs can also transform how work is done. And, in a world that has become more digitized (especially in the HR and talent arenas), direct sourcing is fast becoming table stakes for businesses that are actively pursuing workforce agility.

Why Tech is the Crux of Direct Sourcing 2.0

Direct Sourcing by Christopher J. Dwyer on 05/11/2022

Direct sourcing has dominated discussions around talent, work, and staffing for the past few years because, when executed well, it can deliver incredible value to the greater organization through hard benefits (such as cost savings and a quicker average time-to-fill rate) and soft benefits (greater talent quality, better engagement with highly-skilled candidate, etc.). And, as the overall HR market evolves in the wake of rising worker resignations, smart businesses will prioritize the need for deeper assessment and validation of skillsets and place a greater emphasis on the candidate and hiring manager experience.

The starting point for most will be to build on their existing direct sourcing capabilities and work to develop a true Direct Sourcing 2.0 program…which, of course, is only achievable through the convergence of strategic and automated competencies.

The path to Direct Sourcing 2.0 is paved with technology. While elements such as talent curation, talent pool development, talent pool segmentation, and recruitment stream integration are core to any direct sourcing program, HR leaders and their teams must incorporate digitization and advanced direct sourcing competencies to get to the next level of performance. Achieving Direct Sourcing 2.0 requires advanced capabilities to be coupled with digital recruitment functionality in order to boost talent quality, enhance candidate intelligence, and develop repeatable and scalable methods for reengaging talent to build a truly agile workforce.

While predictive analytics are not commonplace today, soon, a majority of enterprises will look to scenario-building as a way to enhance overall talent intelligence. Predictive analytics, in this realm, will augment the organization’s overall knowledge of its in-house skills as well as the expertise available externally (across all talent communities, including talent pools).

This level of intelligence will spark new and targeted initiatives to find better-aligned candidates with stronger talent engagement efforts and push business leaders to better understand who the strongest candidates are for future roles, positions, and projects.

Sixty-five percent (65%) of businesses plan to link the candidate experience with hiring manager experience. As discussed in the Ardent Partners and Future of Work Exchange Direct Sourcing 2.0 research study, transforming talent acquisition into a consumer-like journey is just one side of the Direct Sourcing 2.0 coin. The other side focuses on the hiring manager experience, which should be seamless in order to streamline the means of finding, engaging, and sourcing talent for a full spectrum of open roles and positions.

While only a third (33%) of businesses have automated candidate experience capabilities in their direct sourcing programs today, 50% more plan to do so within two years. Personalization and sharing more specific details regarding a project/role match, when automated, are repeatable and scalable to ensure that all candidates have a more positive and compelling experience when recruited.

Direct Sourcing 2.0 and the Hiring Manager Experience

Direct Sourcing Talent by Christopher J. Dwyer on 04/20/2022

Beyond deeper and more meaningful candidate relationships, direct sourcing allows a business to leverage (and manage) its culture and brand to attract recruits that are easily engaged for future projects and initiatives. Hearing long-employed (and loyal) HR and business professionals discuss the traits and culture of their organization is a more significant and credible way to learn about a potential employer than through the words of a recruiter with a commission on the line. The informal testimonials of the internal hiring teams can effectively build engagement and ultimately, worker loyalty.

The level of nuance can be akin to the difference between a surgeon and a butcher. The ability to increase recruiting precision can be particularly valuable when businesses are managing specific diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives.

Given the current challenges to find and retain top talent, leading HR organizations are investing in ways to improve the “candidate experience” (similar to the “customer experience”), where every aspect is designed to be positive, engaging, and beneficial to the recruit.

In a market where the candidate holds more power than ever before, compensation and benefits, employment perks, AND the employer’s credentials (i.e., brand, culture, vision, values, etc.) can play a major role in attracting a qualified candidates. This will continue to be true as an increasing number of candidates are incorporating their personal views on an organization’s culture and brand into their decision-making.

While the candidate experience is critical, the hiring manager experience should also be considered. Hiring managers are often on the front lines of the war for talent and must account for:

The specific needs of each role, position, and project.
The intricate requirements of a multifaceted talent acquisition strategy that balances direct hire, job boards, talent marketplaces, staffing suppliers, etc.
The necessary data and intelligence to make faster, more educated talent and hiring decisions.
The proper balance between the human touch, automation, and third-party services, etc. that can be used to find, engage, and source high-quality talent.

Traditional recruitment is not typically seen as scalable due to the manual work often associated with it, while direct sourcing relies heavily on hiring teams to drive activity, scalability, and value. Just as HR leaders are realizing that candidates should be treated like customers, hiring managers also need an experience that is seamless and boundaryless.

Business and HR leaders must also arm their hiring managers with the necessary resources, technologies, and capabilities to effectively tap into different talent pools without the worry of internal barriers or archaic inertia. To achieve this, digitization of key direct sourcing processes is vital.

AI, Direct Sourcing, and the Future of Talent

Direct Sourcing by Christopher J. Dwyer on 04/06/2022

The path to Direct Sourcing 2.0 is rooted in the idea that data should drive talent-led decision-making. Most next-generation direct sourcing programs leverage AI-driven functionality to enable a more robust picture of available skillsets, improve the matching of available skills with open positions and project requirements, streamline the assessment of candidate skills and expertise, and enhance worker intelligence. The majority of businesses see AI and advanced analytics as a catalyst for Direct Sourcing 2.0 over the next two years, as discovered by Ardent Partners and the Future of Work Exchange.

An employer’s brand can be a catalyst for talent transformation because it can be used to attract talent and maintain an allure as non-FTE workers shift in and out of enterprise projects. Direct Sourcing 2.0 builds on brand concepts and pushes them to a higher level by using AI and analytics on candidate data to improve messaging, increase support for diversity initiatives, and gain a clearer picture of the worker expertise available in the market. Our research shows that:

Nearly 70% of businesses plan to leverage AI-based tools for candidate assessment within two years. Candidate fraud has not grabbed headlines yet, but it is a risk for businesses, particularly those that require specific skills and certifications. With more candidates operating in a remote environment, businesses require better means to ensure that their potential hires actually possess what is represented in their resumes and history. AI-fueled candidate assessment tools support the validation of competencies and skills, helping to ensure that the talent pipeline is filled with candidates who can succeed in their placements.
Sixty-four percent (64%) of enterprises plan to use AI to solve talent retention issues. The labor market over the past two years has been anything but stable and certain: within the span of 12 months, the market has experienced a dramatic increase in, and, the largest tallies ever in history, of worker resignations. There are more open positions in the United States than at any other time this century. HR, talent acquisition, and procurement leaders and their teams need the insights required to more accurately forecast what their workforce will look like in the future, given economic and organizational changes. Predictive retention data, modeled within direct sourcing programs, can augment how and when businesses engage talent pool candidates and what skillsets should be targeted in upcoming recruiting marketing campaigns.
Diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives will be boosted with next-level intelligence over the next two years. DE&I remains a critical piece of direct sourcing and talent acquisition overall. In 2022, roughly a quarter of all businesses utilize AI within direct sourcing for DE&I purposes (27% for worker diversity data and 24% for general diversity and inclusion insights). More than half of all enterprises plan to use AI to drive these initiatives over the next 24 months. Businesses that invest in developing AI-led data collection will be able to cast a wider net within the realm of diversity, capturing gender, culture, background, neurodiversity, etc. These insights can provide hiring managers and executives with the intelligence needed to monitor and improve DE&I initiatives.

Moving from Direct Sourcing 1.0 to Direct Sourcing 2.0

Direct Sourcing by Christopher J. Dwyer on 03/09/2022

Leverage digital recruiting processes to engage and communicate with candidates. Recruitment marketing has been a key tool for talent acquisition teams that target both active and passive candidates with specific messaging regarding open positions. Digital recruitment marketing leverages this same thinking but also invites active and passive candidates to join branded portals (and talent pools) by crafting distinctive communications that speak to career paths, worker values, desired cultures, etc.
Harness the power of AI to more effectively validate candidates’ skill, expertise, fit, and overall alignment. Candidate assessment can be enhanced and improved by adding AI capabilities into the mix. Managers simply do not have the time, resources, or energy (especially in today’s frenetic market) to deal with a “bad hire.” Virtual recruiting has made skills validation more difficult and candidate fraud more commonplace. AI-led direct sourcing tools can augment the way that enterprises gain peace of mind over who and how they engage candidates before hiring.
Nurture talent pool candidates with next-generation strategies that take into account timing, trust, and mobile-enabled messaging. Sometimes it is not just how frequently hiring managers communicate with their talent pool candidates, but when they do so that can make a world of difference in the ability to “close” a candidate. Talent nurturing within Direct Sourcing 2.0 programs entails more advanced approaches including text-first messaging, better and deeper communication with candidates, and outreach that can build trust between employer and worker.
Scale direct sourcing to become a repeatable set of processes that can drive value across the full enterprise. Direct sourcing programs typically start small, with a specific segment of worker categories before expanding into other critical areas of the enterprise. Direct Sourcing 2.0 is the culmination of expansive, innovative strategies and solutions that can take direct sourcing to the next level by increasing the number of high-impact, talent-based positions that fall under the scope of the program.

The path to Direct Sourcing 2.0 is also rooted in the idea that data should drive talent-led decision-making. Most next-generation direct sourcing programs leverage AI-driven functionality to enable a more robust picture of available skillsets, improve the matching of available skills with open positions and project requirements, streamline the assessment of candidate skills and expertise, and enhance worker intelligence. The majority of businesses see AI and advanced analytics as a catalyst for Direct Sourcing 2.0 over the next two years.

Ardent Partners and the Future of Work Exchange make the case that an employer’s brand can be a catalyst for talent transformation because it can be used to attract talent and maintain an allure as non-FTE workers shift in and out of enterprise projects. Direct Sourcing 2.0 builds on brand concepts and pushes them to a higher level by using AI and analytics on candidate data to improve messaging, increase support for diversity initiatives, and gain a clearer picture of the worker expertise available in today’s transformative labor market.

FOWX Notes: March 4 Edition

General Insights by Christopher J. Dwyer on 03/04/2022

Some picked-up pieces, news, and insights from across the evolving world of talent and work:

Filtered bolsters its leadership team and drives $10M in funding. The Boston-based Direct Sourcing 2.0 and automated technical interview platform announced this week that former Yahoo!, HotJobs, and Jobvite CEO, Dan Finnagan, has joined the solution as its Chief Executive Officer. Finnagan will oversee the platform’s expected surge in growth in the months and years ahead as Filtered continues to win new Fortune 500 business. The company also announced a $10 million round of financing financing led by AI Fund, Silicon Valley Data Capital, and TDF Ventures, as well as appointing Usama Fayyad, Executive Director of the Institute for Experiential AI at Northeastern University and Chairman at Open Insights, to its Board of Directors.
Initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped to 215,000 for the week ending February 26. The 18,000-claim drop marks the lowest weekly figure since January 1 and an optimistic stat heading into the end of Q1 2022. Although there are nearly 11 million job openings across the United States, there is hope that the economic upswing in the year’s early months will result in bigger job gains. However, as “The Great Resignation” and the “Talent Revolution” continue to hang overhead, we will cautiously await the latest BLS report on voluntary quits to SOMETHING.
Workflow automation platform Catalytic was acquired by PagerDuty, Inc. this week. Congrats to Sean Chou and the Catalytic team, who founded an intelligent automation solution in 2018 that blends efficient AI-fueled optimization and RPA-led process automation. The Catalytic platform will be an interesting addition to PagerDuty’s robust digital operations management offerings; Catalytic’s “no code” software will bring a seamless means of managing and automating collaborative, workflow, purchasing, onboarding, and many other processes across the business spectrum.
LiveHire recently announced partnerships with Tundra Technical Solutions and Broadleaf. The Live Hire-Broadleaf partnership, announced last week, will enable both solutions to build on direct sourcing optimization through LH’s Best-in-Class platform and Broadleaf’s longstanding MSP services, respectively. And, this week, Live Hire also announced its partnership with Tundra Technical Solutions, a union that will converge LH’s direct sourcing automation with Tundra’s talent curation expertise.

Just a reminder, as well, that Ardent Partners and the Future of Work Exchange announced the publication of its 2022 MSP Solution Advisor earlier this week. If you are interested in learning more about our deep evaluations and assessments of the industry’s Managed Service Provider (MSP) solutions market, this report is your go-to guide. Click here or on the image below to download the new research study.

Direct Sourcing 2.0 Is Here to Combat “The Great Resignation”

Direct Sourcing by Christopher J. Dwyer on 02/22/2022

Today, the stakes for finding, attracting, and hiring the right talent are higher still, and a literal talent “frenzy” has hiring managers in all industries and geographies struggling to fill key positions. And that was before “The Great Resignation” of 2021-2022 took hold. Now, more than ever, these leaders need to take control of their talent destinies. As a result, direct sourcing has become one of the hottest topics in the world of talent and work.

With an ever-increasing number of talent channels, including digital staffing marketplaces, traditional staffing vendors, professional services, talent networks, and social media platforms, the ability to match project requirements with available skillsets has never been easier. It has also never been more competitive or difficult to hire top candidates. Businesses that harness the power of direct sourcing and talent pools have the ability to develop an agile, extended workforce which can be the key to truly thriving in these evolving times.

In 2021, Ardent Partners and Future of Work Exchange research found that 82% of all businesses felt the challenging times of the past two years increased the demand for extended and non-employee talent. This number reinforces the idea that workforce flexibility (and scalability) are essential links to economic progress in the now-chaotic, hyper-competitive global marketplace. And, in many ways, operationalizing that flexibility/scalability has become a driving force in enabling overall workforce agility. To do so, enterprises can tap into talent pools, marketplaces, clouds, and communities to enhance the work done by the trusted full-time staff; they can also leverage a range of services and other recruiting streams to build a dynamic talent acquisition process that can support crucial enterprise initiatives.

This is why direct sourcing has become such a powerful tool for business leaders today.

Truth be told, even basic direct sourcing programs can drive value through a combination of on-demand, plug-and-play talent, and hard-cost savings. But the pandemic’s impact on the workforce has dramatically accelerated market shifts. Today, talent is scarce and comes at a premium. As a result, workers are demanding greater flexibility from their employers. They are more focused on work-life balance, while also desiring greater independence. Among many things, the “Talent Revolution” indicates a seismic shift in power towards the worker and away from the employer…meaning that businesses require a more powerful, more flexible, and more scalable version of direct sourcing. Enter “Direct Sourcing 2.0.”

Now is the time for “Direct Sourcing 2.0,” the next generation of sourcing strategies that blend innovative solutions with a renewed focus on the candidate experience and an ability to use talent pools to populate the key projects and roles that require expertise and experience. Today’s business climate has accelerated the need for a reimagined approach to candidate engagement. As the market for talent continues to tighten amidst the lingering pandemic and a surging number of resignations, businesses find themselves in a new kind of “war for talent,” one that is far more extensive and complicated than anything experienced pre-pandemic.

The Age of Direct Sourcing 2.0 Is Here (Upcoming Webinar)

Talent by Christopher J. Dwyer on 01/12/2022

There’s a primary reason why direct sourcing has become one of the hottest topics in the greater world of talent and work: it represents the next evolutionary means of talent acquisition and is actively transforming the way businesses tap into the extended workforce. Ardent Partners and the Future of Work Exchange have coined an apt phrase to describe the progressive nature of direct sourcing in 2022: “Direct Sourcing 2.0,” which is meant to reinforce the relative power of additional elements (both technological and strategic) added to the already-vaunted measures inherent in typical direct sourcing programs.

By leveraging the “traditional” elements of the program (particularly talent curation, talent pool segmentation, talent nurture, etc.) and adding additional functionality, such as AI-fueled candidate assessment, deeper recruitment marketing technology, advanced referral management automation, etc.), enterprises can take direct sourcing to the next level. From our new Direct Sourcing 2.0 research study:

Workers are demanding greater flexibility from their employers. They are more focused on work-life balance, while also desiring greater independence. Among many things, the “Great Resignation” of 2021-2022 indicates a seismic shift in power towards the worker and away from the employer. This may or may not be permanent, but businesses, nonetheless, face constant pressure to deepen human capital and future-proof skillsets within their total workforce. Now, more than ever, enterprises require a steady flow of new workers to keep pace with their competitors. Now, more than ever, enterprises need superior sourcing capabilities. Now, more than ever, enterprises need a new approach.

I’m incredibly excited to join WorkLLama later this month (Thursday, January 27, 12pm ET) for an exclusive webcast that will not only highlight the core research findings from the upcoming Direct Sourcing 2.0 study, but also discuss how business can leverage direct sourcing as a viable, flexible, and nimble talent engagement strategy. Saleem Khaja, WorkLLama’s COO and Co-Founder, will present alongside me, as well as other special guests (to be announced soon). Click here or on the image below to register for this exclusive event. Hope to see you there!