Talent management today is not just about developing and engaging top talent, making data-driven decisions, fostering culture, and building powerful teams that achieve stellar results. It is also about empowering employees through L&D opportunities, R&R culture, engagement, collaboration and communication tools. 

A macroeconomic outlook for talent

Supporting business growth sustainably requires retaining good talent and building a strong internal pipeline for succession planning. Building an entire talent ecosystem means starting from the pre-candidate experience, i.e. pipeline building, brand ambassadorship, L&D, workforce planning, and beyond. For example, Paula Prawira, CHRO, Zenius, shares that they hire basis potential instead of skill set in the tech sector. Constant ROI pressure in start-ups means continuously gaining the necessary insights to better hiring decisions, growing internal and external talent and improving overall efficiency. “We look to hire candidates who can wear multiple hats and take on new challenges in a particular position”, shares Richelle Hogan, Group Head of People, Janio Asia. The business and macroeconomic environment is the ultimate driver of talent strategy. For example, the growth of digital banking brings new challenges to Investree. “We are building our bench strength internally and externally to prepare leaders to lead new business and subsidiaries, as we aim to transform into a digital bank”, shares Ariyo Putro, Chief Human Capital Officer, Investree. Aditya Gupta, Regional Head, SEA, Darwinbox, reiterates that rapid disruption across sectors can no longer have talent blueprints with long-term horizons but should focus on their internal people with a skill view. 

Employee experience as the driver of talent blueprint

As leaders aim to solve the ever-evolving talent crunch, they must ask themselves some hard-hitting questions. 

“Do we have the right people to help our customers make the right business decisions with us? How do we impact customers’ business positively, now and in the future? How do we hire and sustain people with the right kind of empathy, understanding, creativity etc. to look beyond?“

It boils down to creating a smooth and enjoyable ongoing experience for candidates and employees, centred on culture, technology and workspace, believes Richelle. It is an extensive change management exercise. 

Tech as a key enabler of employee experience

“While culture plays a key role in empowering employees, tech provides the tools to drive the culture we want to build,” says Richelle. Indeed, a digital culture became a necessity in Covid. Tech is shaped by humans, for humans, and enables employees to be more productive, make good decisions, and produce better results for the company. It is a progressive journey that centres around connecting people together and providing desired flexibility and visibility. We need to understand how people learn and get support, seek feedback, and incorporate all this into a consistent experience when they come to work every day. Correlating the HR technology with the EVP will help create a lasting digital employee experience. Investree has a three-pillared EVP around ‘flexi-work’, ‘productivity’ and ‘engagement through appreciation and fun’. Technology adoption is ensured through socialization campaigns, training and constant monitoring of adoption rates. “We used gamification, internal social-media and devised a point-based rewards system to recognize people who were actively using the technology”, shares Ariyo.  For Darwinbox, as shared by Aditya, the intention was to build platforms that primarily solve for the employee. He believes such employee-centric platforms will help employees get HR where and when needed, giving managers the right view of their teams and ultimately helping HR spend more time on strategic inputs. “This will help HR step up and become the real business partner and help the business grow”, says Paula. 

Fostering a learning mindset and culture 

A successful talent blueprint is one which is change-ready i.e. fails fast, pivots, and thrives. Because culture is defined by one’s people, empowering the middle managers with the right skill set and attitude will support this evolution, believes Paula. Talent management is about trying to understand who people are and how they work, and fitting that towards the organizational values. Richelle shares, “It is people managers and not leaders, who own a big part of what a company can and cannot do, hence the opportunity to develop them”. At Investree, talent development extends to the core values of Collaboration-Innovation-Integrity-Agility (CHINTA). “Employees can share on our internal social media and leaders and peers can instantly recognize the display of core values and key behaviours, creating a culture of recognition”, shares Ariyo. At Janio Asia, lifelong learning stems from a two-pronged approach i.e. equipping people to take on new positions and challenges, understanding what else they can do and freeing up their time to learn. Profile assessments help people understand themselves and develop customized programs to help them grow and be future-ready. At Zenius, they map star performers and create customized benefits, not necessarily around cash but around wanting to stay in the organization due to belief in the values. 

A critical success factor to build talent is getting the organization to accept that they can never have someone at 100% of the required competencies, and convincing them to take risks, believes Richelle. The learning initiatives must integrate with other HR processes. Ariyo uses quarterly OKR appraisals, potential competencies and 360 assessments to make this happen. Additionally, Aditya points out that assessments can prove to be critical when supporting employees in understanding what it truly means to own their career journeys. 

Above all, leaders must be open and transparent. They must invest time and effort in networking, be willing to look at people beyond the immediate industry, and understand where they come from. Being authentic and not painting a rosy picture, will help people understand what they are getting into, and build long-term stickiness. “You want people to come for what they believe in, not for what you make them believe in”, says Richelle. Aditya agrees that learning agility is one of the biggest differentiators for success as we see a big shift towards a skill-based workforce to sustain business growth. He believes that when succession planning is done rigorously across levels and leadership aligns on what technology means for their organisational planning and growth, one can design talent blueprints that tap into how your people define values differently and how great outcomes are achieved differently. Keeping a pulse on the shifts in the market and in your people’s perspectives will prove to be vital to thrive in the disruptive future of work.