The ideal HR strategy for hiring new employees entails a proactive assessment of the most recent tools, procedures, and resources for hiring that support transformation : Mr. Daya Prakash, Founder, TalentOnLease
In this free-ranging conversation with CXOtoday, Mr.Daya Prakash, Founder of TalentOnLease, a new age HR Tech platform talks about the need for a purpose-driven approach and how their clients across industries are adapting to the candidate driven market. TalentOnLease with a single motto of Making available Right Resources at Right Time and at Right Cost aims to grow as one of the key trusted HR partners.
How has the HR technology space evolved over the last two years?
Human resources and its workforce are in a constant state of evolution. Because of the pandemic, every organization has had to reconsider the true nature of the workplace and its future.
HR leaders have concluded that investing in cutting-edge technological advancements is necessary if they want to implement a successful people strategy.
We have been debating revising our entire approach to investing in HR technology. The current objective is to optimise employee satisfaction. I would say that [HR] is evolving into the Human Resource Business Partner, where they work closely with the company’s senior leadership to ensure that employees feel valued within the organisation and, at the same time, makes the organisation an aspirational brand for potential employees.
HRTech is well-positioned to utilise emerging technologies to enhance employee productivity and efficiency and achieve business goals.
In the past two years, there has been an increase in the number of businesses emphasising the need for complete digital adoption of HR processes, such as virtual hiring, onboarding, employee engagement, and retirement.
With trends like ‘great resignation’ and ‘quiet quitting’ how are you working towards offering a candidate their desirable organisation and vice versa?
According to this year’s State of the Global Workplace report by Gallup, employees acting on their dissatisfaction by being disengaged at work cost the global economy $7.8 trillion in lost productivity.
When considering an organization, many of the most qualified applicants will consider factors other than monetary compensation. It’s critical from an organizational standpoint to comprehend what drives and inspires potential employees to invest in a company. For candidates to assess what it’s like to work for an organization and whether the offer satisfies their needs, businesses should make a concerted effort to promote their brand image, company values, and opportunities. Rather than hiring for positions based on a list of job-related factors, a job-fit assessment should take into account the following:
- Technical Capabilities
- Soft Skills
- Cultural compatibility
- Values
- Education, training, and experience
We believe that the first step in recruiting is discovering alignment between candidates’ and organizations’ purposes. Candidates who are not intrinsically motivated by the same sense of purpose as the organization will never be a good fit, regardless of their skills and level of experience.
The second step is to find candidates who exhibit these characteristics—persistent learners, people developers, and result drivers.
The final step is to verify that the candidate possesses the required functional and technical expertise. You will have a larger pool of candidates who are truly qualified to lead your company into the future by prioritising purpose and critical behaviour over functional expertise.
With the assistance of our AI-enhanced technology, TalentOnLease has transformed the art of talent acquisition and management into a science. For example, Emotion AI technology uses advanced algorithms to detect and analyse the attention, mood, attitude, and emotional state of a candidate during the interview, allowing for a holistic assessment of the candidate in which technical skills and other important parameters are captured to identify the right candidate. Incorporating skills assessments into the hiring process ensures that the next hire meets the job-fit requirements for success, even in a completely virtual environment.
Do you think there are any budget constraints or resource allocation constraints when it comes to adopting or deploying HR technology?
Absolutely. I don’t believe there is any industry that does not face budget constraints especially in current times. No industry has a limitless budget, but how you prioritise your constraints is more important. Although organizations’ budgets have been tightly controlled due to the current economic situation, organizations have increased their spending in this area to improve their ability to attract and retain talent.
What are your future plans and outlook regarding HR technology?
In the future, we will continue to enhance our offerings and leverage more and more on AI/ML, further automation and analytics to give our clients a competitive edge.
It is necessary to comprehend the outcome to drive experiences and value for the business and our team members, as well as measure the return on investment (ROI) produced by HR technology. Before deciding where we want to go next, we must first be certain of where we are and where we want to be.
There seems to be this strong disconnect between the salaries paid to CEOs by top IT firms in India and the kind of headwinds that the industry is facing right now. Do you see this level of variance in other industries or is this peculiar to the IT sector?
To be honest, this is a difficult subject. To answer your question as to whether we observe this in non-IT organisations, the answer is yes, based on the data available for the listed organisations. I’m a little concerned about this entire debate because I’m not sure what we’re proposing. Should we pay CEOs less and lower-level employees more? There must be a reason for all of this. The base pay for CEO is not very high. There are numerous perks. CEO compensation packages at Indian IT companies have a sizable variable component. Therefore, if the performance meets the predetermined criteria, they receive those packages.
We must also appreciate that entry level salaries have also gone up (may not be in similar lines to the salary of a CEO but that’s not something that should be compared in my mind). In recent times we have seen entry level salaries in IT companies vary between INR 3 Lakh/annum to even 15-20 Lakh/annum.
However the difference is how much you as a candidate are prepared to take up the job without organizations having to spend considerable money and resources on making you job-ready.
Globally, businesses are working to improve their value offerings to entice and keep talent. How do you see this trend and the rise of the candidate-driven labour market?
According to a recent study conducted by Indeed, at least 21 per cent of applicants have accepted positions based on the company’s culture. HR leaders need a successful talent acquisition (TA) strategy amid this wave of “quiet quitting” to retain this talent and produce long-term business results. A well-thought-out TA strategy can help boost recruitment efforts throughout the organization. It can also help to strengthen talent pipelines by identifying, attracting, shortlisting, and engaging high-calibre talent while reducing both time to hire and cost-per-hire. The ideal HR strategy for hiring new employees entails a proactive assessment of the most recent tools, procedures, and resources for hiring that support transformation. Recruiters now more than ever need to adapt and stand out as the market currently remains candidate-driven. A revised job description, a personalised recruitment strategy, the use of recruiting services, and the implementation of an applicant tracking system can all help you stand out in a sea of competitive recruiters. One talent strategy that can be used to attract and keep the best possible employees is to invest in their long-term success by providing them with opportunities for learning and advancement.
What would you say are TalentOnLease’s strongest management principles and vision, particularly in terms of human resource management?
The objective of TalentOnLease (a new age platform for “IT talent On Demand”) is to offer a solution to the challenge i.e. Shortage of Tech Talent, that the industry is currently experiencing by bringing clients and partners together on a single platform so that they can work together to achieve mutually beneficial results. The platform here serves as a responsible medium, not only providing a means for its tenants to transact but also ensuring trust-building between them through the use of a strong policy framework and strict audit mechanism. “Making Available Right Resources at Right Time and Right Cost” is our single motto.
What has been your key takeaway from a little over two-decade-long career and what do you advise to the upcoming talent?
Covid-19 has significantly altered the world. The evolution of the meaning of work and the nature of the workplace has had an impact on the hiring processes. The use of technology in HR functions like recruitment, onboarding, and ongoing training has become widespread. Given the rate at which digital transformation is taking place and digital business is expanding, the need for a talent pool that is up to date on advanced technology consistently outstrips the accessibility of trained human resources. For the workforce to be future-ready, one must have experience with new-age technologies, including AI/ML, AR/VR, IoT, Robotics, Cloud Computing, Data Analytics and Data Visualization, to name just a few.
