How to hire for the future, not the past

/>

The current health and economic crisis has transformed the professional landscape drastically and in many ways. To begin with, economic drivers are redefined, business operations are redesigned and the “way of working” is witnessing a complete overhaul of the reality of remote working. As the ripple effects of this disruptive change continue to turn around the job market, one thing that has become a top priority for businesses is the need for professional development.

These dynamic times have transformed many professions, and even made several roles obsolete; not just today, but for years to come. And to protect themselves from these long-term economic shocks, professionals need to embrace a skills upgrading revolution with open arms, while businesses need to shift the needle from past experiences to future potential. Defending this paradigm shift can be difficult, but the prospect of preparing a future-ready workforce to revitalize India’s economic recovery far outweighs the hurdles.

In a rapidly changing environment, adopting a skills-based approach to recruiting and developing talent will be essential in shaping the future of work in India.

Skills-based hiring to revitalize the economy

Basically, competency-based recruiting examines a candidate’s professional skills and abilities, rather than selecting them for their professional background. To truly legitimize this journey, companies need to reconsider how they define job descriptions. Instead of putting together an elaborate list of qualifications, employers should list the skills required (digital and soft skills) for the position they are hiring for. This will help them to better articulate their needs, which is essential in attracting the right talent.

Likewise, assessment processes can also be redesigned to assess skills, rather than relying solely on education or experience as alternatives. Specific assessments focused on technical skills, ‘job auditions’ or innovative soft skills tests can be used as a few metrics to determine whether candidates match the bill. Echoing this sentiment, our recent Perception Study among Young Indians found that every second (51%) of Gen Z Indians wants today’s employers to value skills when hiring, while that 44% want their employers to make their careers an experience, not a process. Collectively, these statistics show us how young Indian professionals seek out jobs that can ensure fair play at every stage of their career path.

This serves as a distress call for companies to rethink the way they hire today and for leaders to implement better processes so they can access large and diverse talent pools.

There are a number of reasons for abandoning traditional recruiting processes that focus only on qualifications, experience or personal references. This mode of hiring eliminates or disqualifies anyone who may not have access to elite institutions or strong professional networks, simply because of their background. And as the uneven impact of the pandemic continues to prevail on those hardest hit, the need to move away from such an approach simply becomes imperative to create a more equitable workforce for tomorrow.

Adopting skills can be a ‘future-proof’ career
While companies must play their part, potential candidates must follow suit by proactively pursuing a skills-based approach to finding and landing the right opportunity. Professionals need to focus more on digital literacy and collaborative skills, specifically seeking to develop emerging skills that are actively shaping the labor market.

In many cases, this can be done effectively by assessing the portability of their existing skills or by looking for the right skills that can help them advance their careers with appreciable agility in today’s digitalising economy. For anyone wondering where to start, SQL and Javascript were among the most in-demand skills on LinkedIn in March 2021.

The potential to develop transferable skills by uncovering opportunities is particularly relevant in India, where over the past year 1 in 3 professionals have started a new job by changing industry. Skill building can help ease career transitions and provide a wide range of lucrative opportunities, even when some avenues are closed due to circumstances. Recognizing the need to facilitate such learning, LinkedIn partnered with Microsoft last year to help three million people in India and 30 million people around the world acquire digital skills since the start of the pandemic.

Thinking of business growth? Think about retraining
Internally, too, companies must consciously cultivate a culture of learning, regularly upgrading employee skills. When filling vacancies internally, companies should deploy structured learning programs to fill knowledge gaps of employees, guiding them to the skills required to fulfill responsibilities in other positions.

Additionally, fostering a culture of learning among employees can make this ‘big talent overhaul’ more inclusive, ensuring that the existing workforce is not overlooked in this changing hiring landscape. . Allowing employees to participate in cross-functional teams, giving them varied responsibilities, and providing more free time to develop are good ways to encourage learning and, therefore, to ensure better retention of existing workers.

At LinkedIn, we’re motivated to see individuals, employers, educational institutions, and government agencies speaking the same skills language to improve planning, hiring, and workforce development programs. Ultimately, following a skills-based approach to hiring will result in an engaged and efficient workforce and a stimulating work environment, which are integral to running smoothly despite market volatility. As we move deeper into this time of change, we must reinvent the role of learning and let our employees take center stage, while deploying a skills-based approach to hiring as a lever for business growth. and economic recovery.

The author is the National Director of LinkedIn for India