A couple of weeks ago, LinkedIn published its annual Global Talent Trends research which explored some of the key themes they are seeing developing in talent acquisition for 2020.
My guest this week is, Amy Schultz, Director of Talent Acquisition at LinkedIn. Amy is returning to the show for the second time to share her insights as a talent acquisition professional on the key findings in the research and also to tell us more about what we can expect to see from Linkedin in 2020
The key trends we discuss in the interview are:
Employee Experience
People Analytics
Internal Recruiting
Multi-Generational Workforce
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Transcript:
Matt Alder [00:00:00]:
Support for this podcast is provided by Smart Recruiters. Future Proof your talent acquisition with a modern TA suite with everything you need to attract, select and hire the best talent. Over 4000 leading brands like Bosch, IKEA, LinkedIn and Visa Trust smart recruiters to deliver hiring success with them on a global scale. This February, Smart Recruiters hosts Hiring Success in San Francisco and it is one of the best TA events of the year. Meet over a thousand influencers, thought leaders and TA practitioners and help shape the future of talent acquisition. Visit hiringsuccess.com that’s hiringsuccess.com to secure your tickets and use the code XYZ for an exclusive 30% off the ticket price.
Nick Price [00:01:14]:
Hi everyone. Welcome to episode 240 of the Recruiting Future podcast. As regular listeners will have noticed, this isn’t Matt. My name is Nick Price and this week I’m breaking away from my usual work in employer branding and career life stories to introduce this episode as Matt is currently recuperating from a short illness. But don’t worry, he will be back at the microphone very soon and we wish him a speedy recovery. A couple of weeks ago, LinkedIn published its annual global talent trends research and Matt was keen to take a deep dive into the key themes. In this interview, he talks to Amy Schultz, Director of talent acquisition at LinkedIn, to find out more about the key findings in the research and what we can expect to see from LinkedIn in 2020.
Matt Alder [00:02:00]:
Hi Amy and welcome back to the podcast.
Amy Schultz [00:02:02]:
Hi Matt, thanks so much for having me back.
Matt Alder [00:02:05]:
An absolute pleasure to have you on the show again. For the people who may have missed you last time, could you just introduce yourself and tell us what you do?
Amy Schultz [00:02:12]:
Absolutely. My name is Amy Schultz and I have the awesome job of leading product recruiting at LinkedIn. In product, we hire the people that build and design the products that help create economic opportunity for our LinkedIn members. I’m originally from Australia, if you may not have already figured it out from my accent. You know I started my recruiting career, gosh, over 16 years ago now and have worked in recruiting agencies in in house teams, hr, RPO environments and lived in four countries. So it’s been a crazy ride and very happy to be back talking to you about all things talent.
Matt Alder [00:02:51]:
Absolutely. So you’re back on the show because LinkedIn have just published a new report on global talent trends in 2020. Could you give us a bit of background to the report tell us where the data’s come from and why LinkedIn are publishing it?
Amy Schultz [00:03:07]:
Absolutely. So this is actually our 10th annual global talent Trends Report and it looks at a survey results from over 7,000 talent professionals in 35 countries, along with our platform data and interviews with leaders that really help provide those insights into key topics that are impacting HR professional. And I think over the years the report’s really become a bit of a must read for talent professionals. I certainly always read it before I joined LinkedIn and it helps inform us in HR talent acquisition business leaders as well around how we should approach our recruiting strategies for the coming year and really help to deliver data driven recommendations that we’re able to act on based on the key trends from the report.
Matt Alder [00:03:55]:
Fantastic. I think there are four key trends from the report. Could you sort of tell us what they are and is there an overall theme that ties them all together?
Amy Schultz [00:04:04]:
Yeah, great question. So, yes, there are four key trends that will continue to shape hiring in 2020 and probably beyond, and their employee experience, people analytics, internal recruiting and the multi generational workforce. On employee experience, Matt, probably when you and I started, employee experience started and ended on day one. We were lucky to get a desk and a computer to log into and maybe a ph. I think over the years we have extended our focus on experience way past day one. And I think the underlying theme, share with employee experience and actually across all four of the trends is actually empathy. And as we enter the 2020s, still getting used to saying that empathy is going to reshape the way employers hire and retain employees. And I think companies are really going to have to work to understand their talent more deeply than perhaps ever before in order to better serve them. And if we were to go kind of one click deeper on that, Matt, empathy can be seen in each of this year’s trends. With the emergence of employee experience, which I touched on before, we’re really looking at new ways to cater to employees. And I think we’ve kind of been in the adolescent stage of people analytics and we will continue to see an emphasis in really understanding human behaviour. And this is perhaps one of my favourite ones, rediscovering internal recruiting with a focus on advancing people’s careers from within. And we’re in such interesting times when you think about all the different generations that are in the workforce and really starting to celebrate everyone’s strengths. And when it comes to empathy, in late 2019, I think there was nearly 200 CEOs, Matt, that signed onto a statement on the purpose of A corporation. And instead of putting shareholder value like first and foremost, they now saying that a company’s purpose includes investing in employees, which I love. So I think 2020 is really going to be about putting people first.
Matt Alder [00:06:14]:
Absolutely. I mean, I saw that and I thought that was such an interesting. It was such an interesting move. So to drill down into these a little bit further, maybe starting with employee experience. Why is employee experience particularly important in 20?
Amy Schultz [00:06:30]:
So I think competition for talent has tightened. I mean, we know this and workers are becoming more skilled. And I feel like that has kind of helped shift the power a bit from institutions or companies to individuals and talent. Professionals are focusing on employee experience, or ex, I think, as we call it in the game. And this is important because it increases retention and productivity and really helps to also meet the expectations of the younger generations that are coming in to the workforce and trying to attract more candidates in this really talent type market. And I feel like, Matt, the data is telling this too. 96% of HR and TA leaders surveyed say employee experience is becoming more important. And there’s actually been a 2.4x increase since 2014 in LinkedIn members whose job titles include employee experience, which I think is super interesting.
Matt Alder [00:07:30]:
I think it’s kind of important to understand perhaps what we mean by employee experience. What are the key elements of it?
Amy Schultz [00:07:38]:
So interesting, you know, we found that only 52% of employees say that their company provides a positive experience. So clearly, Matt, there’s room for improvement. And I think today more businesses are looking at everything they do through the lens of existence. And when we talk about ex, that’s everything that an employee observes, feels, and interacts with as part of a company. And I think it’s a really important distinction to make that it’s different from employee engagement. I think, you know, employee engagement, that’s our end goal. That’s what we want. We want engaged employees. And I think that employee experience is a means to get there.
Matt Alder [00:08:19]:
So who’s doing employee experience? Well, I mean, do you have sort of any examples in the report?
Amy Schultz [00:08:25]:
Yeah, absolutely. So there is a company called Forrester who is doing employee experience well and they measure their employees. They use Glint actually as a means to better understand the full scope of employee experience and really starting to get a more immediate and precise level of understanding. And there’s a really great example that Forrester used surveying their employees to understand that actually one of the barriers that they weren’t aware of around employee engagement was that employees were actually really disappointed in the company’s parental leave policy. In the us. So, based on that feedback and that signal, Forrester Journey mapped the parental leave experience and definitely discovered that there were pockets of confusion and guilt among employees going on leave, colleagues who are covering for leave, managers who are administrating the leaves, and then the team then involved employees in developing structured guidance for the future. And I think that’s so critical because with employee experience, it’s really about starting to solve problems with employees rather than for them. And as a result, Forrester were able to enhance their leave policy with more time off and better pay, and I think just a better standardised way of what that experience looked like around parental leave. And I think that there’s been great success from that. And I think Forrester looks to replicate that approach and sharing ownership of both data and solutions with their employees across the company.
Matt Alder [00:10:02]:
What would your top tips be for companies looking to improve their employee experience in 2020?
Amy Schultz [00:10:09]:
I mean, you can go really deep on employee experience, obviously, and I think a couple of my top tips to sort of start on that journey is really to listen and act, but continuously, I think, survey frequently to gain credibility with your employees, then you’ve got to take action on the feedback in a really timely manner and start to create that super valuable feedback loop. And to be able to do that, that can maybe seem a bit daunting in the beginning if this is something that you’re starting. So win small. I think start with the minor improvements rather than the big overhaul, because sometimes it’s actually the small things that are really, you know, barriers for employees and those small fixes can become a big difference in the end.
Matt Alder [00:10:58]:
So, moving on to People analytics, it’s something that I know sort of a number of employers have been working on for a few years now. Why is that particularly important in 2020?
Amy Schultz [00:11:10]:
Agree. You know, I think that it definitely has been a hot topic for a while and why it’s becoming more important, I think, is to really measure employee performance, start to conduct strategic workforce planning, evaluate recruiting channels, identify skills gaps and really sort of assessing our talent pool, supply and demand in this really competitive environment. And I think that, you know, the advances that we’ve seen that in technology has definitely democratized. So it’s not once reserved for only the most sophisticated companies to have access to data. But I can’t imagine doing my job now without my People analytics partners. And through the survey, we saw that 73% of talent leaders indicate that People analytics is going to be a major priority for their company over the next five years. And we’ve seen a 242% increase, increase in HR professionals with data analytics skills on their profile over the past five years. So I think that really does indicate this shift in people analytics becoming definitely very much front of mind for HR leaders now.
Matt Alder [00:12:22]:
Absolutely. And I couldn’t agree more. Perhaps for employers who are not sort of fully up to speed with where they should be or where they could be with people analytics, could you sort of talk us through the key elements of a people analytics strategy?
Amy Schultz [00:12:37]:
Yeah, happy to, Matt. I think it’s, you know, it really is going to be unique to each company’s needs, but I feel that people analytics comes down to employee performance and workforce planning. Also, where I partner with our people analytics team is about talent pipelining as well. And I think companies are using data to evaluate recruiting channels, identify skills gaps. As I, as I mentioned before, I think that that will help companies to really evaluate competitive intelligence, better understand flight risks within their company and then also overall candidate success.
Matt Alder [00:13:11]:
And what kind of progress are companies making with this? What are you seeing out in the market?
Amy Schultz [00:13:16]:
I mean, we’re getting there. I don’t think we’re there yet, but we’re definitely getting there, Matt. And you know, 55% of talent leaders say that they actually need help putting basic people analytics into practice. And this is where, you know, those important skills like storytelling with data and really being able to make recommendations with data, thus turning them into insights, I think are muscles that many are still developing and we see a drop off in analysis and acting on the findings to solve problems. But the good news is that many companies are taking that first step and that’s to really maintain clean, accurate data and then analyse it. So we’re getting there.
Matt Alder [00:13:59]:
And I suppose going back to those organisations who are just getting started, what would your advice be to them in terms of what they should be doing?
Amy Schultz [00:14:07]:
My advice, Matt, would be launch a pilot program and do that by collaborating with leadership to kind of find that one critical problem that is really important to the business that’s worth spending the time to study and solve. And I think that involves uncovering reasons, maybe for turnover. That’s definitely popular given that we really need to retain talent in this market. And then once you identify that critical problem, enlist allies that could be people within the business that could be cross functional partners and start to build a plan, collect and analyse the data and then share your recommendations and results. My team are about to launch a quality of hire pilot in partnership with our people analytics team and we are using allies from the business to really help us support that launch and also make sure that we’re measuring success in the right way.
Matt Alder [00:15:01]:
Fantastic stuff. Moving on to internal recruiting and you kind of mentioned, you know, almost a return to internal recruiting. Why is this one important in 2020 and what are the benefits for companies of embracing it?
Amy Schultz [00:15:15]:
You know, it’s so interesting. I think over, gosh, you know, many decades, companies, we’ve been hiring talent away from other companies. And I think, you know, it’s because we see that outsiders already trained and easier to recruit, perhaps because they’ve changed employers before. Matt, if I had a dollar for every time I heard a hiring manager say over the years, I need someone who can hit the ground running, potentially wouldn’t be having this conversation with you. I may be on an island somewhere, but I think that organisations are now rediscovering how cost effective and also better for overall business results it is when they recruit internally. When they do that, people stay longer and perform better because they know they have an option somewhere, sometime of a new role at their company. We’ve actually just launched our own internal recruiting pilot in EMEA, which is our fastest growing region at LinkedIn. And Dublin is where our EMEA headquarters is and it’s become one of the most competitive cities in the world for talent. So I’m really interested to see how that pilot goes. And when I speak to peers, Matt, other talent leaders, I think that they’re also sharing with me that companies are starting to prioritise. Since 2015, there’s been a 10% increase in internal hiring, which is pleasing to see.
Matt Alder [00:16:34]:
So what barriers do companies face in terms of doing more internal hiring?
Amy Schultz [00:16:39]:
You know, it’s funny, the biggest barrier to internal recruiting is actually managers don’t want to let go of their good talent and I think we need to move past that. And 70% of managers said that they would prefer to keep talent on their teams and that’s only human. But I think the second biggest barrier is not enough qualified candidates. And according to 56% of those that we surveyed, 38% said that internal recruiting was hindered by the fact that it makes it more difficult to diversify the workforce. So I think that a couple of the barriers, Matt, and some of that is also, I think, down to just starting to shift perceptions and reminding people of the value of this particular channel.
Matt Alder [00:17:23]:
And what are the top ways that employers could be improving internal recruiting.
Amy Schultz [00:17:27]:
So I think you need to start with making internal recruiting both structured and proactive. I think a formalised process will really help diversify and you know, rather than employees having to find opportunities on their own, you know, they can start to hear things through their own network. And once you have that I think structured process, then proactively reach out. I think recruiters need to play a bigger role in initiating moves internally instead of kind of hearing about it second hand. Once employees and hiring managers have perhaps already kick started the process. And to be able to do that, Matt, I think recruiting needs to have really tight partnerships with both the business and hr so we can all be in the know first. And then as you’re going really prove the payoff, provide managers with good reasons, data, success stories to show them why moving top performers is good for the company. And I think that once they see those success stories, they’re going to be wanting to be part of it. And then lastly, tying back to one of the key trends is employee experience. I think we also need to ensure that when we think about internal recruiting that we’re providing a good experience not only to those that get hired, but also those that don’t. So we can ensure retention.
Matt Alder [00:18:49]:
Absolutely. Again, I couldn’t agree with you. I couldn’t agree with you more. So multi generation workforce, again, this is something that has come up over multiple years. Why is it especially important in 2020?
Amy Schultz [00:19:05]:
I mean, we are all now needing to retire later, Matt. And I think millennials are also no longer in college, which is kind of Gen Z are starting to enter the workforce. So that actually means that people are working longer and we have more age diversity in the workforce than ever. And the good news with that is 89% of talent professionals agree the multi generational workforce makes a company more successful. And in fact 56% have recently updated their policies to appeal to a broader multigenerational workforce, which I think is really pleasing to see. And leaders today are now being tasked with understanding the nuances between generations. And this is where empathy is so important and how they communicate differently, different management, different learning styles, motivations, and I think really starting to set up kind of a knowledge exchange and growth opportunities within their employee base. And while this research can definitely shed some light on the differences and start to provide some guidance for us as leaders, it’s also important to make the effort to understand your own unique workforce at your individual company rather than just relying solely on assumptions, just kind of building on that.
Matt Alder [00:20:26]:
I mean, what would your advice be to employers? What do they need to be doing?
Amy Schultz [00:20:31]:
I think definitely, Matt, having attention on your younger workers that will reflect overall pop trends. Millennials and Gen Z now make up Roughly half of the world’s population and certainly the newest generations on the scene. So it makes sense that companies are definitely focused on them. But I think my recommendation is to, by focusing on them, really start to understand what they value and recognising that actually generations often share more similarities than differences when it comes to what they value. I think things like compensation, benefits, work, life, balance, et cetera are consistent for all. But interestingly, baby boomers are more likely to seek out a purposeful mission as a top priority, whereas Gen Z are more likely to value training. And I think it’s also while we need to understand what they value, we also need to understand why they leave. So I would recommend digging into that and what we’ve seen in the research is baby boomers, they yearn to make more impact. They’re looking for fit and they’re looking for challenge. And baby boomers will stay 18% longer than your average employee. So there’s loyalty there. On the flip side, Gen X, sometimes they get lost in these discussions. Gen X, they get the biggest retention Spotlight. You know, 60% of talent professionals we surveyed say that their focus is going to be on retaining Gen X because really, you know, they’re kind of either they’re in leadership positions or perhaps future leaders and then, you know, the changing nature of how we engage all these different generations at work, I would recommend really focusing on and in fact, Gen Z, 135% more likely than baby boomers to be in a part time role or a contract role. So you know, the overall not just multi generational workforce is changing, but also our nature of work is changing, which is super interesting.
Matt Alder [00:22:37]:
As a fully paid up member of Generation X, it’s nice to get a mention for a change. So final question. What can we expect to see from LinkedIn in 2020? What should we be looking out for from you guys?
Amy Schultz [00:22:56]:
Yeah, so I mentioned earlier, you know, we’re launching, we have launched actually an internal recruiting pilot in emea and you’re really focusing on the employee experience and trying to decrease time to fill and just increase retention through that. So really excited about the success of that pilot and you know, overall LinkedIn we are going to continue to have a focus on employee experience. We acquired Glynk just over a year ago. So through that, you know, continuing to optimize our own products to help achieve people’s success.
Matt Alder [00:23:31]:
Amy, thank you very much for talking to me.
Amy Schultz [00:23:34]:
Thanks Matt, always a pleasure.
Matt Alder [00:23:36]:
My thanks to Amy Schultz. You can subscribe to this podcast in Apple Podcasts or via your podcasting app of choice. Please also follow us on Instagram. You can find the show by searching for Recruiting Future. If you’re a Spotify or Pandora user, you can also find the show there. You can find all the past episodes@www.rfpodcast.com. on that site, you can subscribe to the mailing list and find out more about Working with me. Thanks very much for listening. I’ll be back next week and I hope you’ll join me.
