Are HR Professionals Contributing To The Skills Gap?

I saw some information yesterday that just made my gut boil.  Yep -- that's what happened!  You know I am very proud and protective of my colleagues.  I've been an HR professional with a variety of responsibilities for a number of years and I know we do good work.  

I also know we can tend to be the whipping boy, treated like the step child and garner minimal respect and appreciation.  So when I saw this, (see below) I actually felt angry.  One of the things I can't stand is incompetency and stupidity.  Now I know we are all at different stages of knowledge and professional growth. Yet when I look at this chart, I think to myself," This is just plain stupid."  

The very things we need are the very things we are not doing, and then folks write about are not happening!  On top of which, we complain we cannot find people when we fail to meet talent acquisition needs with record unemployment!  Even leaders start blamming us for the shortage of talent.

Ok...friends, colleagues, decision-makers, hiring managers and all the powers that be (did I get them all?) -- reality check:

1. We will have to begin, continue to or increase invest in training and development.  

Studies show the skills gap, particularly in the area of soft skills, continues to grow even with incoming college graduates. We'll need to rethink and for sure redesign on-boarding to incorporate a fundamentals training curriculum of some kind which addressees soft skills. We'll need to see training in the beginning as an investment against perhaps less than productive, constructive behavior.  Please know, you pay now or you pay later!  

How will you pay later? I've written a white paper on how to identify and measure that. You'd be surprised at the "pay later costs". The Big Disconnect - How The Lack of Measuring is Undermining Your Profits.  If you'd like a copy - email me at: joann@thehumansphere.com

2. We will have to pay for talent! (Does this need to be explained?)

3. We will have to break our dependency on automated job boards and develop more effective, blended, creative strategies for talent acquisition.  Did you know that as spending for automatic job application boards rose, finding qualified candidates through this process decreased? Hey I say, save money on the job boards and use the money saved to pay higher compensation for the talent we so need!

Refusal to acknowledge these new talent landscape realties will only serve to constrict the life line of what could be a thriving more profitable business. We, as HR professionals, must be an internal advocate and consultant for shall I say sanity -- or at least the key and most effective activities to get the outcomes we are all working for.

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> Need to review your hire and selection or training and development strategies -- book a no cost advisory session with me. 

> Want the newly released white Paper The Big Disconnect - How The Lack of Measuring is Undermining Your Profits. 

Em: joann@thehumansphere.com