Employers should ditch short-term thinking and use a downturn to develop their pool of talent, says Steve Simmance.
I can't offer my clients and candidates an upbeat prognosis about what the future holds, but I do have a few views on the dangerously short-term attitude that some employers are taking towards recruitment.
The fmcg labour market has experienced its fair share of culling as organisations have slashed headcounts to make short-term cost savings, sometimes using the recession as an excuse to cut surplus staff.
But many organisations underestimate the long-term impact and are not prepared for the inevitable upturn - when the growth times reappear they will struggle to find and recruit talented staff.
Like previous post-recession periods, there will be a frantic scramble to recruit talent as the demand/supply seesaw is reversed. Businesses that take a short-term view on their human assets during the downturn will only end up paying over the odds to recruit them back.
The smart organisations with a genuine labour strategy, however, will continuously innovate and find ways to keep the talent workforce engaged in "future" projects. Meanwhile, recruiters need to weather the storm rather than be spooked by the record low demand and behave appallingly simply to stay in business.
This sort of short-termism has to stop for everyone's sake! I would go so far as to say that companies should remain engaged and active in the recruitment market right now, seeking out talent that may not have been available in the good times. They should, at the very least, keep close contact with reliable recruitment suppliers who are managing the waves of candidate talent bursting from the labour pool.
Workforce reductions and lower remuneration expectations present opportunities. The companies working with their recruitment suppliers to map the supply of talent will be the winners. Managing the people agenda shouldn't be any different to managing a well-defined marketing or sales strategy. But so few organisations truly understand the value of a well-designed talent strategy or that of experienced and longserving fmcg recruiters.
Managers need to stop taking the easy way out and instead seek creative ways to retain staff. Consider reorganising work processes rather than cutting staff to achieve cost reductions. Explore shared services and outsourcing arrangements with manpower providers. In this way, operating costs can be lowered without losing talent, enabling businesses to retain their intellectual property rather than see the competition taking it. There are also several remuneration initiatives from extended leave to shares instead of salary that can help keep a loyal workforce intact.
Recession dramatically reduces voluntary attrition as people are afraid to leave. I often come across groups of disengaged workers causing a "settler" problem, which in turn creates the awkward and laborious need for performance management procedures. If people can't justify their purpose there will inevitably be redundancies. If that's the case, managers should avoid the death by a thousand cuts and take swift, informed, decisive action.
Team building rather than cutting is vital to maintain morale in difficult times. It's hard enough attracting talent to the fmcg industry. Let's not make it more difficult.
Steve Simmance is MD of The Simmance Partnership.
I can't offer my clients and candidates an upbeat prognosis about what the future holds, but I do have a few views on the dangerously short-term attitude that some employers are taking towards recruitment.
The fmcg labour market has experienced its fair share of culling as organisations have slashed headcounts to make short-term cost savings, sometimes using the recession as an excuse to cut surplus staff.
But many organisations underestimate the long-term impact and are not prepared for the inevitable upturn - when the growth times reappear they will struggle to find and recruit talented staff.
Like previous post-recession periods, there will be a frantic scramble to recruit talent as the demand/supply seesaw is reversed. Businesses that take a short-term view on their human assets during the downturn will only end up paying over the odds to recruit them back.
The smart organisations with a genuine labour strategy, however, will continuously innovate and find ways to keep the talent workforce engaged in "future" projects. Meanwhile, recruiters need to weather the storm rather than be spooked by the record low demand and behave appallingly simply to stay in business.
This sort of short-termism has to stop for everyone's sake! I would go so far as to say that companies should remain engaged and active in the recruitment market right now, seeking out talent that may not have been available in the good times. They should, at the very least, keep close contact with reliable recruitment suppliers who are managing the waves of candidate talent bursting from the labour pool.
Workforce reductions and lower remuneration expectations present opportunities. The companies working with their recruitment suppliers to map the supply of talent will be the winners. Managing the people agenda shouldn't be any different to managing a well-defined marketing or sales strategy. But so few organisations truly understand the value of a well-designed talent strategy or that of experienced and longserving fmcg recruiters.
Managers need to stop taking the easy way out and instead seek creative ways to retain staff. Consider reorganising work processes rather than cutting staff to achieve cost reductions. Explore shared services and outsourcing arrangements with manpower providers. In this way, operating costs can be lowered without losing talent, enabling businesses to retain their intellectual property rather than see the competition taking it. There are also several remuneration initiatives from extended leave to shares instead of salary that can help keep a loyal workforce intact.
Recession dramatically reduces voluntary attrition as people are afraid to leave. I often come across groups of disengaged workers causing a "settler" problem, which in turn creates the awkward and laborious need for performance management procedures. If people can't justify their purpose there will inevitably be redundancies. If that's the case, managers should avoid the death by a thousand cuts and take swift, informed, decisive action.
Team building rather than cutting is vital to maintain morale in difficult times. It's hard enough attracting talent to the fmcg industry. Let's not make it more difficult.
Steve Simmance is MD of The Simmance Partnership.
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