The Key to the Talent Shortage Could Reside Within Your Business

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The talent shortage shows no sign of abating. New research from IBM Smarter Workforce Institute found that over half (51%) of all HR professionals say they are struggling to fill open jobs some of the time and over one third (35%) state they ‘very often or always’ experience difficulty filling positions.

In the US alone, around three million employees leave their jobs every month and the global skills shortage is predicted to worsen, at the risk to global growth.

The key to retaining the talent vital to the success of your organization is internal career mobility.

As critical positions go unfilled, the majority of organizations automatically turn to external sources when recruiting for their open jobs, often overlooking the talent available within their existing teams. But lack of career progression is one of the main reasons for the talent exodus.

2018 : The year of the employee experience


2018 is predicted to emerge as the year of the employee experience . As traditional career models evolve into ‘experiences’, HR must respond to that shift to retain talent and bridge skills gaps. Internal career mobility enables them to achieve that goal in three ways:

  • Facilitating movement of employees across different jobs.
  • Empowering them to learn new skills and creating new experiences.
  • Enabling career progression.

    • But research shows that almost one third of HR professionals are dissatisfied with their organization’s ability to meet their internal mobility goals. By not recognizing your internal talent your employees will seek opportunities elsewhere.

    Benefits of internal mobility


    Developing a clear internal career mobility strategy offers several benefits to your organization. Internal mobility has been shown to:

  • Enhance employee career satisfaction.
  • Improve talent retention levels.
  • Reduce recruitment costs and increase time to productivity of your ‘new’ hire.

    • Unlike with a new hire, there is no difficult onboarding process to navigate as your internal hires are already assimilated with your organization’s culture and can get up to speed much faster than a recruit.

    Employees promoted internally also demonstrate significantly better performance for the first two years than external candidates.

    Related: Continuous Feedback Actually Improves Performance

    Adopting a different approach to career mobility


    Failing to recognize your existing talent will continue to impact engagement and retention levels. Adopting a strategic approach to internal mobility is achievable with the following steps:

    Empower your employees : The responsibility for internal career mobility isn’t exclusively that of the employer. A systematic approach to career development is essential to empower your employees to map their own career path scenarios and evaluate personal skills gaps.

    Nurture your talent : Promoting internal career mobility is beneficial to your entire organization in terms of both skills development and developing a positive culture in which talent can thrive. By emphasizing the potential for career progression, employees are more engaged and happier in their work.

    Support your processes with technology : Facilitating internal career mobility with technology will provide an interactive and automated experience for employees to easily navigate to vacant and aspired roles within their organization.