the talent management gap

HOW HR TECHNOLOGY SYSTEMS CONNECTTO THE HIRE-TO-RETIRE PROCESS

BY PATRICK JAMES | WWW.LINKEDIN.COM/IN/PATRICKJAMES

THETALENTMANAGEMENTGAP

THE TALENT MANAGEMENT GAP

How HR Technology Systems Connect to the Hire-to-Retire Process, by Patrick James

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Professional Service Organizations (PSO) often refer to their employees as their biggest and greatest asset, however very few have a full perspective on how they are managing, or have managed, this asset during the employee’s time with the company. Even more problematic is the lack of visibility into the entire workforce as an aggregate, plus ensuring the employees are aligned with the talent management and broader organization’s strategy. Due to system fragmentation, organizations often do not have a unified view of the employee lifecycle which leads to lost revenue and higher workforce costs – see Figure 1.

Tracking the Employee LifecycleThe employee lifecycle is loosely defined as the time an employee started with the organization, added value through their work, learned new skills, had their per-formance assessed and eventually departed from the organization. To track all the stages of employment, most organizations have an Applicant Tracking System (ATS)i to first source and recruit potential employees, another system to onboard and offboard employees, an-other to assess performance and define goals, a human resource information system, and the always convoluted compensation system. There are likely other systems to track skills, store resumes, learning plans and content, and track compliance. On top of these common employ-ee information systems, high performing PSOs invest in Professional Service Applications (PSAs) to capture em-ployee time and expenses, allocate and track resources for client projects, and monitor utilization and billing.

While tracking all these areas about employees is well in-tended, with multiple systems, the entire process quickly

falls short because companies are capturing the informa-tion in silos and human resource departments can not provide the organization a clear a view of the employee’s hire-to-retire process. Since McKinsey & Company first coined the term Talent Managementii in their book War for Talent, many software companies have developed Talent Management Systems to help manage what has become known as the hire-to-retire process.

Tracking the Entire Hire-to-Retire ProcessThere are many Talent Management Systems (TMS)iii in the marketplace, and each may have different nomen-clatures for modules within the applications, as illus-trated in Figure 2 - Employee Hire-to-Retire Process. Each application should address the entire hire-to-retire process and integrate with employee management sys-

A unified hire-to-retire process provides visibility and structure for the recruitment and compensation process.



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tems. Many PSOs have made substantial investments into their existing employee systems, so this is not to say that those legacy systems should be scrapped, but PSOs should analyze how, what, and if they can capture and report on information in a way that support a unified view to understanding the entire employee hire-to-re-tire process.

Employee Attraction and RecruitmentMost organizations lack system integration between the compensation system, (which is usually a massive spreadsheet for smaller PSOs), Human Resource Infor-mation Systems (HRIS), and Applicant Tracking System (ATS) for sourcing and tracking employment candi-dates. Without integrated processes and systems, quite often compensation for new employees does not align with existing payroll and bonus structures. All too of-ten the hiring manager or practice leader has set a com-pensation level for the job requisition that is not aligned with the existing employee compensation structure. This results in difficulties during end-of-the-year compen-sation assessments. Additionally, a compensation level that is not aligned with the organization or marketplace can often impact and be a waste of time for recruiters trying to source the position. By having all three systems integrated, the risk for hiring managers to go outside set hiring and compensation bands is greatly reduced. Plus, as market salary levels adjust for a particular skill set or position, salary bands can be adjusted, allowing for a unified view and alignment with market rates. A unified hire-to-retire process provides visibility and structure for the recruitment and compensation process.

Tracking Employee Skills How often are emails sent or calls made when trying to track down the needed skillset for a project or time-crunched proposal with the leading question: “Who has experience with X?” Even worse, what about the scenar-io of a new employee or contractor being hired only for the team to find out later that a current employee on the bench had the needed skillset? A unified process and in-tegrated set of systems allow hiring and resource man-agers to have this visibility alongside common open job requisition reports to attract better talent with the right skills at the right time. Skills and resume databases are typically not kept up-to-date because the process and in-formation systems are not integrated and easily updated by employees via an employee portal. Think about all the systems where skills, certifications, and clearance in-formation can reside:

• applicant tracking system from submitted resumes; • performance assessment system;• learning system containing the employees learning

classes and plans; • PSA for resource assignment; and sometimes • resumes stored in a SharePoint database or a talent

management system.

The first key to tracking skills is to make it easy for em-ployees to keep their skills, certifications obtained, clear-ances and resumes up-to-date. The use of online employee portals is a good method for capturing this information. Second, have one version of the truth. Employee skills are used in many systems; talent management systems are good at being the backbone for this information and being a feeder system for other employee management applications.

More than any other type of organization, PSOs should have their ATS, recruiting process and metrics, talent management systems, PSA and talent management strat-egy tightly aligned with the overall organizational strat-egy and revenue goals. Without the integration of these systems and information, gathering an accurate forecast of what resources are needed, who is on the cusp of leav-ing, historical and forecasted attrition rates, resource pool availability with plotting of high and low perform-ers – all while needing those resources to meet revenue

Figure 1- Fragmentation among systems with employee Information



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goals – quickly falls short. Looking at this problem from a system and data point of view:

• HRIS will have historical and forecasted attrition rates,

• PSAs will have current and forecasted resource assignments

• TMS will have employee skills and performance assessments, and

• ATS will have the clearest picture of the incoming inflow of employees with visibility on how close the requisition is to being filled.

Without a unified process to capture the data, Resource Managers often result to doing spreadsheet gymnastics to compile a static forecast, from a PSA, of current allo-cated and unallocated resources, taking into consider-ation those that will roll off projects, against incoming employees, leaving employees, and the open job requi-

sitions and headcount across multiple practices that is contained in the ATS. High performing PSOs realize key benefits when they can access data from all of these systems in a unified way for analysis of their current

and future talent pool, and use such knowledge in an actionable way. Just as an organization would create a financial dashboard with key reporting metrics and drill down capability, human resource and information tech-

Figure 2 - Employee Hire-to-Retire Process

Organizations should have their employee systems, data and talent management strategy tightly aligned with the overall organizational strategy and revenue goals.



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nology departments need to work together to create a consolidated dashboard and series of actionable metrics from all the employee-based applications to manage the greatest asset.

See Figure 3 for a list of typical employee data contained within common applications used by organizations.

Employee OnboardingRecruiters, hiring managers and interview screening teams have spent many hours sourcing and courting a candidate, so the onboarding process should reflect the investment the organization has made to hire this new employee – first impressions are critical!

Integrating onboarding systems within Talent Manage-ment Systems (integrated with ATS and HRIS) provide all participants (candidate, hiring manager, recruiter, HR) included in the hiring process to have visibility to track activities and push the appropriate requests, re-minders, and forms through the onboarding process.

Key indicators that an organization’s employee onboard-ing system does not support an automated and unified hire-to-retire process are:

• The candidate is filling out paper-based or PDF application forms when they already submitted their resume and information into the ATS.

• New employees are still filling out paper-based i-9 and W-4 forms, not doing this on-line with e-signature.

• Onboarding documentation is still printed and handed to the employee. Should be accessible by the new employee in an employee portal with documents signed off via e-signature and documentation tailored by the office location of the employee.

• HR and the hiring manager have a dashboard and visibility as to where the candidate is with their onboarding paperwork.

• Employee data is being rekeyed into multiple employee applications.

By providing the new employee with access to an on-boarding portal, it provides the organization the ability to include welcome videos for the new employee, send the employee tasks between the hire date and start date, and provide electronic versions of the offered benefits. By providing employees with tasks before their start date, it has been shown that incoming employees will have early discussions with their family and make de-cisions regarding their benefits before their actual start date. This approach will save human resources time and energy by not having to track down the employee weeks

Application Common Employee Information within Applications

Applicant Tracking System (ATS)

• Job description (skills needed)• List of candidates applied along with their

skills• Interview notes and candidate assessments• Candidate work history via application

portalHuman Resources Information System (HRIS)

• Hired date• Start and end date• Comprehensive employee information• Attrition rates

Onboarding • System, infrastructure and information access with workflow based on location

• Employee portal to assign and track onboarding activities

• Employment documents with employee electronic signature

Compensation • Current and historical compensation by employee reported on: position, department, utilization, revenue

Talent Management System (TMS)

• Cascading goals and alignment• Goals and performance reviews• High and low performers• Could include onboarding, offboarding,

ATS, compensation, and LMS• Employee skill tracking

Learning Manage-ment System (LMS)

• Skills obtained and needed• Learning videos, compliance videos• Compliance and authorization• Tracking of learning plan completion

(individual and organization)Professional Service Automation (PSA)

• Clients served• Current and forecasted resource

assignments• Employee skill tracking• Project economics - utilization, revenue

and billing ratesOffboarding • Removal system, infrastructure and

information access with workflow based on location

Alumni • Former employee contact information • Current and past company - network• Skills and certifications acquired post-

employment

Figure 3 - Common Employee Information within Applications



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after starting to get benefits elections. Additionally, by providing the incoming employee with tasks, such as writing an introduction bio, organizations can get an early indication of the employee engagement level.

An employee portal that is integrated with an ATS can be very helpful for increasing employee referrals. As fig-ure 1 shows, employee engagement is at its highest when a new employee is being onboarded. The recently-hired employee is excited about the new opportunities the company brings and is highly likely to refer those with-in their network. A highly unified hire-to-retire process allows the new employee to submit a candidate’s resume easily within the employee portal so that these refer-rals are sent to the ATS and notifies internal recruiting team of the referral. The new employee is already work-ing through onboarding tasks, so it is very beneficial to make it easy for them within the employee portal where they are performing these tasks.

For further information on this topic, see next month’s paper, “Why Traditional Onboarding Doesn’t Work (and What You Can Do About It)”. This paper will be posted on psvillage.com and LinkedIn.

Employee Development: Goals and Performance ReviewsA highly unified hire-to-retire process has the new em-ployee quickly working with their manager to align their performance objectives with the cascading company goals. When employees understand what they do and how it contributes to the success of the team, depart-ment, and organization, their engagement level, and re-tention increases. Therefore, the onboarding, goals, and performance review process and systems should not be in information silos, but provide a fully unified view of the employee.

The hire-to-retire process should have performance re-views closely tied to the compensation systems so that compensation tiers (within HRIS and integrated with ATS for recruiting purposes) are aligned properly. This way, high performers are not under-compensated nor underperformers over-compensated. As compensation and bonus structures are adjusted, based on perfor-mance and compensation cycles, the unified hire-to-re-tire process adjusts appropriately by having these tiers integrated with the HRIS and ATS, so new hires are not over- or under-compensated in relation to the rest of the organization.

Key indicators that an employee’s performance assess-ment structure does not support a unified hire-to-retire process:

• Performance review documents are not online and are printed.

• Not able to get a company-wide view of how a single employee is performing relative to those in his or her peer group and within the entire organization.

• Not able to cascade employee goals from the company goals and also tie employee goals with the performance assessments.

• Not able to easily determine if high performers are making employee referrals.

• Difficulty plotting high or low performing employees with the recruiter that sourced the employee.

Additionally, managers and employee engagement and attrition rates have shown to be closely linked. Being able to identify which managers have the highest or low-est attrition rates as well as what the managers and their team’s performance assessment ratings are can be very useful in analyzing attrition and retention strategies.

Learning and Professional DevelopmentAs part of the goal and performance review process, skills, and learning plans should be incorporated into the hire-to-retire process, which is based on a comprehen-sive talent management strategy for the organization. The talent management strategy plan should outline where the organization wants to make learning invest-ments for the organization based on the direction and strategy of the business. Just as operational and financial goals will cascade from the overall organizational goals, detailed learning plans for the employees – within the talent management strategy – should be aligned with the organization’s growth plans. By not including the planning, tracking and completion monitoring of the employee learning plans alongside the goals and per-formance assessments, the full scope of an employee’s performance and engagement with the organization

Just as an organization would create a financial dashboard with key reporting metrics and drill down capability from multiple systems, create a consolidated dashboard and series of actionable metrics from all the employee based applications.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrickjames



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falls short. Quite often organizations have a blind spot assessing how and if the employee and the entire orga-nization are learning the needed skills and knowledge to meet future revenue goals. This means there is no way to assess the full advancement of the learning within the entire organization. If an organization’s revenue goals are centered around the growth of a specific technology or expertise in a subject area, a question that needs to be asked is, “Do the learning programs for developers, managers, customer success personnel, customer sup-port, internal operations support, and even executives all align with the business and talent management strat-egy to meet those revenue goals?”

Key indicators that an employee’s learning and profes-sional development structure does not support a unified hire-to-retire process:

• Misalignment of talent management strategy plan compared to the overall organizational strategy and/or current learning classes being offered.

• Not able to track what employees are interested in learning, and if the learning programs are tied to the company, department, project and employee goals.

• Manual or time-consuming process is needed to report an updated list of the skills, certifications, and clearances for the organization.

• No easy way for employees to update and keep track of their skills, certifications, clearances and resumes.

• Training programs are not centrally made available, and employees are left to fend for themselves to seek out training.

• Not knowing the skill gaps for underperformers and if they are completing training to help improve their performance.

• Not knowing the skill sets needed to fulfill the talent management strategy and if the Open Job Requisitions contain the skills that the organization needs.

• Attrition rates are not addressed in the hire-to-retire process and talent management strategy.

OffboardingWhile offboarding an employee, or even a contractor, has many of the same workflow and automation tasks that onboarding has, but of course in reverse, the ability to keep all the previously mentioned systems up-to-date with decremented headcount and skills is highly im-portant to an employee focused based PSO.

Alumni ProgramsUnfortunately, alumni programs are one area that many PSO’s fall short in the hire-to-retire process. Once the

Quite often organizations have a blind spot assessing how and if the employee and the entire organization are learning the needed skills and knowledge to meet future revenue goals.

PSO Benefits Alumni Benefits

• Access to alumni network• Potential leads or referrals for

sales opportunities• Alumni as brand ambassadors

(very good reason to have a cordial separation when an employee decides to leave the organization)

• Source for employee referrals• Potential to re-hire the alumni• Provides a structure for alumni

to remain engaged with the organization

• Access to alumni network• Access to PSO learning programs

and thought materials coming out of the PSO – many of these programs might already be within the TMS learning system and could be made available to alumni

• Ability to post jobs on alumni networks

Figure 4 - Alumni Program Benefits

employee has departed the organization, TMS function-ality and tracking usually stops there. Even though an employee has departed, the PSOs alumni can still be engaged with the organization. This does assume the re-lationship between the departed employee and previous employer is in good standing and both want to remain somewhat engaged.

While employees may leave an organization, they have not left the workforce or may not have truly retired. The alumni are still valuable to the organization and, if structured and managed properly by human resources, there is mutual benefit. Former colleagues can stay con-nected and benefit from alumni offerings such as those in Figure 4.

Conclusion: Hire-to-Retire Process for PSOsProfessional Service Organizations need to provide the systems, solutions and processes that give managers and leaders the tools and applications they need to manage the entire employee hire-to-retire lifecycle. While high-er performing PSOs do invest in Professional Service Automation solutions, there is still a major gap that is not being addressed or analyzed by many PSOs and



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related industry organizations. Employee, managers, resource managers, hiring managers, practice leaders, and leadership teams often cobble all kinds of employee information together in a manner of spreadsheets and emails still only to provide a partial and static view of the employee and entire organizations performance. Talent Management Systems and unified data-driven view of the hire-to-retire process must become part of the com-mon set of systems analyzed by PSOs and industry relat-ed organizations.

i Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) – ApplicantStack, Greenhouse, iCIMS, Jobvite, Taleo, SuccessFactors, Zoho Recruit (not a complete list as there are numerous companies offering ATS solutions)ii Broadly defined, talent management is the implementation of inte-grated strategies or systems designed to increase workplace produc-tivity by developing improved processes for attracting, developing, retaining and utilizing people with the required skills and aptitude to meet current and future business needs. – Source SHRM HR Glossary, www.shrm.orgiii Talent Management System (TMS) – Cornerstone, FinancialForce, Halogen Software, SuccessFactors, Taleo (not a complete list as there are numerous companies offering TMS solutions)

To learn more, or to have a discussion follow Patrick James on LinkedIn or Twitter for topics such as:

• Why Traditional Onboarding Doesn’t Work (and What You Can Do About It)

• What Should Be in Your Talent Management Strategy

• What Should Be on Your Talent Management Dashboard

• What Your Professional Development Department Should Be Doing for You

• How to Build Out a Buddy Program and the Benefits of this over a Mentor Program

• Why Mentor Programs Fall Short• The Many Approaches to Assessing Employee

Performance

https://www.linkedin.com/in/patrickjames

https://twitter.com/patrickjamesSF

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