Talent Curation: An Important Component of High5 Vetted Talent

We recently published the first issue of our Playbook Series on High5 Vetted Talent, which covers what High5 Vetted Talent is and how it can impact your organization at a critical moment such as now – when the staffing industry is ripe for change. Talent curation is an important component of High5 Vetted Talent.

To summarize, High5 Vetted Talent is talent that’s been put through a thorough screening, interviewing, and skills assessment process by experienced subject matter experts (SMEs) before they are submitted for a role. This translates to higher quality talent, faster speed-to-hire — all at a lower cost than organizations are used to paying via traditional staffing methods.

Talent Curation is Critical to Delivering Quality Vetted Talent

The same way a museum curator acquires fine art collections and presents them to an audience, talent curation means talent is being selected, categorized, provided feedback, and presented for the most relevant, highest-value roles that allow both the organization and talent to be successful.

Similarly, when we think about talent curation over the more dated concept of talent management, it rightly brings the needs of the talent to the forefront. When we think of management, it feels more like control and reaction rather than empowering and developing others. By investing in a curation process, organizations show a commitment to finding the right person who will be successful inside a given environment and culture.

Talent curation is proactive. It means going after emerging tech skills (i.e., full stack, cloud, big data, cyber security), providing stringent vetting of that talent, and creating a cloud of available, engaged talent that’s ready to deploy immediately.

Moreover, curation is a process that happens continuously, so there is always a readily available talent pipeline for an organization to select.

Devil in The Details

There are differing opinions on the best way to vet curated talent. Testing and assessment tools have been around for some time. In the future, the need to remove bias from the hiring process, more accurately test for specific, emerging technical skills, and ensure a candidate is a culture fit are musts. Whether it’s AI-based, personality assessments, coding-based testing, at-scale vetting requires experts in that domain to provide screening and validate credentials.

Curation must come from a trusted referrer of information like a subject matter expert knowledgeable within a given skill set. This leads directly to the quality of talent within an organization.

Still, talent curation and selection of quality talent to put into a curated pool (or deliver individually) requires finding the best match technologically, as well as brand, culture, and soft skills fit. This requires a very specific, customized process.

The status quo is no longer acceptable

In a saturated market, talent curation has become critical in the hiring process. It directly impacts submit-to-hire ratios, speed-to-hire, cost savings, and organization’s ability to deliver projects on time.

Even the most experienced corporate or staffing recruiters have limited scope because they represent one organization. What’s more, with the speed new technology is emerging and the globalization of the market, it’s impossible for traditional recruitment models to have the requisite knowledge to vet, at scale, talent to fill critical roles.

To meet today’s market demands, talent curation must be scalable through an extensive network of subject matter experts who are available 24x7x365. Subject matter experts bring crucial industry and organizational experience because they have been in these roles before.

The Cost Factor

Sifting through dozens of resumes for every job opening and attempting to qualify soft and hard skills isn’t a hiring manager’s job. What’s more, hiring the wrong talent is costly and time-consuming.

According to the U.S. Department of Labor, the average cost of a bad hire is up to 30% of the employee’s first-year earnings, resulting in lost productivity and time, inflated hiring expenses, wasted recruiting efforts, and delayed projects.

That’s not all. If organizations muddle through with talent that doesn’t have the right skills, they, too, will be disengaged. Research by Gallup estimates that actively disengaged and unhappy employees cost businesses anywhere from $450 billion to $550 billion a year in lost productivity.

The competition for top talent remains one of the most critical pieces for a company to get right. Talent curation allows organizations to cultivate a larger, broader pool of quality talent, continuously, and engage with them throughout the process. This leads to happier, more engaged talent which leads to increased productivity, lower costs, and an active pipeline of referrals.

At High5, we’ve invested heavily in an innovative and thorough curation and vetting process that benefits all parties. To that end, this is the second in a three-part Playbook Series committed to providing organizations with detailed information about High5 Vetted Talent, choosing the right talent curation partner, and the future of talent. We look forward to partnering with you through the process.

If you want to learn more about High5’s global work enablement platform and learn how we find, vet, and curate talent, please visit high5hire.com.