My name is David Powell, one of the co-founders here at FMC Global Talent. Since our last communication in March, governments from around the world have had to continue to make difficult decisions impacting almost every part of our daily lives.

Lockdown is an immensely challenging time for us all, both professionally and personally. However, during the last few weeks the team at FMC has continued to work and speak with our customers globally and I wanted to share some of the insights captured that might be of value and interest to you as we collectively navigate a way forward. We have been limiting our communications to not fill your inboxes but hope that having some market context would be beneficial.

Recruitment ‘new normal’

Whilst many of our clients have had to press the pause button on recruitment, not everybody is in the same situation. Across our Auto Innovation, Smart Industry and Meditech Teams, customers in certain segments have seen limited impact, or actually a spike in demand, and in some areas and geographies are starting to emerge from lockdown and physically return to work.

Like me, you will currently be living on a platform like Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Google Hangouts and other video conferencing technologies. Those businesses continuing to recruit are embracing these technologies to replace what would have been face to face interviews. Interestingly both candidates and clients are feeling the benefits of reduced timeframes as a result.

In fact, some of our clients are making 100% virtual hires during this period, even taking candidates on virtual tours of factories and facilities. Understandably not everyone is comfortable concluding a process devoid of a face to face interaction, but what we have learnt is that we can collectively get to that final stage much more effectively and quicker than most of us were approaching things pre COVID-19.

Recruitment pause

Whilst your hands might currently be tied from an onboarding perspective and none of us know what the ‘new normal’ will be, what is certain is that the quality of the team that you retain and ultimately attract will never be more critical to the success and sustainability of your business.

If you have had to pause your recruitment plans, then try to remember that this is also a time of uncertainty for candidates, as much as it is for employers and your existing employees. As we emerge from this period, the competition for the ‘best’ talent is likely to be fiercer than ever.

Don’t lose the time and effort that you invested in your recruitment processes prior to March, stay in touch with your high potential candidate prospects, as this will maximise the chances of keeping them engaged with you and your brand and securing them as a candidate as soon as is practicably possible.

Recruitment advantage

You might have stopped conventional recruitment, but you certainly won’t have stopped thinking about recruitment or talent attraction. For many of you, getting your recruitment right and securing the best talent versus the best available talent, will be more business critical than ever.

Specific feedback from some of our clients is that they have identified a future spike in demand as a result of the various government restrictions that have been in place. While a specific date might not be clear there is certainty that demand has built during the lockdown that will place significant strain on existing resources and that turnaround will need to be rapid when restrictions are lifted.

In these scenarios we are currently supporting our clients with talent pooling and candidate pipeline projects to massively reduce response times to ensure talent is available at point of need versus when a vacancy is released.

For some of our more well-funded clients, we’re also hearing this period described as an opportunity. We have been approached by several clients that are using this time to acquire strategically important talent, with a view to achieving competitive advantage and take market share. With many candidates currently homebased accessing hard to reach candidates has never been more effective.

If you have any questions or queries that I can help with or you would like me to expand on any of the above, then please do not hesitate to get in touch at david.powell@fmctalent.com or by calling +44 (0) 7887 775761.

In the meantime, stay safe and well and we wish you and your organisation all the best.

David