Why investing in digital skills will help you with recruitment and retainment, Tim Hughes

My friend Robert Tearle shared some data with me the other day that he has extracted from LinkedIn, which shows the problem businesses have today, with recruitment and retainment.

These figures are for the US.

According to LinkedIn, there are 170 million employed in the US.

Of these, 15 million have set their LinkedIn profile that they are open to a move which means they are open to conversations from recruitment consultants about other roles.

Overall on LinkedIn, there are 6.9 million vacancies, which means there are 2 people for every role.

If you work in software this is turn on it's head as there is 2.8 million people, 240,000 that are open to move and 780,000 vacancies that means there is 1 candidate for 3 roles.

In software sales there is 240,000 people, 38,000 open to move and 125,000 vacancies, which again means there is 1 candidate for 3 roles.

In the UK, similar sort of figures but the skills gap is greater as there is 1 sales candidate for 5 roles.

Your employees can quit from your company and walk into another role

Putting this bluntly, your salespeople can literally walk and find something "better".

I'm not defining what "better" is but it could mean more or less money, it could be related to culture, it could be related to the ideals of the company. Each person with have their own set of circumstances, challenges, opportunities, wants and needs.

We cannot get the talent

Senior leaders tell me that cannot get the talent, they cannot get the right talent. I'm also being told that the people they may have hired before the pandemic, they wouldn't hire now.

I recently interviewed James Barry on my podcast, link here, he talks about the importance that everybody has a personal brand in their business. He also talks about the attributes he looks for in salespeople today, which are; creativity, sharing, ability to tell stories, tenacity and curiosity.

If the talent can choose where they work what will you to attract the talent?

In an email from Robert, he's given me permission to share this he says

1 in 10 people is open to a move
Jobs in computer software outnumber people open to a move by a factor of 2 to 1, or greater
Hiring problem is acute
When we go into the new year, we can expect a surge in vacancies – likely to start Mid Jan through March
It’ll get worse

All of that we know. But, at least we know about this 2 months in advance of the problem so we have some time to do something about it. Yes?

But there is more

Robert also says

Impact on the business of failure to be able to hire
Longer hiring cycles
Increased salary costs
Higher attrition
Shorter tenures! = need to onboard people more quickly, need to max performance of people more quickly, this will impact on a cost to the business
Need to work out how to cover employment gaps – people may end up doing multiple jobs
Possible requirement to tweak business operations to achieve work arounds

This article states...

Report: Only 16% of orgs rank employee retention as top priority

"New research from NTT DATA reveals only 16% of organizations rank employee retention and engagement as a top priority, and the majority feel unprepared for continued business disruption. Amid the Great Resignation, many organizations are struggling to retain and attract top talent; however, customer satisfaction and financial performance remain the primary focus over employee engagement, even though employees have a direct impact on business outcomes."

People are crying out for digital skills

One of the ways you can plug these gaps is by offering people digital skills. Why? we know that digital kills provides the business and yourself with

Visibility – recognition in the marketplace
Trusted advisor status
Recruitment opportunities
Employee engagement & shared sense of purpose
Pipeline, growth & inbound

It's not just about giving people the skills they want, it's providing them with the coaching that will mean they will use them.

People want to be invested in

In all the business I've worked in, the number one thing that the sales team wanted was to see the leadership team stand up and say "we are going to invest in you". Stand up and say that to your team and you will see the heads raise, the shoulders open and the people start to listen.

Investment is not some one hour session on hints and tips, or even a day LinkedIn training. You know as well as I do that this is a waste of money.

Your team wants to hear that you are going to give them a methodology to help them sell move. You are going to give them the digital skills they crave and need in this digital world.

So who's social selling?

In case you missed it, the Bank of America’s Merrill Lynch have banned cold calling and have moved all their people to social selling. This isn't some trendy tech company that might have decided to do this on a whim, this is a very conservative financial services company that has made a decision based on data.

But surely cold calling has a better ROI than social selling? Not according to Merrill Lynch.

"They will also be encouraged to contact prospects over LinkedIn, which has a higher hit rate than cold calling"

The CRO (chief revenue officer), Richard Eltham of Namos Solutions, of one of clients posted a comment on LinkedIn about social selling. See here.

“Social selling is not an option now it is the way of the world and you either learn and execute it or fear getting left behind”

Kevin Murray who is the Head of Sales at MacArtney Underwater Technology recently posted about his success with social selling here and wrote an article about the transformation that has happened in sales here.

I don't believe you Tim!

If you check out this video of Chris Mason CEO at Oracle reseller Namos, fast forward to 19 minutes 55 seconds. Chris talks about a $2.6 million win from being on social, after completing the DLA Ignite social selling and influence course.

Here at DLA Ignite we don't do "hints and tips sessions" we don't want you to waste your money. Our social selling and influence methodology will provide your sales team with the stable platform for growth. It is also the only social selling program based on 70:20:10 change management principles which gives your business the mindset change and habit change they need in this digital world.

Other articles you might be interested in ....

Would you buy social selling training course from somebody that doesn't use social selling?

How to create budget and build a business case for your social selling project