As the COVID-19 pandemic forced employees to work virtually, and in isolation, organizations started to seek a more flexible work arrangement. Things like remote working and talent sharing have become the new work trends, making organizations redefine their workforce and become more agile in managing their human resources.
While remote working has already become very common, even more so due to the current pandemic, talent sharing between companies is a relatively newer concept.
What is Talent Sharing?
During this ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, many organizations laid off their employees, while a few others implemented furloughs. While sectors like high street retail, entertainment, hospitality, and similar service industries, had to cut down on manpower and other resources due to plummeting consumer demand, others like grocery, pharmaceuticals, health care, and similar essential services saw a spike in their workforce need. This created a huge skill gap, which called for a cross-industry exchange of human resources. For example, a hotel that laid off most of its staff partnered with a local grocery store that needed more staff to cater to increased customer demands.
Some major examples of Talent Sharing come from McDonald’s and Aldi in Germany. Employees from closed McDonald’s fast-food outlets could work temporarily at Aldi’s grocery retail chain until social distancing restrictions were lifted and businesses were back to normal operations.
How is Talent Sharing helping HR Managers navigate workforce disruption during the current pandemic?
For HR Managers, Talent Sharing seems like a desperate solution. But from a human resource management perspective, it is a strategic solution for their organizations to tide over these challenging times.
For HR Managers, Talent Sharing seems like a desperate solution. But from a human resource management perspective, it is a strategic solution for their organizations to tide over these challenging times.
For one, it is following the simple ‘sharing is caring‘ mantra of present times. But operationally, it helps offset costs for both companies, helps leverage talent, and fills skill gaps. It allows organizations to spread responsibilities across appropriate talents and meet the organization’s needs and customers while also ensuring that no talent is wasted.
“Everyone in Germany is currently asked to do their part to cope with the crisis. With this solution, we can do that and, at the same time, offer a classic win-win situation: Our employees can—if they want—be kept employed. At the same time, Aldi benefits from additional resources. And this ensures for the company in Germany that Aldi can act fully even during the crisis” Holger Beeck, CEO of McDonald’s Germany. Source
Talent sharing has proven to be economical for many industry sectors with tighter human resources, where they need to continue delivering as earlier, and sometimes even more. It is a win-win situation for both employers and employees. Employees enjoy a stable income, expand their opportunities through a new job and learn new skills in the process. On the other hand, it helps HR manage overheads and meets their business needs.
Source: HR in Asia
Is Talent Sharing sustainable in the post-pandemic days?
In the post-pandemic days, such collaborative measures will help strained businesses get back on their feet. Experts are eyeing more opportunities in Talent Sharing if at all it is planned and executed in a structured way. This could be a sustainable method in the future where businesses would need to restructure themselves, but that calls for a lot of prepping in terms of processes and workflows.
While remote working is now very mainstream, the concept of talent sharing is relatively new and still in its nascent stage. And like the virtual/remote work, Talent Sharing also came with no-warning, where businesses are making adjustments on the fly, whenever and wherever necessary. As such, this is still not a structured and formalized system of human resource management. Organizations are still in the process of evaluating a holistic method of scouting shared talent, managing the logistics of the talent exchange, (how, when, and how much), and how that can transform their operations.
That is where emerging technologies like AI and Machine Learning can be leveraged to plan and organize the same. Scientifically designed HRM systems could streamline the talent sharing process, enabling organizations to quickly and systematically identify, assess and manage their employees and the new incoming employees.
What strategies are you employing to overcome workforce disruption in these challenging times?
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