Human resources have long been acknowledged as one of the most precious and valuable assets of any organisation. And, irrespective of whether the company is an MNC or a start-up, the one crucial aspect without which no business can really ever take off is a skilled and committed workforce. As the global business world has taken cognizance of this fact, it is little wonder that the talent acquisition and retention function has taken on newer dimensions in the last couple of years. Finding the right set of employees with a high degree of advanced skills, motivation, the willingness to adapt and evolve with the changing business eco-system is no mean feat, and, is the reason behind businesses quickly understanding the importance of investing in HR technologies to gain a competitive edge in their specific domains.

Before we take a look at how the HR function is in itself transforming in India, let us understand what the challenges in the industry are, and, why is there a need for widespread tech adoption when it comes to talent recruitment. The primary challenge in the Indian human resources space is a mismatch between the skills required for a job and those possessed by the candidates. Most new job roles require a high degree of tech adeptness amongst the candidates, which formal Indian education has yet been unable to hitherto offer. Further, the few candidates that do have the requisite skills are hard to identify, and, have multiple job offers to choose from. Ensuring that they pick your offer over others’ is another challenge.

However, every challenge presents a unique opportunity, and, this stands as a case in the HR domain as well. As recruitment in the world of technology becomes more complex, there has been a concomitant rise in the use of tech-based tools that recruiters can employ to identify, hire, and retain the talent best suited for their organisations. The use of digital and data analytics based platforms can substantially improve the efficiency of the HR function in India.

Challenges for HR

• Mismatch of skills between candidates and job roles
• Absence of tech adeptness among candidates
• Good talent have multiple offers to choose from

The relevance of job portals

Companies that rely on the services of top job portals have found that their recruitment process has become far more streamlined than before. Shine.com, for instance, has been pulling out all stops over the last ten years to leverage tech and enhance the effectiveness of the hiring process not just for recruiters, but also job seekers. Through the use of its mobile-first approach and an advanced application of technologies such as AI, data analytics, and machine learning, the portal has been able to match candidates with only the most relevant job profiles in terms of experience, skill-set, interests etc.

Further, by employing automated shortlisting and real-time reporting to gauge skills and define performance benchmarks, recruiters can handpick only those candidates who fit their hiring criteria, and, this shortens the decision-making process by a large margin and also ups its effectiveness. In fact, predictive analytics can further help by forecasting a candidate’s future performance and enable recruiters to make the right choice at the very onset. The integration of such technologies in the hiring process can result in significant cost savings by helping companies identify better talent fits and prevent lost time in dealing with a huge influx of resumes.    

In Quotes “By employing automated shortlisting and real-time reporting to gauge skills and define performance benchmarks, recruiters can handpick only those candidates who fit their hiring criteria, and this shortens the decision-making process by a large margin and also ups its effectiveness.”

Additionally, as a solution to address the issue of skill gap, Shine.com also offers candidates and recruiters a handy tool to plug the skill gap in the hiring space. Under the Shine Learning platform, Shine offers curated courses put together by expert global faculty and institutions, which can help candidates in upskilling and re-skilling themselves in order to improve their career prospects and ease the challenges that confronts the recruiters in finding such talent for their organisations. Through the use of data analytics, the online learning platform also periodically offers insights on what skills and emerging technologies are going to be largely in demand in the job market in the foreseeable future. This helps companies prepare their hiring strategy optimally while helping job seekers understand the skills they would like to pick up, and the future path they would like to design for their career.

Technology for effective talent management

Lastly, the challenge associated with actually attracting suitable talent and retaining it can be managed with technology. Firstly, the online upskilling programmes can be leveraged by organisations and HR teams to allow existing employees to upgrade their skills on-the-job. This is likely to lead to greater job satisfaction and fulfilment in employees. Secondly, the recruitment portals also enable clients to highlight their company as a great place to work at by offering them sophisticated branding solutions along with expertise in social media, E-Mail, and SMS marketing so that recruiters apart from being able to identify the right talent, can also ensure that they actually come onboard.

A look at the challenges and emerging trends discussed above makes it amply clear that the evolutions in the Indian HR industry are nowhere near their end. The recruitment game, in fact, has just begun to get interesting with the emergence of a vast set of new technologies and skills that companies need to proactively hire for. Recruiters who do not just look for tech skills in job candidates but are also willing to embrace technology whole-heartedly themselves are sure to enjoy a definitive edge over competitors in the market and unlock unbridled advantages for their respective organisations.

In Quotes “Recruiters who do not just look for tech skills in job candidates but are also willing to embrace technology whole-heartedly themselves are sure to enjoy a definitive edge over competitors in the market and unlock unbridled advantages for their respective organisations.”