Retaining Top Talent – Career Pathways to Success

by Damien Peat, NGA Human Resources Strategic Accounts Director

When attending the Irish IBEC HR Leadership 2016 Summit at Croke Park in Dublin I had the opportunity to ask a number of the 400 or so high profile HR executives attending this event what was the single biggest issue that they are facing right now in their organisation.

The one common concern across the board is the possibility of losing top talent to competitors now that there are more jobs available.

One organisation even estimated the cost of losing a high performing graduate hired during the recession could be as much as 10 times their annual salary in terms of the monetary value they are currently bringing to the business. In addition to this, they had seen how losing top talent will negatively impact their future organisational development succession plans not to mention the role these future leaders play in the informal training of their peers and new hires.

Of course it’s incredibly difficult to calculate the real value that your top talent business network is worth to your business, hospital or Government body now and even over the next five to ten years. Let’s just agree it’s important.

So how do you predict when someone is about to leave or even starting to think about it? Nobody said it was easy but some of the leading Cloud HCM solutions do have analytics working across different modules for Recruitment, Performance & Goals, Learning and Succession planning. It is by joining up the dots across all the touch-points that your employees have with you both formal and informal that you get a real indicator of the risk of someone moving on.

Using a HR tool that has comprehensive Performance Management functionality is the key. This should include everything from the basics of setting objectives and measuring with full 360 degree feedback and competency grids, right through to Learning and Development modules which record and identify development needs. Career Development modules which enable managers and employees to record career aspirations and map out the actions that need to be taken can be very effective in employee engagement and retention. Ultimately, Succession Planning is an area which needs a lot of focus. HR software tools now have the ability to hold extensive details of an organisation’s hierarchy plus the necessary skills, qualifications and attainments pertinent to each post. This can be vital in identifying and nurturing future leaders by highlighting any skills misalignment or areas where additional training is required.

There is so much more to HR and Payroll software these days than just paying staff on time and in-line with industry standards. Having the right tools to support strategic HR initiatives is vital for sourcing and retaining top talent within an organisation.

About the author
Damien Peat is a veteran of the ICT industry with more than 30 years of experience helping leading organisations to use technology to empower their staff in delivering better customer experiences. His roles include senior management positions at Apple, Digital, Oracle and currently Strategic Accounts Director at NGA Human Resources.
Damien has served on two Irish eGovernment steering committees, one of which provided the basis for the Revenue On Line or ROS system now recognised as a leading European public sector project delivering eGovernment services to citizens.