Keeping up with the pace of technological advancement may be a challenge for companies of all shapes and sizes. While technology creates powerful business opportunities, it also creates skills gaps, particularly within the manufacturing, healthcare, and construction industries, where the demand for skilled workers is very high.

So How can employers combat this skills gap while retaining their current workforce?

Any organization’s competitive advantage is determined and measured in terms of the technology aspect not only by the existing in-house technical capabilities but also incorporates the company’s capability with respect to reskill and upskill its employees on a horizontal plane in times of need. In fact, in line with McKinsey, “to emerge stronger from the COVID-19 crisis, companies should start reskilling their workforces now.”

Benefits of Upskilling Employees

Upskilling comes with a varied range of advantages/benefits. Something positive has to get to offer to both Organisations and therefore the employees. Upskilling can become a vital part of the employee training and development process if it is a two-way beneficial aspect Upskilling, or reskilling, may be a smaller investment than hiring and training new entrants. Reskilling of the employees also tends to have created more mature and secure personnel in the company who are cross trained and more effective as resources.
It doesn’t just boost your bottom line. It also:

1)Improves retention.

Nobody wants to be in association with an Organisation that doesn’t invest enough in its employees’ career development. People tend to be with the organizations that are more active in carefully adopting the practices that ensure upskilling the people skillset to avoid the people’s obsoleteness in the changing technical environments and help them envision career advancement more clearly.

2)Boosts morale.

Employees who have training and development opportunities are happier in their roles and have a brighter outlook on their future with corporate Organisations. Training and skilling opportunities at regular intervals help the people to clearly make out the changing environments and the new requirements and are able to appreciate the upskilling efforts from an organization with the right understanding and more receptivity. Knowing they’re working toward something that may better their lives creates a deeper sense of purpose.

3)Increases customer satisfaction.

Happy employees result in happy customers. When workers are happier with their company and believe in what they’re working toward, they are providing better results. Plus, upskilling keeps your workforce up thus far on industry trends, allowing them to
supply the simplest recommendations and insights to clients and prospects. Clients are willing to pay more to figure with a more knowledgeable, proactive team. And when clients are proud of the work you are doing, they become stronger brand advocates for you.

4)Attracts new talent.

When a business is successful, chances are high that you’ll need new talent to feature to your experienced, upskilled workforce. When employees feel a way of purpose with their company and clients are pleased with their work, they become stronger brand advocates. which means they’re more likely to recommend your organization to their network of friends, past colleagues, and relations. Suddenly you have got a good pool of diverse talent to settle on from when it comes time to expand your team.

How to Upskill Your Workforce

Before creating an upskilling strategy, conduct a discovery phase to work out what skills you’ll need from your employee base down the road.

Your goal is to be proactive and stay sooner than your industry’s future demands to induce a grip on your competitors.

Make training and development opportunities readily available and affordable for everybody. after all, there could be employees—the ones with high productivity and great morale—you’ll want to concentrate on more. That’s fine. But confirm everyone has access to those opportunities. You may be surprised who takes advantage and benefits the foremost from your offerings.

Accommodate different learning styles. Some employees might do best in an exceedingly traditional classroom setting with a coach. And a very different segment may prefer walking through courses online. Others might prefer microlearning—watching 15-minute videos that cover topics in small increments. Providing something for all learning styles ensures that most amount of employees will want to participate.
Empower employees to settle on their path. When employees feel they need the liberty to settle on what areas they develop, they take more ownership over their personal and professional development.
Reward employees for their upskilling efforts. Give them an incentive for completing training and development to bolster its importance. Plus, positive recognition results in a happier, more productive workforce.

Engage Employees in Upskilling

The important thing to recollect is that each one people are motivated in several ways, by various things. Organizations that are specializing in their employee experience are seeing impressive leads in terms of retention, revenue, and profitability. So what does it seem like, and the way you’ll be able to jazz, too?.

Companies are trying to develop more customer-centric cultures for many years. Yet, even with new technology solutions that make it easier to engage with customers, many businesses find it difficult to shift to customer-centricity fully. Customer centricity is defined as putting the customer at the middle of a business’s efforts, from development to marketing and customer support. Doing so requires leadership support, empowering employees, and designing a compelling customer experience…

To successfully implement a customer-centric strategy and operating model, a company must have a culture that aligns with them — and leaders who deliberately cultivate the necessary mindset and values in their employees.

Six ways that you simply create a more customer-centric organization.

1) Promote Active Listening

One of the most effective ways for individual employees to make trust with customers is to concentrate actively to what they need to mention. Putting customer interests first requires everyone within the organization to develop more empathy. Encourage your support staff to research the people they’re trying to assist and review data which will help them understand every customer persona. Learning more about your customers will help employees handle requests more effectively and end in the next level of customer satisfaction.

2) Align Your Core Values

No matter what approach you’re taking toward customer-centricity, it’s crucial to align your corporate values with the trouble. If your values are well-chosen, they must reflect employees’ behaviors and be easy to grasp. Some companies even go as far as documenting their commitment to customer-centricity as an element of their written values. There should be a minimum of one company value that promotes customer-centric behaviour.

3) Hire and Train to The Culture

Even with the foremost customer-centric values and company culture, it’s impossible to create progress without employees that embrace your strategy. Hiring employees supported skills and skill will always be necessary, but don’t forget to contemplate attitude. Making an attempt to assess soft skills associated with your customer-centric values can make a positive difference when it involves hiring. in a different way to bolster your commitment to customer-centricity is to incorporate these themes in your employee on boarding and any ongoing training that you just offer. That way, you’ll not only hire great employees but also reinforce desired behaviours and best practices over time.

4) Prioritize Customer Satisfaction

Customer satisfaction is a wonderful benchmark for measuring your company’s ability to satisfy customer needs effectively. One bold strategy that some companies employ is to create customer satisfaction the highest priority, with a commitment to doing whatever it takes to confirm customer happiness. Doing so can have a drastic impact on your work processes and schedules, but it is also a surefire thanks to direct your effort toward customer needs. Shifting your focus and putting customer satisfaction at the forefront can demonstrate a transparent commitment that your customers will notice.

5) Collect Customer Feedback

Without a continual flow of customer feedback, it are often impossible to grasp if changes have the specified impact. As you develop plans to be more customer-centric, don’t forget to style surveys that provide valuable insights into customer satisfaction and other essential metrics. Using well-structured surveys that ask the correct questions can provide you with a wonderful baseline. Follow-up surveys at key touch points throughout the customer journey allow you to trace your progress over time.

6) Use Technology to connect with Customers

With numerous excellent tools available today, it’s easier than ever to attach together with your customers. Customer support teams can now offer Omni channel support to customers round the clock. One excellent tool that directly supports a customer-centric strategy is that the customer portal. Customer portals give your team the flexibility to share helpful information together with your customers directly while also giving them a bird’s-eye view of their support ticket history and providing easy accessibility to self-service options like knowledge bases. Empowering customers could be a useful thanks to build more trust and make a more collaborative environment for your employees and customers.

Developing a customer-centric culture requires the involvement of the complete company and a willingness to create bold decisions. These two factors alone often prevent many businesses from achieving their goals. Any number of strategies may be wont to develop a more customer-centric culture, and it’s essential to line the proper goals for your team. Committing to a long-term goal of becoming genuinely customer-centric can have an enduring impact on your company’s customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction, and overall performance.

For a business to be successful the foremost requirement is collaborative teamwork. The ability to hire the right people and build a successful and powerful team determines the long-term success of any organization. Good organizations need a high-performing team that can communicate clearly to achieve business objectives. Cultivating a team for a highly productive setup needs encouragement and active contribution from a true leader and mere team management activities will not help.

Importance of a successful team

For a successful team is crucial to require a plan from inception to completion. A dynamic team will be an asset for the organization which may help in accomplishing tasks and achieving business objectives. A robust team is one during which employees can work closely with one another and may help each other to assemble complementary skills which is crucial to complete employees’ work

Characteristics of a successful team

● They have clear goals and plans.
● They have strong leadership.
● By helping each other members can fulfill their tasks on time.
● Members communicate openly with the team.
● Members resolve conflict constructively.
● Members feel they directly contribute to the company’s success.

How to build a team

1) Set SMART goals

By choosing SMART goals your team can fulfill their objectives that are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-based.

Once these objectives are implemented, organizations want to trace the progress regularly. Every team member shares their team-specific metrics and then the team can measure and monitor the progress and celebrate the accomplishments. Having one metric to measure the progress instead of applying multiple definitions of success helps the team members to more accurately understand their progress and helps in achieving the goals.

2) Perform well-defined roles

Having well-defined roles for every individual member of the team helps in setting the expectations right and typically results in the team engaging at their best. Typically, the teams work best when each member is liable for contributing something specific. Creating well-defined roles for all the team members helps them in focusing on accomplishing their individual tasks and following specific workflows rather than wasting their energy identifying their responsibilities and place within the team.

3) Experiment regularly

Although teams are often best after they have well-defined roles, Organizations consider experimenting with new ideas likewise. Calculated risk-taking allows for ample opportunities for learning and successful teams tend to accommodate this strategy especially if these experiments have the potential to come up with far better outcomes.

You may try and make time for brainstorming before starting a project to initiate experimentation into your standard workflows. During this thoughtful exercise, team members can contribute ideas for conducting research, structuring a project, or collecting and analyzing results.

4) Embrace diversity

When building successful teams, it’s important that the team members are as diverse as possible and are available from different backgrounds, and have diverse opinions and knowledge levels. the foremost effective and successful teams embrace different skill sets and professional backgrounds which help in encouraging alternative ways of thinking and better decision-making. By inviting members with diverse views to your team, your team may approach problems in numerous and innovative ways and hit the most effective solution possible

5) Share a common culture

Despite coming from diverse backgrounds and opinions, the foremost successful teams often share a typical company or group culture. Your team might create and agree on these shared behaviours unconsciously, as they’re likely to reflect preferred working or communication styles. However, your team is probably going to be more productive when it’s guidelines to follow. because the leader, you’ll want to line expectations right and make the sort of team environment you’re willing to ascertain in your team or company clear to all or any of the team members.

6) Be accountable to the team

Accountability is one of the key things that every team member should maintain to make a powerful and successful team. Holding each team member in control of their assigned tasks helps in bringing the simplest out of them and allows them to attain their full potential by doing their best work. you’ll want to steer by example and establish this kind of accountability by setting an honest example together with your own work, encouraging your team members to debate ways to enhance, and ensuring to implement the feedback. Encouraging group accountability may help your team members find a way of belonging and purpose and help them in specializing in the goals to realize the required objectives.

7) Communicate effectively

Effective communication is one of the key things that differentiate successful teams from average teams. Clear lines of communication are necessary to figure together seamlessly and to streamline communication, you will want to clarify each member’s roles and responsibilities in a clear way. this can help the team understand who is answerable for what and what to try and do when a difficulty arises, or controversy must be solved.

8) Welcome strong leadership

Strong leadership is important to make sure that the teams reach their goals, work together effectively and perform at their best. Organizations can demonstrate effective leadership by being committed, accountable and chargeable for the team’s work. As a robust leader, try and cultivate adaptability, welcome feedback, and motivate team members to try to do their best work.

Select a leadership style that most closely fits the kind of team you’re managing to get the way to best facilitate communication, mediate discussion and conflicts and ensure continuous progress.

In today’s scenario Organizations are in an exceedingly constant state of change now quite ever, externally and internally. The causal factors for these changes include growth or the lack of it, economic cycles, emerging technologies, etc. One has to work out a way to best lead these Cultural gaps, generational workforce, and communication challenges.

Being a frontrunner one needs to drive the mandatory change and preach to employees its importance. Obtaining buy-in and protecting the corporate culture is critical and this will only be finished clear and consistent communication and follow-through.
Here are eight vital steps for helping the workers to just accept and even help push for change within a corporation.

1) State the Change

Change can be major or minor but the leaders must be able to make understand what the change is all about, why it’s important and what the positive outcomes of the change will be. The senior leaders must get all the managers on the same understanding before communicating the message to the rest of the employees in the company. That way, the other team leaders in the company are well prepared to face all the answers/questions/queries and concerns as needed.

2) Listen to Feedback

The team’s voice must be heard. Many folks within the Organisation are presumably begging for change and know what’s needed. Companies should get their feedback which will assist in smooth transitions and gaining their buy-in.
There are varying styles of change that occur in organizations. The primary type needs no explanation and everybody understands the requirement and why it’s happening. The subsequent type is comparable in this the team generally understands the requirement, but the “why” requires more explanation. Other varieties of change are either misinterpreted or have an adverse effect. Gaining feedback throughout the change process will hold everyone accountable and help maintain calibration.

3) Acknowledge the Feedback

Acknowledging and collecting feedback from the team is that the most significant for motivating the staff to embrace a change. It’s recommended to get team feedback during the start, middle, and end of the change process. For a smooth learning process, the after-action review is incredibly important. Don’t leave that part out!
Also, the acknowledgment doesn’t must be a proper process. Getting feedback during casual conversation is ok. But it’s suggested to possess an anonymous survey at some point during times of change. Employees will feel better-off being transparent. This last step is that the most significant. The leadership team always reflect on the feedback and what they’re hearing from the feedback, accordingly some quite action must be taken.

4) Use Emotional Intelligence

Leaders must lead by example in this regard. It is important to show empathy to the team as changes are very scary for the team. Leaders should show discipline, communicate clearly and be transparent with the team.
Leaders that practice improving their emotional intelligence are better equipped to drive positive change and guide the team through the inevitable obstacles.Emotional intelligence is not a soft-side leadership strategy as it may sometimes be perceived.

5) Explain the Why

Organisational change must be known to everyone. Organizations should strive for better project management solutions and better data as to where people were spending their time. This would lead to improved efficiencies and financial decisions. It is very apparent that employees needed to be doing a better job explaining the “why.” Once the team understands the reasoning behind the change and the goal of introducing it the employee buy-in increases dramatically.

6) Define Clear Roles

Defining the roles and decision-makers is extremely important. Everyone with a job in driving change must understand who is accountable, responsible, and informed. All the team members must own certain aspects of the processes to embrace change.
Once roles are assigned, ensure that milestones are set, regular check-ins scheduled and a rhythm of communication established.

7) Provide Training

Most of the time, training are required. Whether it’s a replacement system, process, software, or customer service, the team has to be well-trained for the changes to not only stick but to be effective.

And yes, time and budget should be carved out. this is often where companies fail most of the time. Leaders should provide proper time and resources during the rollout period.

8) Reward Acceptance

Some team members will take well to vary and proactively aid in its acceptance while others are slow to adopt. Organizations can have a thought in situ to publicly reward people who make the time and energy to embrace change. Especially people who have it off with an honest attitude and find other team members on board.

Change is inevitable but Organizations can control how employees will react to the changes if proper change management steps are adhered to religiously. And as a great motivator, it’s much less painful doing it right the first time.
“Help your employees embrace the changes you want and need by capturing their heads AND their hearts”.

Most companies have their own unique set of requirements for conducting background checks but the primary goal is to have the most accurate overview of a candidate before the new hire sign the contract and join the Organization. A thorough background check is an assurance that Organization has made the right decision. Every time a business hires a new employee, it is an investment in time, resources, and money. Hence, making a right decision is very important.

The most basic pre-employment screening includes reference checks, past employment and education verification, address verification and criminal history checks. Each of them has its own set of compliance procedures that must be adhered to. This article aims to provide an insightful overview of the importance of background checks for employment and how it can benefit a business’ long-term growth plans.

Why background check is important for Organization

Generally, an employer that fails to investigate the background of an applicant whom they hire for a risk-sensitive position may be liable for negligent hiring or retention if the employee is later found involved in serious misconduct or illegal activities. Consequently, the time and money one might “save” by not doing background checks are only a drop in the bucket compared to what one might be required to spend to defend yourself against a negligent hiring lawsuit.

Background checks also help confirm dates of attendance and degrees or certifications earned and can provide specific information about prior employment.

There are Six main reasons to run Background Checks on all job applicants:

● To provide a safe workplace for employees and customers.
● To hire the qualified people who will help to grow your business.
● To minimize exposure from employee liability by practicing “due diligence” in the hiring process.
● To encourage honesty in the application and interview process.
● To discourage applicants with something to hide, to enter the organizational hire process.
● To eliminate uncertainty of the unknown factors in the hiring process.

Types of Basic Background Checks Organizations follow:

● Identity Verification
● Address Verification
● Academic Background check
● Employment background verification
● Criminal Record Check

1) Identity Verification

Identification is the action or process of identifying someone or something or the fact of being identified. To process any critical information about any individual, their official account or proof of identification is a must. Establishing integrity within the organization has become a key factor for growth and is taken care of by most of the leading corporates as of now. To confirm one’s credibility on the basis of their identification proof, this process is very important. The details of the candidate are documented and sent to an employee background verification service, a series of automatic processes take place thereafter:

Classifying: The document type may be recognized automatically. If not, the type must be indicated to the service before verification can start.

Extracting: Information on the document and its bearer is extracted from the source.

Verifying: Detailed checks are performed on the document’s security elements.

Responding: A detailed analytical report is a yield to the client of the verification done.

2) Address Verification

Address verification is an important subset of employee background verification. For any organization, the correct residence of its employees is fundamental, to contact the employees in cases of any emergencies. As part of address verification, background check agencies shall verify the address and can also gather additional details about the candidate or the verifier on the location, in case of need. During the address visit, team should visit the rental or permanent house, verifies the location, GPS Coordinates are collected and the signature of the verifier is captured, if required, and shared with the employer. During the visit, the following credentials are verified:

House Street
Lane Pin code
City / Town State

3) Academic Background check

How reliable is the candidate in terms of work he/she will confer depends on the skills and knowledge that the individual has? Forging qualification and educational history are some attempts candidates are prompt to fabricate so that they get through the vacancy. Hiring the best resource is crucial for any organization. And with the best resource, we mean the one who meets the criteria thoroughly. Educational qualification is one of the most essential criteria for any candidate to be eligible for a position in a company. To meet the criteria and be recruited, candidates may tend to forge the documents of their qualifications.

Academic record check consists of verification of the dates of attendance and whether the degree was obtained by the particular candidate. Most of the degrees are verified by the admissions and records office of the school or institution. The verification process validates.

> Name of college & university
> Year of Enrollment& Passing
> Registration number / Roll number
> Issuing date of certificates
> Recognized under which authorized board/university
> Subjects/Course Pursued
> Marks/Percentage Obtained

4) Employment background verification

The potential of a candidate might be insufficient to compromise the risk factors the hire would bring into the work environment. The hire an employer hires must be enduring a genuine uphold about the past work experience. Failing in which would drain off the effort and cost invested in recruits.

The following types of employment background verifications:

Current Employment Check – It is a case in which the present experience of a candidate where he/she is employed at present is verified. Verified information is mostly obtained either from the human resource department or immediate supervisor.

Previous Employment – It is a case in which the previous employment of a candidate is verified. Verification depends on the need of the employer if the background verification is to be done for all the experience since the start or selective ones.

5) Criminal Record Check

Criminal Record Check is a fundamental process for analyzing a person’s loyalty. Herein, a candidate’s criminal reports are collected at various levels such as a city, state, and country with other minor details like home address, property details, and neighbourhood report. Any information proving a candidate responsible for fraud or any traces of anti-national activities such as terrorism makes the candidate a threat to the organization and also helps an employer to make the righteous decision of not getting in such candidates into the organization.

Criminal record check enlists a person’s trustworthiness, safe environments for an organization, confirms the candidate’s credibility, and decreases the vulnerability of an organization against any kind of threat. Criminal record check suffices the legal requisite to safeguard undue risk to any venture or enterprise.

A criminal background check is mandatory which enables
> Identification of potentially risky hires
> Safeguarding your organization’s reputation
> Protection of organizational assets
> Fostering trust among current employees

Maintaining a compliant background screening policy for your company will allow you to evaluate and hire fairly and consistently. As laws surrounding employee privacy and protection continue to evolve and change, so must your screening policy. Working with a third-party workforce solutions provider like Air swift will allow businesses to benefit from our expertise when setting up a comprehensive screening program and also speed up their hiring time.

Performance reviews being a key element of performance management, help HR teams gain
holistic insights into employee performance. Companies that implement comprehensive
employee evaluations can learn valuable information about members of their workforce, such as
who exhibits leadership potential, who is great at defining scalable processes, or who has
exceptional industry knowledge that can help drive business. Apart from highlighting top
performers, performance reviews also help managers and HR teams identify struggling
employees who need support or performance improvement plans.
A successful review cycle can provide HR teams with visibility to discover workforce skill gaps,
missing resources, and outdated or misaligned goals when done correctly. But getting
performance reviews right takes careful planning and coordination across an organization.
Here’s what one needs to know before building out the performance review process.

Performance reviews are the perfect opportunity to provide constructive feedback to your
employees, understand their personal goals, and make a plan to attain them together. In fact,
giving and receiving feedback is a pillar of any performance review. It’s also a chance for
managers to become better leaders by gaining valuable takeaways from their team.

Questions about employee performance review on the
following categories below:

Here are some performance review questions for managers to use to start a conversation about
your direct report’s overall performance:
● Overall performance and accomplishments
● Employee strengths
● Improvement Opportunities
● Current role
● Future outlook
● Manager-employee relationship
● Company culture

Employee strengths

It’s important that you focus on your team members' strengths and acknowledge what they’re
doing well in their current roles. In asking employees about their perceived strengths, you’re
also going to gain additional perspective, because the qualities they share with you may be
different than the ones you notice. In many cases, there are skills that managers are unaware of
because the employee hasn’t had the opportunity to showcase them yet.

● What skills do you have that you believe we could use more effectively?
● What personal strengths help you do your job effectively?
● What makes you the best fit for your position?
● What kind of work comes easiest to you?

Opportunities of improvement

Next, you want to focus on areas of improvement. This part of the performance review process
isn’t negative by any means – in fact, it’s going to teach you what your employee wants to work
on and how you can help them get there.
● What goals/deliverables were you least proud of? Why?
● How will you do those differences in the future?
● What 2-3 things will you focus on in the next quarter to help you grow and develop?
● What can I do to help you better meet your goals?
● Where do you feel there’s room for you to improve?

Current role

When you discuss your team members’ current roles, you gain an understanding of what they’re
enjoying about their job and which responsibilities they might not be loving as much. This gives
you the opportunity to reorganize their daily tasks where you can, to accommodate them and
therefore also keep them motivated.

● Which job responsibilities/tasks do you enjoy most?
● Which job responsibilities do you least enjoy?
● How do you think your role helps the company succeed?
● What do you like least about your current role?
● What would you change about your current role?
● What do you like most about working for this company?

Future outlook

When you ask about employee aspirations and goals, you begin to understand what really
motivates them. Think about what kinds of tools and resources you can offer to support
professional development and see what you can do to help them achieve their goals for the next
quarter.

Here are some questions you can ask to start a conversation about the future:
● What are your most important goals for the next quarter?
● What do you want your next position at this company to be?
● How would your responsibilities change?
● What professional growth opportunities would you like to explore in order to get there?
● What type of career growth is most important to you?
● What position at the company do you want to move to next?

Manager-employee relationship

A performance evaluation serves as a great chance to build relationships with team members.
Everyone likes to be managed in different ways, so it is really important that you discuss what
kind of management style works best for your employees.
● What (if any) concerns do you have when it comes to giving me feedback?
● How can I alleviate those concerns?
● How do you prefer to receive feedback and/or recognition for your work?
● What are two to three things could I do differently to better manage you?
● What do I do that is most/least helpful for you when it comes to completing your work?
● What can we do to improve our relationship?
● Do you feel that the team is working well collaboratively?
● Where has management helped and hindered your work?

Company culture

Company culture is a huge part of employee engagement and satisfaction. It’s important that
when you check in with your team members you get a sense if individuals feel as if they are
really a part of the larger collective.

● What are the main drivers of success in the company?
● Are you comfortable with our corporate culture, and are there areas that need
improvement?
● What’s your favourite part about working in this company?
● How can we make our company more inclusive and diverse?
● When have you felt the proudest about being part of this company?
Performance reviews help managers gain valuable insights from their teams. If you want to use
this opportunity to understand your team’s goals and help them reach their optimal
performance, make sure to ask about the following 7 topics:

1. Overall performance and accomplishments
2. Employee strengths
3. Areas of improvement
4. Current role
5. Future outlook
6. Manager-employee relationship
7. Company culture

The pandemic era of our lives has brought in the never before witnessed trends of “The Great Resignation” and “Top Talent Crunch” in the workforce industry manifesting in ways never envisioned previously, posing a bigger challenge to businesses of surviving the talent pool droughts across the domains and geographies. This inorganic workforce shortfall due to changed nature of opportunities and more importantly, the changed life priorities post covid has made talent hiring a difficult challenge to navigate in the current circumstances, where finding and assessing the right candidates is extremely difficult, especially because of the need to scan a much larger candidate pool size. The task has become more challenging over the past year because job applicants are outnumbering job vacancies and simply put, the ratio of applicants applying for available jobs has, on average, more than doubled during the past year.

Employers are at risk of losing out on top talent, hiring unqualified candidates, and struggle with other screening inconsistencies and recruiters are under immense pressure to manage applicants and find qualified talent while mainatianing a strong hiring pipeline. Fortunately, technologies like automation, machine learning, and AI have simplified modern hiring and turned out to be more than able assistance to navigate these modern day “talent pool” challenges.

Top Benefits of using Recruiting Software

Recruitment software can offer several benefits to recruitment teams when selecting candidates. With tools that are powered by AI and machine learning, recruiters can eliminate inefficiencies, mitigate bias, and connect with top-level talent in the industry.

Let’s look at the top benefits of investing in recruiting technology.

Increase Productivity

Candidate screening software can empower recruiting teams to work more efficiently, make critical decisions quickly, and avoid manual tasks. For instance, automating the manual candidate screening process can free up more time for other priority tasks, especially with volume hiring.
Similarly, automated interview scheduling can decimate the time consumed in setting up meetings with potential candidates.

Enhance the Quality of Hire

Screening software, candidate selection allows recruiters to assess a candidate’s cognitive ability, growth mindset, and problem-solving ability, among others. This fast-forwards the right-fit candidates through the recruitment process. Data-driven recruitment solution that allows recruiters to identify candidates from talent pools that are most likely to be high-performing.
Thus, companies having to review hundreds of candidates each month can hugely benefit from automation and improve the quality of their hires.

Aid Diversity Initiatives

Most talent acquisition leaders find it challenging to connect with and hire diverse talent. By leveraging software tools and supporting technologies, companies can get rid of this bias and optimize their candidate qualification process.
Today, only 20% of firms are leveraging automation to support their diversity initiatives. As businesses increasingly invest in recruiting automation, companies can be assured of a fair hiring process.

Boosts Candidate Experience

Above all, benefits lead to enhancing candidate experience. A great candidate’s experience hugely determines their willingness to join the firm. Automation allows recruiters to build strong relationships with candidates and ensures quick response times.

Ways Recruiters Can Employ Automation in the Hiring Process

1) Preparing
At this stage, it’s about gathering information from the hiring manager. As soon as the job requisition has been approved internally, the recruiter will contact the hiring manager to make an appointment for the vacancy intake.
During the intake, the recruiter and hiring manager will discuss the specific requirements for the new position. It includes the required skills, role in the team, personality, and capabilities of a suitable candidate.
The recruiter will use the information gathered during the vacancy intake to write a clear, inclusive, job description (to use internally).
Based on the job description, they will then write the job posting. The job posting, or job advert, is the external text that candidates will see.

2) Sourcing
Once the foundation for the candidate search has been laid, it’s time to source. This is where it’s easier if the full cycle recruiter is, for example, only focusing on highly specialized roles.
Focusing on specialized roles also makes it easier to build and maintain a talent pool– a database that holds all the profiles of people with interest in your organization.
A talent pool can be a great sourcing channel, too, providing a safety net when faced with a sudden departure, and giving you access to passive candidates who can be hard to connect with.
During the sourcing phase, the recruiter will be in touch with the hiring manager regularly to give them an update on how things are going.

3) Screening
The initial screening of candidates can take place in several ways.
● Resume screening. This is the most common technique. It helps the recruiter assess if candidates comply with (some of) the criteria in the job description.
● Phone screening/chatbot. After the resume screening, a phone screening often takes place. This helps to align expectations between the candidate and the employer.
● Pre-selection. It is a powerful screening method that helps to avoid potential mismatches. Pre-selection tools provide assessments that can include cognitive testing, a job sample, personality testing, and other tests that help to predict the quality of the new hire.

4) Selecting

This step of the selection process is about sending out assignments, arranging interviews, taking part in the interview process, and providing feedback to candidates. It’s also about maintaining a good relationship with the hiring manager and keeping him or her actively involved.

5) Hiring

Once the recruiter and hiring manager have reduced their shortlist to between one and three candidates, it’s time to do a reference check and, in some cases, also a background check.
Reference checks are a way to confirm your perception of the candidate and gather additional information from multiple perspectives. This comes especially useful if you had a doubt about a certain competency or skill during the interview.

6) Onboarding

Once the candidate has signed the contract, the full cycle of recruiting isn’t over yet. This is where the pre-boarding period starts. It refers to the time between the candidate signing the contract and them starting their new job.
It’s crucial to keep in touch with new hires during this period to keep them engaged and excited about getting started. Not doing so can cause them to join another company before they even begin.

Full cycle recruiting can help build better relationships with the hiring managers and the candidates. It can also provide a good experience for everyone involved in the hiring process. Before implementing this type of recruiting, though, carefully consider your organization’s needs as it’s not suitable for every type of organization.

The HR sector is witnessing a paradigm shift in the use of technology in its processes, with big data
mining, artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, and machine learning to lead the way forward. Like most
industries, HR is heading towards a technology-powered future and intuitive tech is already powering
many of its systems. The HR technology market is clearly on the rise as it continues to expand its
capabilities, with chatbot solutions, machine learning, and artificial intelligence gaining prominence.
Automated processes are also refining operations and workplace experiences.

HR is focused on offering highly personalized employee experiences founded on technology with a
strategic approach to recruitment, employee satisfaction, and workplace wellbeing. It all begins with a
reliable HR and payroll software that influences the key HR processes. Before we look at the seven key
human resource processes that must be automated in any modern HR Organization, let’s quickly define
HR automation.

HR automation enhances your HR department’s efficiency by automating standard and repetitive tasks
using tools. Automation helps free up your HR personnel from tedious manual tasks and allows them to
focus on more complex functions like decision making and strategizing.

Automating HR activities will help your organization streamline core HR processes. As a result, you
reduce the cost and time you’ll spend on manual HR planning and processing. Besides, in the age of
remote work we’re living in, you have no choice but to automate your HR processes.

1) Recruitment
Automation serves an increasingly active role in managing time-consuming tasks such as screening
resumes and advanced software helps to shortlist candidates. Technological support reduces errors in
the recruitment process and creates greater room to focus on other finer aspects of hiring.

2) Onboarding
Onboarding, which usually involves considerable paperwork and time, is now almost wholly an online
process. ‌HR software provides online documentation and orientation to ensure due diligence with a
quick handover of information and equipment necessary to begin work for new employees.

3) Time Tracking
Employee schedules and work hours are now monitored digitally, with automated data collection and
validation that is managed in a much shorter time with new interventions. A Payroll software system
reviews timesheets’ important aspects, like overtime or absences, and streamlines approvals for payroll
deployment.

4) Performance Management
Maintaining employee performance records through regular manual evaluation of key performance
indicators (KPIs) are now features of the past. Instead, HR automation and online monitoring systems
assist in tracking performance with automated procedures in place to help actively boost productivity.

5) Leave Management
Time-consuming procedures in calculating and approving absences are now replaced by automated
approval systems. HR automation of leave management provides faster approvals and also updates
leave records instantly. The entire process is easier to monitor, handle, and accept with the right
software.

6) Offboarding
HR automation standardizes the entire offboarding process as well. A series of procedures that require
managerial checks at each stage is now simplified. The software-guided process also makes offboarding
much easier with speedy completion of each step and quick resolution of any disputes.

7) HR Analytics
Maintaining employee data and creating insights from such information can be a big challenge for large
companies. Automation comes to the rescue here by automatically organizing the information to
provide the HR department with powerful insights. The technologically guided system ensures faster
processing and reduces the chance of data loss or manual data entry errors.

To Sum up, to be abreast with the pace of change of other departments and overall industry in terms of
technology adoption, in HR domain technology has clearly become an integral part of the HR processes
in an organization located anywhere across the world. HR automation is already creating a workspace
where humans and digital tools seamlessly work together for the progress and performance of an
organization. At Emirates HR, our team focuses on providing the best-fit medium that will not only
elevate employee experience but also that of the management from the inside-out.

Since the time unknown, human civilization at its core has ingrained and strengthened the instinct of close collaboration with fellow tribe members, aka the team, for completing tasks of great importance while furthering the process of human development. Whether it is hunting and bringing down a giant mammoth in prehistoric times or building a rocket to take human species to another planet to settle down there, the core principles to achieve any great goal is one, the “Team Work” .

It is well recognized that teamwork is an essential ingredient for the success and effectiveness of any team. Hence, all businesses educate and continue to focus on training individuals to be team players. Instead, it should focus on the far more effective approach of helping actual teams become better together.

The myth of the single leader is just that, a myth. The idea of James Bond falling from the sky to single-handedly save the world captures our imaginations, but the most urgent and daring missions. are executed by teams of elite soldiers who have been handpicked and relentlessly trained to operate as a cohesive unit.

Effective teamwork is a vital ingredient for success, but there is a sizable gap between working in a team and a team that works well. What distinguishes high-performance teams from other groups is that a team is more than a collection of people simply following orders. To function effectively, a high-performance team also needs:

● An obvious purpose, aim and commitment to the team’s members.
● Ambitious performance goals than average teams.
● Mutual accountability and a clear understanding of members’ responsibilities to the team and individual obligations.
● A diverse range of expertise that complements other team members’ abilities.
● Interdependence and trust between members.

Key reasons teams work

● A group of individuals brings complementary skills and experience that exceed the abilities of a single individual.
● Teams support real-time problem-solving and are more flexible and responsive to changing demands.
● Teams provide a unique social dimension that enhances the economic and administrative aspects of work.
● High-performance teams have more fun at work than low-achieving teams or individuals.

Stages of Team Development

Learning to work together effectively is team development. Research has shown that teams go through definitive stages during the development phase. Dr. Bruce Tuckman, an educational psychologist, identified a five-stage development process that most teams follow to become high performing. He called the stages forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning.

Forming stage
The team meets and learns about the opportunities and challenges, and then agrees on goals and tackles the tasks. Team members behave independently. They may be motivated, but are usually relatively uninformed about the issues and objectives of the team. Team members are usually on their best behavior but very focused on themselves. Members attempt to become oriented toward the tasks as well as toward one another. Discussion centers on defining the task, how to approach it, and similar concerns. To grow from this stage to the next, each member must relinquish the comfort of non-threatening topics and risk the possibility of conflict.

Storming stage
This is the second stage of team development, where the group starts to sort itself out and gain each other’s trust. Members communicate their feelings but still view themselves as individuals rather than as part of the team. They resist control by group leaders and show hostility. The ideal is that they will not feel that they are being judged, and will therefore share their opinions and views. Normally, tension, struggle, and sometimes arguments occur. This stage can also be upsetting.

Norming stage
Resolved disagreements and personality clashes result in greater intimacy, and a spirit of cooperation emerges. This happens when the team is aware of competition and they share a common goal. At this stage, all team members take responsibility and have the ambition to work towards the success of the team’s goals. They tolerate the whims and fancies of other team members. They accept others as they are and make an effort to move on. The danger here is that members may be so focused on preventing conflict that they are reluctant to share controversial ideas.

Performing stage
In the performing stage, consensus and cooperation have been well-established, and the team is mature, organized, and well-functioning. There is a clear and stable structure, and members are committed to the team’s mission. Problems and conflicts still emerge, but they are dealt with constructively. The team is focused on problem solving and meeting team goals.

Adjourning Stage
In the adjourning stage, most of the team’s goals have been accomplished. The emphasis is on wrapping up final tasks and documenting the effort and results. As the workload is diminished, individual members may be reassigned. They may reassign individual members to other teams, and the team disbands with usually a ceremonial acknowledgement of the work and success of the team. If the team is a standing committee with ongoing responsibility, members may be replaced by new people and the team can go back to a forming or storming stage and repeat the development process.

Teams can improve their collaboration and cohesion, but they only do so through the team developing together. Organizations need to shift from its focus on individual leaders to enabling intact teams to define their own terms of performance and allow them to practice and share meaningful experiences together.

Alongside unique abilities to assist in the delivery of projects, every new person in the organization brings in a unique set of needs and expectations as well. To set in motion this behemoth system, informally termed as a “company”, towards success, all resources need to pull in unison in the same direction. Given the complexities of human nature and the circumstantial situations that may add to the complexity of the task to align everyone for a common greater good, makes any company’s most valuable resource, viz “The Workforce”, one of the most dynamic resources to manage. This most critical task of the understanding the needs and expectations of the people and devising processes to codify the rules and regulations in order to maintain the uniformity and transparency amongst the rank and files of the team is borne by the “Facilitators and Enablers of organization”, more generally and fondly known in any organization as the “HR team”.

Role of Human Resource Department

● The presence of the HR department is an essential component of any business, regardless of the organization’s size.
● The HR department is tasked with maximizing employee productivity and protecting the company from issues that may arise within the workforce.
● HR responsibilities include strategic and operational interventions in the areas of recruitment, employee life cycle management, compensation, performance management, training and development, compliance and the overall well-being of all employees.

HR managers that adopt “Human Resource Management” (HRM) Strategies typically play a more active role in improving an organization’s workforce. They develop strategies pertaining to processes, approaches, and business solutions to management. Many big players have adopted an active approach to employee relations through their HR department.

Why is the HR department more important than ever before?

HR managers have become strategic partners in building an organization’s workforce strategies and lowering employee attrition rates. HR managers have a very strong voice in any company’s decision – making. Hence, the HR department has become a strong pillar of employee interest. While the HR office chiefly manages functions such as recruiting and payroll, it’s also responsible for creating a positive work environment and helping employees when needed.

Ways in which the HR department scale-up workforce.
1. A positive work environment for employees
2. Induction sessions for employees to learn about the organization and their team
3. Organize learning and development training programs
4. Handles requests outside managers’ capacity
5. Personal emergencies help during personal emergencies

A positive work environment for employees

The prime feature of the HR department is to provide a cohesive work environment for employees to optimize their work productivity. The positive work environment gives confidence to employees to speak up about the issues which are upsetting them. Listed below are the three primary ways through which the HR department creates a positive workplace culture.

● Maintains organization-wide diversity
● Protects whistleblowers
● Conducts employee surveys

Induction sessions for employees to learn about the organization and their team

The HR department should welcome new employees with a well-designed orientation. This will inform new hires about the organization’s values and work culture. It also assists with onboarding activities, such as documentation, workstation setup, and team introductions.

Organizes learning and development training programs

Based on business requirements, employees may be asked to upskill or reskill so that they can fulfill their roles more efficiently. The HR department organizes learning and development programs to help employees gain new skills and hone existing ones. These programs—which could be mandatory or optional—not only equip employees with the knowledge required, but they need to upgrade their knowledge from time to time.

Handles requests outside managers’ capacity

There are many activities in which managers can’t directly assist their team members, and such requests have to be routed through the HR department. For example, if an employee needs to apply for a loan for his personal requirements, he will have to directly contact the HR department. The HR department addresses such concerns and suggests a course of action.

Medical reimbursements, internal job postings, benefits enrollment, and performance rating review are some similar requests that the HR team helps employees with.

Personal emergencies help during personal emergencies

Employees have to deal with personal emergencies. They could face a medical or family urgency that requires an immediate or planned leave of absence, which might even have to be extended.

During personal emergencies, the HR office is the right contact point and is trained to respond to such employee requests. It holds discussions with employees’ reporting managers to seek approval. Based on the severity of the situation, it even designs flexible return-to-work plans.

So, summing up, the HR department requires firm commitment and dedication. Organizations have understood how crucial HRs are in the industry and how they make employees’ lives easier. The role of HR not only helps an organization in elevating the presence in the market but also improves the bottom line of the organization positively.