Imagine standing in mid-town Manhattan on a clear, blue sky day and not being able to get a cab because there aren’t enough cab drivers! That was my experience in June of 2005 as I waited over 40 minutes trying to get a cab to get to the other side of town for a dinner meeting. It became increasingly clear that not only would I already be late but if I didn’t pursue another mode of transportation I would never make it. So, I decided to take a Rickshaw ride to dinner!
Needless to say, this is something everyone should experience at least once, and maybe not more than once. It was certainly an adventure! The humorous part of this was that as I climbed aboard the Rickshaw and we were pulling away I noticed the cab in front of me was adorned with a bumper sticker that said, “drivers wanted”! Well, that certainly said a lot! Business and tourism in NYC had certainly come back since Sept. 2001 and it was clear that there were not enough drivers to meet demand - again, remember that this was a beautiful, clear day and the temperature was quite pleasant as well.
I had been traveling into Manhattan fairly regularly over the past 7 years and had never experienced anything like this. The additional irony here was that the dinner I was going to was with a major job board - who will remain nameless, and before our dinner had even arrived they dropped the bomb that there pricing would be going up considerably….apparently capitalizing on the current economic growth.
Regardless of the type of business your operating in there is a unique talent dependency required to accomplish the strategic imperatives. Keeping a pulse on market trends and business cycles is critical to building an effective human capital planning strategy. Trends cross industries and can reflect social, economic and political events to influence shifting and evolving patterns that are important to decision making over the short and long-term.
Business cycles are unique by company and/or industry and are critical to effective planning. Aligning with the strategic business directives that are influenced by these trends and mapping to the organization’s planning horizon is the starting point. From here decisions can be made around resource allocation - budget and recruiter talent as examples, talent needs and projections around the known and anticipated skills, knowledge, and experiences for both internal and external talent.
Taking planning to the next step to look at talent needs by level and geography ensures that the recruitment and talent management functions make a valued-added contribution to the competitive positioning of the company.
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