Bringing talent back – O2’s story
Over the summer we brought HR, D&I, Talent and Resourcing practitioners from organisations including Whitbread, EY, Accenture and Cap Gemini together to explore ways to uncover and bring back ‘hidden talent’. Thank you to Avanade & Accenture for hosting us and to O2 for sharing their story.
What and why a ‘hidden talent action tank’?
O2
When Jessica Chivers wrote the book, Mothers Work! she discovered vast numbers of women were returning to jobs not commensurate with their skills and abilities (all tied up with the flexible working/presenteeism problem that pervades UK workplaces). Fast forward to 2013 we piloted a workshop for the Chartered Institute of Chartered Accountants England and Wales aimed at supporting the return to work of members on maternity leave. What actually happened was a full room of women, the majority of whom were not on maternity leave, but those hungry to get back to work after 2-10 years out. They were struggling because the gap on the CV meant they were being overlooked – hence their pouncing on a workshop about getting back to work.
Since then we’ve run swathes of free maternity comeback and career comeback workshops (which participants love and have travelled 100s of miles to attend) but they don’t address the heart of the problem – the need for Heads of Resourcing, Talent and D&I practitioners to see the problem and commit to action. There’s just too much talent going to waste and this is a problem on many levels, but commercially speaking it doesn’t make sense when there’s still a ‘war for talent.’ Hence the ‘hidden talent action tank’ to drive change through peer idea exchange, including a spotlight on returner programmes as one tool for bringing talent back.
O2’s returner programme
Andrea Jones, resourcing lead at O2, shared the telecoms giant’s experience of running a returner programme in the operations area of the business.
Many of us drew breath when she shared research stating most line managers would prefer to hire someone with less experience than a candidate who had been out of work for more than six months. “Six months!?” That’s less than most maternity leaves. The good news is the O2 scheme was hailed a rip-roaring success and The Talent Keeper Specialists expects more demand in 2016-2018 for returner programmes.
Key stats that drove O2’s decision to run a returner programme
- Managers would rather hire less qualified candidate over one who has been out for over 6 months
- Gender diverse companies are 45% more likely to improve market share, achieve 53% higher returns on equity, and 70% more likely to capture new markets
- For every 10% increase in gender diversity in the senior executive team, there is a 3.5% increase in financial performance.
- 42% of millennial dads feel ‘burnt out’ most or all of the time
- 40% of working women earn more than their partners
- 1 million now work past 65
- Only 17% of over 50s favour traditional retirement pattern as majority want to ease into retirement via part-time work
- 50-60% of women returners want to work part-time
- 34%-48% of women would like to work part-time
- 27% of the UK workforce work part time. Of those, 74% are women
- 44% of Generation Y rate work-life balance as a key driver in their career
Ten golden nuggets for improving gender balance
We grappled with five questions in the ‘action’ part of the morning. People spoke with passion, others listened intently. Ten golden nuggets emerged for improving gender balance from the talent, HR, D&I and resourcing practitioners at the Action Tank:
- 1) Confront lazy hiring – value finding the best talent over quick recruitment. This might mean looking in different places.
- 2) Look beyond a candidate’s last role – many women’s careers aren’t linear and strengths are transferrable.
- 3) Create more open job descriptions – countless capable candidates (internal and external) rule themselves out at the application stage because they don’t tick every box.
- 4) See returners as assets – they’re fresh, motivated and hungry to put their minds to work. Returner programmes tap into ‘hidden talent’ and are a good news story for your business.
- 5) Promote flexible working in job descriptions – and offer flexibility for employees already in business, not only after returning from maternity leave.
- 6) Use gender balanced panels to make hiring decisions to reduce unconscious bias and avoid line managers hiring in their own image.
- 7) Experiment with new recruiting processes, such as games, to assess people’s potential rather than relying on CVs.
- 8) Focus on opening middle managers’ minds to how flexible and part-time working can fuel productivity and performance, and be of benefit to them personally.
- 9) Showcase senior role models who work flexibly, recruit diverse teams and have high employee engagement scores – these are the people you want other managers to emulate.
- 10) Don’t overlook introverts or make assumptions – actively encourage ‘quieter’ people (who may not talk openly about career aspirations) to apply for promotions and stretch assignments.
6 pillars of success/what O2 learned:
- Target a specific area of the business where there’s a need/desire to recruit more women.
- Have clear benefits, timelines and costs for setting up – make it easy for the business to say yes
- Ask for referrals to the programme from employees and partners (this went down ‘really well’ at O2)
- Assessment centre to be a two-way process and the agenda to kept ‘light’ with lots of networking and senior leadership team to attend
- Be flexible about how the roles work
- Resourcing and the Diversity & Inclusion teams to work in partnership
A returner programme for your organisation?
If bringing talent back is on your agenda or you’re struggling to meet gender diversity targets, save yourself time, hassle and budget by meeting with us.
Contact Jessica Chivers to arrange a conversation: jc@talentkeepers.co.uk | @TalentKeepers on Twitter and Instagram and find us on LinkedIn | +44 (0)1727 856169