As the Managing Director of one of the leading HR services companies in India, I am privileged to experience a vantage point that allows me to analyze how companies are embracing the various challenges in talent development. Interestingly, many companies address this by investing massively in expanding skills and competencies in India. This is inevitable given the speed at which our country is now developing and the emergence of a challenging global competition. India has a young population that is growing at a very high pace and is at the forefront of IT talent.
Global talent landscape is changing rapidly and the HR services sector is transforming to be able to create total talent management solutions to support the future of work.
But why is the landscape changing so much and how can we navigate such a market in a way to be ready and continuously prepared. We are living the age of what I call “continuous transformation”. Some years back, the concept of change was a concept of moving from equilibrium to another and there was time to enjoy a settling down period where preferences, feedback, transparency and price discovery were slow processes.
Nowadays there is no concept of settling down, or equilibrium. We are living in a world where feedback is instantaneous, preferences change by the day with the infinite possibilities to shop, decide, and change our minds. This landscape shapes the talent requirements and hence, competencies and skills. Talent management has become even more critical for responding to customers in real-time. Multiple new jobs have emerged and incumbent functions are threatened by obsolescence. IT, for example, is not a process or infrastructure game anymore. The potential career-making talent in IT is required to master analytics, customer experience, and usability along with artificial intelligence and machine learning
In this new landscape, companies must focus on three basic goals in order to survive:
- Continuously reskill and up-skill its workforce. It is not only the soft skills anymore but training must be thought of in terms of upskilling in skills like coding, analytics, experience design, digital marketing.
- Have the speed and agility when it comes to analyzing feedback from consumers, launching a new product to market or reengineering the old one.
- Make your client your consultant. Discussing, adapting, and prototyping have become a collaborative effort with clients. In order to acquire all the competencies required, reach objectives at the desired pace, and define continuous feedback systems, suppliers and clients must work together.
- The last part of the equation is the ability of education to form talent that has the required “new” skills and competencies. Education must encourage, develop, and strengthen the basic requirements and skills needed in this world. Critical thinking, cultivating passions, problem-solving, and exposure to multiple subjects are becoming increasingly important. The Adecco Group India believes in continuous training and upskilling of its workforce and in providing re/up-skilling services to its clients. We are experiencing a surge in requirements for training of client’s workforce as an indication that the skill gap in the economies and the rapidly requirements changes are impacting the private sector.
India Inc has understood what is important and is progressing at an increasing speed. We should all enjoy the ride of the perpetual rollercoaster, as it will not stop!