We show why potential-oriented recruiting with a focus on career changers could be a solution to the skilled labor problem in Germany.
For years, people have complained about the lack of skilled workers in Germany, especially in the IT and care sectors. But what is the problem? Is there really a lack of suitable candidates?
We show how outdated recruiting mindsets waste opportunities and why potential-oriented recruitment with a focus on career changers could be a solution to the skilled labor problem.
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During the Corona pandemic, many CEOs' concerns about having sufficiently qualified employees have increased. According to KPMG's CEO Outlook 2020 survey, 21 percent of 315 CEOs surveyed in Germany see the shortage of skilled workers as the greatest business risk, even ahead of climate and supply chain risks.
Angelika Huber-Straßer, Head of Corporates at KPMG Germany, explains the concern as follows: "The redesign of the working world with a wide variety of models of collaboration is becoming increasingly important. In this respect, it is understandable that CEOs are giving top priority to personnel issues in order to be able to secure and expand their business."
This means that the pandemic-related Digitalization and new technologies require staff with digital skills. Finding and retaining employees with these skills was already a major challenge for many companies before Corona.
The question arises why companies have such a hard time finding skilled workers. Brandmonks CEO Morten Babakhani cannot identify a shortage of potential candidates on the job market and says in an interview with Ingenieur.de: “There are so many undiscovered talents out there who could be valuable employees for companies.”
These undiscovered talents are primarily motivated career changers, i.e. people with a strong affinity for digital topics and Soft skills such as willingness to learn, flexibility, motivation, high comprehension and willingness to change.
However, many companies do not seem to have career changers on their radar or even categorically exclude them. During the application process, a large number of candidates are eliminated who, at first glance, do not seem to be suitable for the advertised position. And why? Because their qualifications in their CV do not clearly match the requirements of the job profile.
However, what is overlooked is that these candidates would in many cases be a real asset to the company due to their skills and personality. "But for this to happen, companies must be prepared to open up to new talent whose CVs do not offer all the necessary qualifications," says Brandmonks partner Katharina Pratesi in Strive Magazine firmly.
Opening up would also mean investing in the further training of these people. Due to their motivation to learn new things, most career changers could be quickly integrated and make a useful contribution.
For companies, the integration of career changers would also mean more diversity in their teams. Another benefit, because talent from other industries brings new perspectives and innovative ideas.
Also read: Diversity rules! You should know these diversity management measures
Companies must be willing to open themselves up to new talent whose resumes do not offer all the required qualifications.
How can recruiters succeed in recognizing the potential of many career changers? Certainly not by screening their CVs. Instead, they need modern AI Recruiting Tools to the hand, which with the help of Artificial Intelligence support potential-oriented recruiting. For example, flynne.
„Digitale KI-gestützte Tools können dabei helfen, passende Quereinsteiger zu finden und eine Vorauswahl zu treffen. Deshalb haben wir das digitale Tool flynne entwickelt, das potenzialorientiert und vollautomatisiert Talente findet und die Arbeit von Recruitern beim Suchen von Quereinsteigern effizienter und erfolgreicher macht“, erklärt Babakhani bei Digital Business Cloud.
But the best tools alone are useless unless the mindset of those who are supposed to use them changes. Recruiters need to, as in a guest article at HR-Journal described to stop “selecting applicants based on skills, such as formal qualifications, specialist knowledge, tool knowledge, past successes and industry history.”
The mindset change would also have to take place throughout the company. It would need a HR Department, department and management jointly developed an effective strategy for recruiting career changers.
TIP: Mindset change in recruiting for more career changers! Listen now in the Saatkorn podcast
There are already some established companies that use the “recruiting by skills” approach to attract new talent. One example is SAP SE.
The starting point here is the following: A study on the growth of consultant capacity in the SAP partner ecosystem found that partners need support in hiring experienced consultants. The difficulty is that experienced SAP consultants are not available due to the shortage of IT specialists or are already working for another SAP Business Partner.
In their search, SAP partners are supported by flynne for SAP The digital recruiting tool specifically identifies motivated IT consultants and project managers who have little or no SAP experience but are considering a career in the SAP environment.
(Image source cover image: NDAB Creativity – Shutterstock.com)
