Attracting top procurement talent

In today’s competitive environment, attracting, developing, and retaining top procurement talent is crucial for success. Today’s procurement professionals prioritize a sense of purpose and meaning in their work, a positive work-life balance, and a workplace that aligns with their values and offers opportunities for growth and development. The future of staffing and recruiting is quickly evolving against the backdrop of emerging technologies, economic instability, and a shifting workforce mindset.

In this Future of Procurement Talent Insights series, we expand on the concepts set forth in the recently published ProcureAbility’s Five Bold Procurement Predictions for 2030. Throughout this four-part blog series, we focus exclusively on exploring the topics related to forward-looking insights for staffing and recruiting and how these best practices can help with recruiting top talent, hiring the right people, and fuel a procurement organization’s long-term growth.

Attracting Top Procurement Talent:
Key Strategies to Appeal to a New Talent Pool

Differentiating a Firm as the Employer of Choice

To differentiate themselves to candidates, employers need to focus on communicating their company culture, highlighting their innovative benefits packages, commitment to social responsibility, and opportunities for growth and development. Also, to appeal to a new talent pool, organizations must understand what employees look for in a company and tailor their strategies accordingly. By focusing on these areas and effectively communicating them to candidates through their employer brand, the company will stand out among others within supply chain and procurement and attract the top talent needed to succeed. This strategy not only increases the chances of attracting the right candidates, but also ensures long-term retention and a positive work environment. Below are focus areas that have been shown to lead to greater candidate experience and employee retainment.

Personally connecting with candidates to stand out in a competitive procurement market, serving as their advocate, being honest about the role, and providing consistent and timely feedback. 52% of candidates who were given feedback were more likely to continue a relationship with the company.¹ Building strong candidate relationships can allow the human resource professionals to be proactive in their recruitment strategy with a strong pipeline of candidates from which to draw.

Providing a positive candidate experience through effective communication and a streamlined recruitment process. Candidates that are continually engaged in the process are more likely to accept an offer; 50% of job seekers surveyed had declined a job offer due to poor candidate experience.²

Being transparent about the types of projects in which they will engage; Candidates today are seeking out Greenfield projects and projects that allow them to grow and expand in their career.

Highlighting the company’s opportunities for growth and development, such as mentoring programs, training, continuing education benefits, and networking.

Offering flexible work arrangements, such as remote/hybrid work options and flextime: Companies can hire top procurement professionals from anywhere rather than being limited to a specific geographic location.

Offering competitive compensation and benefits packages: Procurement professionals are in high demand so conduct a salary benchmark to ensure competitiveness within the market.

Providing mental health resources, support, and opportunities for stress relief and self-care.

Establishing a strong, clear, and consistent employer brand. Eighty percent of talent acquisition managers believe that employer branding has a significant impact on the ability to hire extraordinary talent; nine out of ten candidates would apply for a job when it’s from an employer brand that is actively maintained.³

Creating recognition through industry awards such as ‘Great Places to Work®’ rankings bring awareness and credibility to the hiring firm through third-party recognition.

Employees today are prioritizing factors beyond just financial compensation when seeking an ideal workplace. According to a recent study from Glassdoor⁴ showed that:

77%of respondents

cite company culture as a crucial element in their job satisfaction

73%of job seekers

value a company's commitment to work-life balance

Other elements including opportunities for professional growth and development, and a positive workplace environment with a strong emphasis on diversity and inclusion are also significant factors that contribute to a company’s appeal. Highlighting how the company excels in these areas can be effectively done by communicating the hiring firm as the employer of choice.

Communicating a Firm as the Employer of Choice

An employer brand reflects the company’s reputation—it is important to maintain a positive reputation in the marketplace. Seventy-nine percent of job applicants use social media to search for a job: Potential candidates research the company they are applying to online; review sites like Glassdoor can paste a positive or negative image about the company’s reputation and have a significant effect on the employer brand.

55%of job seekers

abandoned a job application after coming across negative reviews about the employer.⁵

Employer branding can also provide cost savings within recruiting. According to a survey by LinkedIn, companies with strong employer brands have a 50% lower cost-per-hire and can hire candidates two times faster than their competitors.⁶ Notably, companies with poor branding pay their employees 10% more.⁷

Examples of vehicles through which a firm can build and communicate their brand include:

Social media

Social media platforms are an effective way to establish and communicate an employer brand to a wide and diverse audience.

Website

A company's website is the primary source of information for job applicants and is a key competent for attracting top talent.

Employee referral programs

Employee referrals have become an extremely effective tool for hiring, as most referrals are pre-screened, and they already have a connection to an existing employee.

Unique job postings

Stand out from the crowd with creative job postings that speak to the unique culture and benefits of the company.

Social impact

Companies that have a strong commitment to social responsibility can use this as a selling point and key differentiator to potential candidates.

Engaging multi-media

Employer branding videos, podcasts, photos, and blogs are an engaging and personalized way to showcase an organization's people, culture, and work environment.

Finding the Right Procurement Talent Partner

Recruiting top talent in the procurement industry is more important, and competitive, than ever. By personally connecting with the candidates, employers are recruiting and sharing the company’s culture and unique offerings. Communicated in part through employer branding, they can attract talented candidates who share the company’s values, are aligned with their mission, and help the organization succeed.

Finding the right partner in this effort is essential to ensuring the firm stands out among the sea of possibilities for the industry’s top talent. ProcureAbility partners with procurement organizations to help find, recruit, and place high-quality resources—whether the need is for staff augmentation support or direct hire recruitment. We serve as a resource for providing sustainable ways for our clients to improve upon their ability to hire. In part two of ProcureAbility’s ‘Future of Procurement Talent’ Insights series, we will explore how to develop a procurement team by effectively leveraging the unique needs and strengths of a firm’s employees, as well as how to drive collaboration and efficiency to position the organization to be strategic contributors to the business.

References:

⁴ forbes.com

⁶ linkedin.com

⁷ thrivemyway.com

Author

Kim Neisen

Director of Talent, ProcureAbility

Future of Procurement Talent

Recruiting Top Talent in a Competitive Market: Attracting Top Procurement Talent