Opportunistic Hiring: Now is the Time to Stack the Deck With Talent! with Jeff Erle of MobilityWare

Remember that person who you really wanted to hire but they took a job somewhere else? Now is the time to reconnect. Through no fault of their own, great talent is being displaced due to the pandemic. Now is the time to proactively hire and raise the level of performance through opportunistic hiring! This crisis will pass. And when it does, emerge as a much stronger organization and be positioned to crush your competitors!

Our guest today: Jeff Erle, Former CEO of MobilityWare

Jeff has held numerous C-level positions throughout his career.  His experience spans across start-ups, small privately-held and large public enterprises including ADP, Western Digital, MobilityWare and most recently as the COO at Blast.  

Jeff focuses on building high-performing teams and evolving award-winning cultures focusing on multi-generational workforces, developing/coaching key executives, and helping companies develop strategies to scale for growth and/or exit. 

Today we discuss

Why it is a great opportunity to hire

A-players: what are they?

How to identify and elevate your company performance during this downturn

Why is this important evaluate and proactively hire now?

Talent is your #1 asset

You now have the opportunity to upgrade your talent 

Missing an amazing opportunity to settle for the first people to knock on your door

Now you have the ability to find an abundance of a players

Obviously, the Covid-19 virus has changed the world’s landscape like never before in our lifetimes. In particular, for businesses of all sizes, the nature of the workforce has and will continue to evolve, especially given the looming changes to the large number of workers that will be looking for work. Whether already or soon to be unemployed, or working for a company whose business model has been adversely impacted, millions of people will be applying for open positions later this year unlike anything we have seen in a very long time.

What's an A-player?

top 10% of experience, capability,  for the compensation you are willing to pay for the role. 

Given that, for most companies, people are their greatest assets, the challenge will be to retain your A-players. And the opportunity would be to use this historic dynamic to “upgrade” your team and your organization. We’ll focus today on the latter, using the talent either already available or soon to be to assure our businesses come out of this cycle stronger than ever before. 

Rick’s Input

SalesForce, CEO Marc Benioff (tweet- 2200 jobs open…… prioritizing referrals of friends & family who have lost jobs. 

A-player - right profile (builders/startups), cultural alignment

Desire should be workable

How do we start?

First step is to develop a definition of what an A-player looks like for your organization.

One who is among the top 10% “available” for the open (or too be upgraded) position

“Available” means: they are willing to accept an offer given the compensation level offered, in a culture such as yours, in your particular industry and location, with the resources available to them, with specific accountabilities/responsibilities, and reporting to a specific person

Discuss examples...

Second step is to take an inventory, or a snapshot of your people assets and the level of their quality on an individual basis:

Identify the “Pioneers” (A-players), “vacationers” (maintainers), and the “prisoners” (those always complaining… but they never leave; they feel handcuffed...)

Methods to accomplish this include: (1) performance management tools (reviews, feedback, etc.) commonly used at year end for merit increases, and/or (2) “force-ranking” individuals either within departments, or if small enough, across the entire organization. (NB: There are numerous views/debates of the efficacy of force-ranking… but I have used it successfully, especially in circumstances such as this, when economic times demand tough decisions around headcount.)

Last step is to assure your recruiting strategy, methodologies and capabilities