Talent Mapping
A proactive recruitment strategy
What does talent mapping mean?
- Examine existing skillsets, including a review of current performance against wider business objectives – to understand where knowledge gaps may exist.
- Identify potential candidates – both internal and external, and define development paths to enhance existing talent.
- Use this research to address future hiring needs proactively – creating new talent networks or enhancing existing ‘hubs’.
What are the benefits of talent mapping?
What challenges are associated with talent mapping?
- Everybody needs to be onboard and share a clear vision of what the future looks like for your organisation. Otherwise, results may not meet expectations
- This approach can be time-consuming, particularly when building your ‘map’ for the first time. This is especially true for smaller recruitment or Human Resources (HR) teams. Many businesses choose to work with a workforce transformation partner for this reason
- Data is key. You need to be identifying the right skills and performance metrics for your recruitment process to guide decisions from the beginning
What is the talent mapping process?
How to do talent mapping in recruitment: best practices
- Understand why you are doing it: It’s critical to know why you’re talent mapping in the first place. What are your goals and priorities? Are there any measurable outcomes or KPIs? This will help you stay on track
- Target specific roles: Start small — try talent mapping for particular roles at the beginning before scaling up
- Ensure that you have an active talent pipeline: The key to getting results is having candidates when you need them. Use existing knowledge, new leads and social media to build your talent pool according to your mapping specifications