Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast (Toby Culshaw)

Welcome to the 12th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

Before I jump into this episode - I wanted to let you know about an extra special offer our sponsors Stratigens are offering to all our listeners.

If you go to Stratigens.com, book a demo, and enter the promotional code "TIC2021", you'll get a discount and a free proof of concept! How wonderful! And, just as a warning, Nick's audio broke down halfway through the episode. So he asked his questions through me, via chat. Which was odd.

In this episode me - Alan Walker - Alison Ettridge and Nick Brooks co-hosted an incredibly insightful conversation with Eric Moskowitz Head of Talent Intelligence and Analytics at Modern Executive Solutions.

In Toby's absence, the role of leading us through the news section - highlighting the compelling and thought-inducing hot topics around Talent Intelligence - fell upon me.

So bare with me as we work out way through Toby's list, which luckily he managed to collate and pull together for me.

The first interesting piece that I was eager to talk about revolved around the increase in US Workforce volatility. With the unemployment rate down nearly 50% year-over-year, almost every job category showed a significant volatility increase in Q2.

What I found really fascinating about this report were the sectors that saw the most change. Categories like: Public Safety, Military and Skilled Trade. Which are not the typical sectors we would be seeing with these increases in volatility.

- Alison Ettridge

I think it's because people have been sitting in their houses for the past 15ish months. And now that they have the opportunity to run away or go on that trip of a lifetime - they don't want to wait any longer.

- Eric Moskowitz

With many of us reprioritising what is important, the lure of truly flexible working is causing a massive shift in the corporate world. With many employees shifting industries and sectors on the hunt for that flexibility and possibility higher quality of life.

Transitioning our conversation smoothly onto our final piece of worldly news from the Future of Education, we discussed the fundamental disconnect between the UK's modern education system and the job market requirements.

What is crazy to me is that the Common Entrance Exam I took 30ish years ago, is exactly the same today. And yet the skills you need now are completely different.

- Alison Ettridge

To add to your point Alison. What about emotional intelligence? Or soft skills? How do we prepare the next generation to operate and think in different ways so that they can hit the workforce with a different perspective. There is a fundamental redesign that needs to happen

- Nick Brooks

At this point, I felt like we had heard everyone's opinion about the world and its news, and we were eager to find out more about our guest, Eric. About his world and his background. So I virtually passed the mic onto our resident hard-hitting interview extraordinaires - Alison and Nick (while I took a see back and put my feet up).

As ex-reporter for Bloomberg, Alison and Nick were curious to know how Eric had transitioned into Talent Intelligence and his learnings from journalism into his role today.

We then discussed what are some of the best primary or human intelligence-gathering practices out there. What type of success could you experience with consistent collection practices. And how to help a client diagnose internal business opportunities versus external business landscapes and competition.

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. Till the next one – stay intelligent!

🎉 Wrapping Up 2024 with the Talent Intelligence Collective! 🎙️

Welcome to our special year-end wrap-up episode! Join hosts Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge, and Toby Culshaw as they reflect on the year that was—packed with milestones, incredible guests, and unforgettable moments in the world of Talent Intelligence.

From standout episodes featuring professionals like Megan at Volvo, Martin at Novartis, and Lou’s practical tips on building TI functions, to industry-defining events like the Amsterdam Talent Intelligence Conference and the debut of a Talent Intelligence stage at RecFest—2024 has been a whirlwind!

Our hosts also share personal highlights, including:

• Alison's transformative year, marked by resilience after a personal challenge and the exciting acquisition of Stratigens by Lightcast.
• Toby's insights into the thriving TI community and the importance of collaboration amidst challenging times.
• Alan’s journey with Udder, growing the business globally and hosting the Talent Intelligence Conference.

Together, they unpack key themes from the year: the evolution of internal and external data integration, the rise of strategic workforce planning on national scales, and the ongoing adoption of AI in HR and beyond. With humor, heartfelt moments, and plenty of industry wisdom, this episode is a celebration of the Talent Intelligence community’s growth and resilience.

As the year ends, the hosts look ahead with big predictions for 2025—consolidation in the TI vendor space, growing strategic workforce planning at a national level, and more meaningful AI adoption in business.

Tune in for laughs, reflections, and a glimpse of what’s to come in 2025. Stay curious, stay brilliant, and most importantly, stay intelligent!

Welcome back to 5th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

Since we’ve gathered quite a few new listeners (Hey! Hi! Welcome!) let me start with a round of introductions.

Co-hosting we have me (Alan Walker) from Udder, Toby Culshaw from Amazon, Alison Ettridge from Talent Intuition and Nick Brooks from Microsoft.  And joining us for this episode we have the amazing by Lyndon Llanes of Verizon.

As usual, Toby kicked us off with a refresh on the happenings of the world of Talent Intelligence.

His first update revolved around a recent report by Deutsche Bank. Their research suggested working from home should be taxed to help support workers whose jobs are under threat.

Obviously, the report was met with some very mixed reviews, in general leaning towards the negative. With Lyndon correctly pointing out that there are no set of rules that decide who gets to work from home and who doesn’t. And how there are clear cost benefits regarding working from home, for both sides. While an employee doesn’t have to pay to commute, the company also does not have to pay for the upkeep of office space. So perhaps the tax should be split? Not just imposed on the employee?

A new mandate by the SEC, around human capital disclosure, sprouted the discussion – Are we going to see more investment from the company in Talent Intelligence? Due to business wanting to provide the SEC with numbers that are healthy and good?

While Lyndon and Nick both agreed the change that was long overdue, clean and usable data is still a very long way off. But I think Alison really highlighted the positive of this change:

‘I ABSOLUTELY LOVE THIS. I THINK THIS MANDATE IS GOING TO EXPOSE A WHOLE BUNCH OF ORGANISATIONS THAT JUST DON’T HAVE THIS TYPE OF DATA, NEVER MIND IT NOT BEING ACCURATE. THAT MEANS THERE IS GOING TO BE A DRIVE TO COLLECT DATA, WHICH IS AMAZING. BUT MOST IMPORTANTLY, THERE IS NOW A RECOGNITION THAT HUMAN CAPITAL IS THE REAL DRIVER OF VALUE WITHIN AN ORGANISATION. AND IT CAN NO LONGER BE IGNORED. WE ARE GOING TO SEE A MASSIVE RISE IN TALENT INTELLIGENCE.’

Toby continued with his worldly updates pivoting our discussion to the new Tesla Gigafactory (what a fun word!) and the NewYorkTimes opinion piece – The Human Experience Will Not Be Quantified.

‘I’VE QUITE A STRONG OPINION ABOUT THIS. DATA ALONE OR KNOWLEDGE ALONE IS NOT ENOUGH TO MAKE A DECISION. TAKE SMOKING FOR EXAMPLE. SIMPLY KNOWING THAT SMOKING IS BAD FOR YOUR HEALTH ISN’T ALWAYS ENOUGH TO MAKE YOU STOP. YOU CANNOT SIMPLY LOOK AT DATA AND FIND YOUR ANSWER. THERE ARE ALWAYS OTHER THINGS INVOLVED.’ – LYNDON

I then opened the floor to our resident hard-hitting interviewer extraordinaires – Toby and Alison. Who were very much prepared with questions like: ‘How does Talent Intelligence and People Analytics blend?’ and ‘Do you have any words of advice for companies who are just starting out in the world of Talent Intelligence’.

As always we hope you enjoy the episode. Please do leave a review and a rating for the podcast (if you liked it). Your support really does mean the world to us and it is all we need to ensure this podcast continues to grow.

Stay intelligent!

———-

Don’t forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition

Welcome to Episode 33 of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! Join hosts Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge, and Toby Culshaw as they welcome Chris Rowe, Head of Talent Acquisition at DHU Healthcare, who shares his fascinating journey from military service to championing talent acquisition in healthcare.

In this month's market intelligence roundup, Toby delves into Saudi Arabia's strategic investment in AI infrastructure, with the nation setting its sights on becoming a global hub for data centres and AI development. This sparks a fascinating discussion about the future of talent mobility in the region and the environmental considerations of AI advancement, including surprising insights about the energy demands of AI systems.

The discussion then turns to UK disability employment statistics, revealing both progress and persistent challenges, with the disability employment rate at 53% compared to 81.6% for non-disabled people. The hosts explore the complexities of workplace accessibility and the broader implications for diversity, equity, and inclusion.

The spotlight then turns to Chris's compelling professional journey, as he recounts his path from military service to healthcare recruitment, revealing how his passion for making a difference shapes his approach to talent acquisition. He discusses DHU Healthcare's role as a social enterprise providing frontline NHS services and explains how his team's approach to talent acquisition directly impacts healthcare delivery.

Chris offers valuable insights into strategic workforce planning, particularly in healthcare settings. He shares how his organisation has achieved significant cost savings through predictive talent management and discusses their partnership with Foresight to better understand and anticipate workforce needs. The conversation explores the challenges of healthcare recruitment, agency proliferation, and the importance of sustainable talent sharing within the sector.

The episode concludes with Chris's perspective on mentoring first and second-generation migrants, encouraging listeners to use their privilege to create opportunities for others. And yes, there's even a brief discussion about what makes the perfect cup of tea!

Until next time, stay curious, stay brilliant, and most importantly, stay intelligent!

Welcome to the 11th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

Where we, meaning me and my far more talented co-hosts Alison Ettridge and Toby Culshaw, and Nick Brooks the wonderful Gerrit Schimmelpenninck from Philips.

After our usual pleasantries, Toby dived straight in with his update on the happening within the world of Talent Intelligence.

We started by discussing a recently released article by Indeed, Employer Use of Hiring Incentives Grows. The article states that job searches for hiring incentives, such as signing bonuses, retention bonuses, and cash incentives, have jumped 134% since the beginning of the year.

Not only have searches gone up, but job postings advertising hiring incentives has also doubled since last July. I think that a great sign as to how hot the market is at the moment.

– TOBY CULSHAW

Hiring incentives have always been around for more senior roles, so what is really interesting is how this is now trickling down into more junior roles. We all know there are skills that are hard to find, cause perhaps they are hard to learn. But what this increase is telling is that the search for specific talent is expanding to the rest of the labour market.

– ALAN WALKER

Toby continued with his worldly updates pivoting our chat to something that many may not have thought about. As we begin to see many companies returning to office-based work, could this be the end of the baby boomer workforce? As many will likely be debating if there is worth in re-joining the commuting rat race. Will we see a much larger than usual surge of retirements during the rest of this year? And will that mean to the labour market?

I think this is when we should talk about forecasting. We just all assume a constant supply. But there is no allowing for a big event that could cause a massive change. So I’m really excited to see if some of the economic forecasts pickup on it.

– ALISON ETTRIDGE

The final piece of news for this episode that Toby shared was around a quote from the International Labour Organisation’s Director-General, Guy Ryder. He underlined that unless deliberate action is taken to protect the labour market, the world of work will become even more unjust, less inclusive and ultimately less sustainable.

At which point I felt like we had heard everyone’s opinion about the world and its news, but we were eager to find out more about our guest, Gerrit. His world, his background. So I virtually passed the mic onto our resident hard-hitting interviewer extraordinaires – Alison and Nick (through me, via chat).

We find out about Gerrit’s university degree in history and how it may or may not have helped his Talent Intelligence career. And where Gerrit feels that his role as Senior Talent Intelligence Manager at Philips sits. In analytics, or a commercial role, or a broader role. And the type of projects that his team would get involved in.

The thing with Talent Intelligence is that is hard to convey the value of it, without showing the work. So you need to be confident and show how much value you can bring to any department.

– GERRIT SCHIMMELPENNINCK

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. All we ask in return is your help in telling the world. This podcast needs your support to reach as many ears as possible. A review or rating on your favourite podcast listening app does go a long way. And of course, if there’s anything we can do better – drop us a line. You can do this via email or reach out to us on our LinkedIn page or Facebook Group.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

Welcome to the 13th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

In this episode, apart from being joined by my amazing co-hosts Toby Culshaw and Nick Brooks, we welcomed the incredible Andrew Gadomski from Aspen Analytics.

We started off the episode in our typical fashion, with Toby updating us on the happenings within the world of Talent Intelligence. Specifically with a topic that has caused quite a stir - Google considering cutting pay off those work from home.

For me, it's quite an interesting one, as I don't really see it as big of news as it's been built up to be. Most companies will have some form of calculation based on where their employees are working (regions, cities and countries). There has always been a pay flex.

Toby Culshaw

This is a hot topic, isn't it? And I think the biggest issue is that people are confused. Employers should start making this part of their employment brand. Full transparency.

Andrew Gadomski

However, when viewing this topic from a different perspective, surely employees should be paid on the outcome of their roles, regardless of where and how it is completed?

I think many companies, and specifically Google have just caused quite a bit of confusion for their staff. So with this transparent tool, employees will be able to select whatever works for them, and they will be compensated in accordance with their choices.

Nick Brooks

Clearly, there are definitely a lot of factors. It's not just a clean-cut solution. And most of us are still in experiment mode.

Moving on to a completely new topic, we discussed the often seen parallels between Talent Intelligence and Competitive Intelligence, highlighted with a PhD paper by Luis Madureira.

Which, of course, fuelled me to ask Andrew the essential question for our podcast guests - What is his definition of Talent Intelligence?

I was prepared for this question and I believe Talent Intelligence to be a function whose job it is to aggregate information about the workforce, the competition, the diversity, the salaries etc.. and to use that information to determine where, when and how to do things differently.

Andrew Gadomski

It's definitely murky waters. With many cross overs between competitive, sourcing and talent intelligence. So much so that Toby shared his idea of renaming Talent Intelligence to Labour Market Intelligence.

Already way past our halfway point; it was definitely time for us to find out more about our amazing guest, Andrew. And as Alison was away enjoying some much-needed sunshine on holiday, it was up to Nick to ask those hard-hitting questions.

We discussed the challenges of bringing together internal and external data sources and deriving meaningful insights from them. As well as the importance of data hygiene.

I may be a bit bias when I say this, but I really do think this was such an interesting episode. Especially when Andrew discussed his definition of Talent Intelligence and how he believes it will change over the coming years.

As always, we would love to hear your feedback! So please leave us a review. Let us know what works, what doesn’t...

And if you can, help us spread the word, your support is very much appreciated.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

Welcome to the 17th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

This is our second episode of 2022; we’ll be coming up to a whole year of TIC soon.

In this episode, myself, Alison Ettridge and Toby Culshaw spoke to Hallie Bregman from Cuup.

Hallie is an ex-data scientist who really understands the power of analytics and how combining Talent Intelligence with People Analytics can bring outstanding results. Perfect for this show, don’t you think?

After our usual (I think I can say usual now? After 17 episodes?) introductions, an article in the Financial Times questioned whether US workers will return to the labour market. At the end of last year, there were almost 11million unfilled openings, yet the unemployment rate was just 3.9%.

As we begin to come out of the other side of the pandemic, this piece then won’t be permanent. It will be interesting to see how it flip and changes in the coming months and years.

First shift we will see is a change in organisations approach to talent attraction. I also think, we will also see a change in workforce planning. Changing the focus from our immediate plan and instead switching to a proactive approach about what the hiring trends will be on the horizon.

Alison Ettridge

Unsurprisingly, the other article Toby flagged was that half of US SMEs were having to raise their salaries amid the tightening labour market.

However, the article, which questioned whether the gender wage gap had roots extending back into childhood, raised the most questions.

I think this is retrospective. We would need to take into consideration the culture shifts we are seeing in this generation.

Hallie Bregman

Believed that to be enough news and insights - as informative as it was - Alison was eager to start questioning our guest, Hallie. With questions like: “What were the different motivators for your career moves?” and “what was the things that surprised you when you entered the world of talent intelligence and people analytics?”.

How manual everything was. The lack of automation was outstanding. I have been so encouraged to see how much technology has really been accepted in these past few years.

Hallie Bregman

Picking up on what Hallie mentioned way back at the start of the episode, her love for storytelling, Alison and Hallie started a conversation on the skills needed to present data to stakeholders.

Data is very much a part of how things work these days, and a lot of people do actually understand metrics. It’s trying to shift the metrics we look at. Pulling them towards business metrics. Things like productivity, retention, attrition, those are the things that matter more.

Hallie Bregman

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. A review or a share on social really does go a long way in helping us reach as many ears as possible.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

Welcome to the 10th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast! Our first ever episode in double figures!!

In this episode, Alison Ettridge, Nick Brooks, and Toby Culshaw co-hosted a cracking discussion with the wonderful Meta McKinney.

She currently works for Stryker as their Associate Talent Intelligence Manager, but before that, she worked for AllState. The same place as our past guest – Lesley Rood (episode 8).

Starting off the episode in our typical fashion, with Toby updating us on the happenings within the world of Talent Intelligence, we started with a topic that will come as no surprise – flexible working.

With many companies announcing their future working strategies, flexible working is definitely not something that will be going away soon.

“Someone at work called it the great debate. And I do think Google backtracking on their initial statement and deciding to focus on flexibility and choice is smart. I think the listening to your employees’ aspect is more important than ever before.”
META MCKINNEY

Our conversation then moved on to a recent paper from Indeed announcing the projected loss of over 36million jobs.

“I think this we should also be talking about transferable skills. Within the Talent Intelligence and Talent Acquisition industry, we are very good at looking at job titles, job function, but when it comes to looking at the skills required to do the job, we are pretty bad. So it’s time we stop looking at past companies or job titles and start looking at the skills people possess.”
TOBY CULSHAW

Could this shift from job titles and job functions to transferable skills and opportunity mean the end of the CV?

“It is definitely the perfect situation for us to move away from certain requirements. Like possessing a university degree. We are at a crossroads. And this is where we are going to start seeing how adventurous hiring managers are willing to be”
META MCKINNEY

Moving on to a completely new topic that we have definitely never addressed previously on this podcast, we discussed what Talent Intelligence is. And how it is being used within the industry.

“It is driving me absolutely insane. I think there needs to be some definition around what it is and what it isn’t.”
ALISON ETTRIDGE

After this very heated discussion, I think it was time for us to find out more about our amazing guest, Meta. Finding out how Meta’s background in library services helped influence her transition into Talent Intelligence. While her creative background comes in handy when storytelling to the stakeholders.

Within Striker, Meta is a one-woman team, taking on multiple projects for the entire 40thousand plus company, so naturally, we were curious about the type of skills she would be looking for when hiring her next teammate and if she could share any tips about building a Talent Intelligence team from the ground up.

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. We’re now in double digits, and we just can’t believe it! It’s flown by for us, but we would love to hear what you thought! What worked, what hasn’t, and what we should do differently for the next 10 episodes!

You can do this via our email or reach out to us on our LinkedIn page or Facebook Group.

Stay intelligent!

———-

Don’t forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition

Welcome back to the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast for another insightful episode! In episode 30, your hosts Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge, and Toby Culshaw are joined by the "workforce geek" himself, Maarten Hansson of Novartis.

Toby kicks off the show with a thought-provoking news segment, covering topics like the war for AI talent, the UK's controversial immigration salary threshold hike, and Latin America's tech talent boom. The discussion sparks debate around the challenges of attracting and retaining top AI talent, the potential impact of immigration policies on various industries, and the factors driving the growth of tech hubs in Latin America.

In the interview with Maarten, we dive deep into his fascinating career journey, spanning roles in the Dutch military, IT engineering, and his transformative experience living and working in India. Maarten shares how his time in India fuelled his passion for leveraging global talent and the importance of consciously choosing how to interact with and manage distributed teams.

Maarten introduces us to the concept of "total workforce" and the proprietary workforce drivers he uses to help organisations make informed decisions about their talent strategies. He emphasises the importance of visibility into all aspects of the workforce, including employees, contingent workers, and outsourced or automated work, to effectively manage costs, risks, and access to talent.

Throughout the conversation, Maarten stresses the value of combining internal workforce data with external labour market insights to provide actionable advice to the business. He shares examples of how his work has triggered procurement teams to change their category strategies, HR to rethink workforce policies, and finance to optimise total workforce costs.

Maarten's unique perspective, shaped by his diverse background in procurement, HR, and engineering, leaves us with a fresh understanding of how talent intelligence can drive transformative workforce decisions. His passion for the topic is infectious, leaving us eager to explore more in future episodes!

Until next time, stay intelligent, and don't forget to share the podcast with your network!

** Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → ⁠⁠Stratigens⁠⁠! **

Welcome to 6th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

Happy New Year to you all!

We’ve got the whole crew together again for this one. By which I mean myself – Alan Walker, Toby Culshaw, Alison Ettridge and Nick Brooks.

Since we’ve all been together for 6 months now (I guess you could say we’re official) I skimmed past the intros and moved straight to welcoming our legendary guest for this episode: Vibhu Ganesan, Global Talent Intelligence Lead at Intel.

The first topic of discussion was the POWER of video and how will it change the world of Talent Intelligence.

A really fascinating topic, which sprouted us all to discuss it’s future potential. While our guest Vibhu actually highlighted how video interviews could have an immediate benefit to organisations.

For example. If you were to conduct two interviews between two very different candidates, you later could use the recording of the hired candidate to build out your ideal candidate persona. As well as using the recording for reference later down the line when a similar position appears.

While Nick believed that this advancement should focus on how we make human interaction quantifiable.

How are our hiring managers conducting these types of interviews? Are they doing it equitably? Are they staying true to their diverse and inclusive values throughout?

We then moved on to a topic that I think will constantly be resurfaced many more times as it seems to be constantly evolving – the meaning behind the phrase ‘Talent Intelligence’.

Vibhu highlighted that it really comes down to how we use the word ‘intelligence’.  While some organisations (like Intel) will use it to describe knowledge about competitors and the wider market, other organisations will associate it with the information available about candidates and their profiles.

If this were the case, where should Talent Intelligence sit within an organisation?

As we were eager to find out more about our amazing guest, I figuratively passed the mic onto our resident hard-hitting interviewer extraordinaires. 

Very excitedly Alison mentioned that she would go first, referring back to what Vibhu mentioned at the start of the podcast, she asked. How does Intel set themselves apart?

Questions about the future of Intel, the importance of combining internal and external data and what learnings does Vibhu take from past roles, then followed.

One of the final questions that Alison asked is: What is the one thing you wished you had learned earlier?

“Looking for more people within the organisation with whom we partner with. It just goes back to what we were saying earlier about joining the dots between all the different departments and teams.”

Even though it’s a new year, I am not going to ever stop saying thank you to all of you. Our regular listeners. You lot are amazing.

See you in the next episode.

Stay intelligent!

———-

Don’t forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition

Welcome back to another enlightening episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! In episode 31, your hosts Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge, and Toby Culshaw are joined by the insightful Patrick Coolen, a seasoned HR analytics expert and Partner at Kennedy Fitch.

Toby starts the show with a thought-provoking news segment, discussing topics such as the UK's reliance on foreign workers, the challenges of upskilling the workforce, and the World Economic Forum's take on combating STEM talent shortages. The conversation sparks a lively debate on the societal and political factors influencing talent strategies and the importance of evidence-based decision-making.

In the interview, Patrick shares his fascinating journey in HR analytics, spanning over two decades at ABN AMRO. He delves into the evolution of people analytics, the challenges organizations face in adopting and institutionalizing advanced analytics, and the factors that drive success in this field.

Patrick emphasizes the importance of aligning people analytics initiatives with strategic business goals and integrating various evidence-based HR services to effectively answer critical workforce questions. He highlights the need to balance data science with behavioral science expertise and the significance of proper data management.

The discussion also touches on the future of people analytics, with Patrick sharing his insights on the potential of machine learning and AI in democratizing intelligence for end-users. He stresses the importance of governance and the trend towards enterprise-wide analytics practices that share data and skills across departments.

Throughout the conversation, Patrick's passion for evidence-based HR shines through, leaving listeners with valuable advice on starting and scaling people analytics functions. His unique perspective, shaped by his extensive research and practical experience, offers a fresh understanding of how talent intelligence can drive strategic workforce decisions.

Until next time, stay intelligent, and don't forget to connect with Patrick on LinkedIn to learn more about his "10 Golden Rules of People Analytics"!

** Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → ⁠⁠⁠Stratigens⁠⁠⁠! **

Welcome to a milestone edition of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

That's right - by hook or by crook, we've hit our 20th episode.

And what a cracker it is.

In this one, me - Alan Walker - and, of course, Alison Ettridge of Stratigens and Toby Culshaw of Amazon - co-hosted an episode where we spoke to Joe Thompson of Booz Allen Hamilton.

First up in the world of Talent Intelligence, PRO Unlimited, an integrated workforce management platform provider, introduced Total Talent Intelligence, a solution providing organisations with real-time data on their talent landscape to help inform strategic hiring and retention decisions.

"I think it's interesting. We're seeing a lot of these platforms appearing. I do wonder if more data will mean more clarity."

Joe Thompson

"The most challenging thing with all these new pieces of technology is accuracy. The danger is the generalisation of job roles and titles."

Toby Culshaw

As the European labour market experiences vast shortages, with more and more job vacancies going unfilled, many recruiters and international companies are struggling to attract skilled workers. To shed some light on this issue, and help companies attract employees, the market research firm Intelligence Group, has compiled the first-ever European Talent Intelligence Manual for 2022.

"Personally, I was really surprised to see London up there in the Top10."

Toby Culshaw

"Although this is a wonderful piece of work, for me, too much detail is missing. Who did the survey? How was it split? What are the age groups? What are they really basing good on?"

Alison Ettridge

An interesting report from the Hiring Lab, Economic Research by Indeed, showed during the pandemic’s initial phase, demand for workers in sectors that predominantly employed women was significantly crippled. The subsequent loss of pay and work experience set women back further than they were before.

"This is where we talk about how the 'return to work' policies have affected families. With the lack of childcare and other constraints, women’s ability to work has really skyrocketed. And not in the right direction."

Joe Thompson

At this point, it was definitely time to focus on Joe and his world. Alison, our interview extraordinaire, was really eager to learn more about the evolution of Joe's career - from working US navy submarine service to heading up a Talent Transformation consulting function

Next, Alison asked the question that nobody on this podcast ever escapes from - what is your definition of Talent Intelligence?

"I think Talent Intelligence is a toolbox. You've talked about different talent lenses, and for our clients, it's about helping them use data to make better decisions. Particularly today where no manager has ever experienced a global competition for talent like this ever before".

Joe Thompson

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. Massive thanks for supporting us. Keep telling your friends about us. If you aren't telling your friends about us, start telling your friends about us. And if you haven’t any friends - join the Talent Intelligence Collective Facebook Group whilst Facebook still has users.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

Welcome to Episode 35 of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge, and Toby Culshaw sit down with Chris Woodward, whose fascinating journey from military leadership to strategic workforce planning offers a masterclass in talent strategy and organisational effectiveness.

This month's intelligence roundup features Toby exploring whether AI agents can truly become trusted advisors in talent intelligence, sparking a thought-provoking discussion about the balance between automation and human judgement. The conversation shifts to the UK's ambitious AI skills strategy, contrasting it with the Gulf region's more pragmatic approach to talent development, highlighting the critical importance of long-term thinking versus short-term political cycles.

Chris shares his remarkable career trajectory from the British Army, where he served four tours in Afghanistan, to his role as Global Head of Strategic Workforce Planning at Babcock. He offers valuable insights into how military concepts like "battle grouping" – bringing together diverse capabilities towards clear outcomes – can transform talent strategy in the corporate world. His experience reimagining talent pathways in the military and later applying competency science at Korn Ferry reveals the power of objective, future-focused talent management.

The discussion delves into the challenges of demand-side workforce planning, with Chris highlighting how organisations often struggle with long-term capability building when faced with immediate business pressures. His work on criticality assessments for submarine servicing exposed stark talent shortages, necessitating innovative approaches to capability development with multi-year horizons.

As Chris embarks on his next chapter establishing an advisory practice focused on organisational effectiveness, he shares three essential tips for strategic workforce planning professionals: get strategic clarity, build relationships across the business, and truly understand how the business creates value. His perspective on HR functions becoming truly strategic partners rather than cost centres offers a compelling vision for the future of talent management.

Until next time, stay curious, stay strategic, and most importantly, stay intelligent!

Welcome to 7th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

Unfortunately for this one, Toby wasn’t able to join us so it was just myself (Alan Walker), Alison Ettridge and Nick Brooks welcoming the wonderful Lesley Rood, Senior Research Consultant for Talent Analytics at Allstate.

Albeit one man down, we powered through with our usual format starting off with some news, views, and worldly insights.

Starting off with a discussion from the Talent Intelligence Collective Facebook Group (join the group). Or in particular a comment from a member: “One major issue is the credibility of those producing the research. For example, are they even senior enough for the executive audiences to view them as peers and reasons to believe, rely upon, or otherwise trust them?“.

To which our podcast guest Lesley, rightfully pointed out:

“I think, if you are a subject matter expert, you can certainly build up your credibility. As long as you start with confidence and business perspective. Because the biggest thing an executive is looking for is: Can you help me picture the future with this knowledge that you are bringing in?”

Which then led us onto a whole bigger conversation about ‘The language of the business’. Understanding what problems your business is facing and thinking about how to solve them. Rather than simply presenting data reports.

“It’s really about critical thinking. Thinking about the business challenges you are trying to solve. Being able to understand and identify those issues. And presenting yourself with clarity and confidence. It’s less about the seniority and more about your ability to apply context” - Nick Brooks

A quote from the CEO of ThoughtSpot, around future data skills, led us to discuss - Are companies going to expect candidates to be able to both understand and speak data?

Lesley believed that the simple knowledge and understanding of data, wouldn’t be enough. Since it’s the skill of critical thinking that enables individuals to consult, lead and drive conclusions through data.

“Data is not the be-all and end-all. It’s the ability to overlay insight and data that adds real value.” - Alison Ettridge

Believed that to be enough news and insights - as informative as it was - Alison was eager to start questioning to our guest Lesley. With questions like: “Both our previous podcast guests, Vibhu Ganesan and Lyndon Llanes, mentioned that their companies are building a taxonomy. Is this something that Allstate are considering?”

“We’ve focused more on defining and classifying the market information that we bring in. For example: if you asked about retention would know exactly what points to be pulling in and how to apply them to internal data. So I guess you could say we’ve come up with a data dictionary of external data.”

As always we hope you enjoy the episode. Please do leave a review and a rating for the podcast (if you liked it). Your support really does mean the world to us and it is all we need to ensure this podcast continues to grow.

Stay Intelligent!

———-

Don’t forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition

Welcome to another episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

In this one, I - Alan Walker - Alison Ettridge of Stratigens and Toby Culshaw of Amazon - met Jerry Hu from Amazon Web Services.

Passing the mic over to Toby, we caught up on everything happening in the talent intelligence world.

According to a 2022 report by IndiaAI, a government-led industry group, AI is expected to raise India’s annual growth rate by 1.3% by 2035 – which, for context, is an additional $957bn to India’s economy.

“I think this is really fascinating. We’re already seeing a lot of companies looking to India for their tech solutions in terms of workforces.”

Toby Culshaw

“On the talent piece, you can see this great migration trend, with many who may have been living overseas deciding to come back.”

Jerry Hu

Another survey of 20,000 employees from 11 countries found that 52% of Gen Z and millennial workers are considering changing employers this year. However, 73% said they would stay at their jobs if it were easier to change roles internally.

“That really ties into what we were saying on our last episode. Internal and external data needs to be looked at separately to make sensible decisions regarding how to shape the workforce.”

Alison Ettridge

With the utter chaos that the UK workforce seems to find itself in, it was impossible for us not to talk about it.  With 350,000 people across the UK being inactive due to long-term sickness due to the pandemic, the new UK chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng, aims to reverse this inactivity by pushing those over-50s into full-time work.

“I’m not convinced. I think in most industries, age discrimination is still alive and well. It’s one of those issues we don’t really discuss. That makes it hard for those over-50s to pick up work.”

Toby Culshaw

After this very labour-focused discussion, it was time for us to learn more about our fantastic guest, Jerry Hu. Alison was especially eager to explore Jerry’s career path - the why and how he got to where he is today.

“I started my Talent Intelligence journey with Alibaba. At first, it was about sourcing new talent across the border but then it transitioned. Some skills were non-existent, so we started going beyond a typical talent acquisition approach. We began utilising data and tying that back to how we were helping the business.”

Jerry Hu

While we know that Talent Intelligence can be so fundamental for making business decisions, when you’re working for large-scale companies, it’s easy to experiment. But what about when you’re working within a startup?

“I absolutely think that Talent Intelligence has a place in startups. But when every decision you make impacts whether your business will survive tomorrow, plan your talent first. What is the number one thing you’ll need to know to solve your recruiting problems?”

Jerry Hu

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. A review or a share on social really goes a long way in helping us reach as many ears as possible.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

Welcome to the 8th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

We’ve decided to change things up. We are doing things a little different this time.

So many of you, our listeners, requested to hear more from Nick and Toby, so this time they joined the episode not as co-hosts but as guests.

Furthermore, for this episode, we also flipped our usual flow and started with the interview bit first. With Alison being the sole bad cop interviewer and myself pipping up every so often with a comment.

Kickstarting the round of questions, with a seemingly easy one, Alison asked – What is the difference between Talent Acquisition and Talent Intelligence?

“If you think of it from a formula 1 perspective. Talent acquisition is the engine. It drives things. It moves us forward. While Talent Intelligence is the decisions that occur before the engine starts running. What are the track conditions like? What type of fuel do we need? How much do we need? Talent Intelligence primes talent acquisition so it can perform in the best way possible.”  – Toby Culshaw

Nick believed that there is a type of synergy between the two functions. Talent Acquisition has ‘boots on the ground’. It goes into market, it listens, it collects information that then can be levelled up by Talent Intelligence for competitive advantage or operational efficiencies like how to enter a new location.

Alison, picking up on the terminology that both Toby and Nick used, asked whether terms like strategic, tactical should be used when talking about Talent Intelligence? Or were there any better ones?

“I think the battle for talent intelligence terminology is something that we’ve created ourselves. And I’m not sure that’s what we should be doing. I think the language choice is whatever fits best in your organisation.” – Toby Culshaw

“I agree. But I also think words really do matter. For example ’war for talent’. It can get organisations in a very reactive mindset. It can blur strategic thinking and it can affect inclusive hiring.” – Nick Brooks

On the topic of talent, Alison asked what role do Toby and Nick believe sourcing plays within Talent Intelligence. And what are the top two things organisations can do to breed a culture of intelligence?

One of the biggest obstacles many Talent Intelligence teams face is convincing management to implement their findings. Which lead Alison to ask whether Toby or Nick have ever experienced this situation and what advice would they offer to overcome it.

“Make sure you have a deep enough understanding of the business context. This will help you ascertain what any possible blockers could be.” – Nick Brooks

Another obstacle that many organisations face is thinking they are too small to start using Talent Intelligence.

“I would argue the smaller you are the more important talent intelligence is” – Toby Culshaw

“And at that level, your insight and information can have a bigger influence.” – Nick Brooks

We then discussed what skillsets are required to form a Talent Intelligence team and for our guests to share some top tips for setting up a Talent intelligence function from scratch.

As always we hope you enjoy the episode. We’ve done things quite differently this time to our past episodes and we would love to hear what you thought.

Leave us a review or send us an email, your support really does mean the world to us and it is all we need to ensure this podcast continues to grow.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

———-

Don’t forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition

Welcome to the 16th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

Or should I say welcome back?

We owe you all a big apology. It's been faaaaar to long since we released one of these. To the point that our last guest - Randy Bailey - messaged us last week asking whether he'd killed the podcast forever.

Thankfully not. It's alive and kicking, and we're pleased to release our latest episode!

In this one, myself, Alison Ettridge and Toby Culshaw co-hosted an episode where we spoke to Ian Addison-Smith of EY. And it's a goodun!

We started off the episode in our typical fashion, with Toby updating us on the happenings within the world of Talent Intelligence. Unsurprisingly, 'quite a lot' has happened.

The first piece of news that Toby was quite excited to talk about was how the scientific 'war for talent' was heating up as the pandemic restrictions continued to ease.

After a brief discussion about the warning issued by US economist, Francisco Mary Daly related to Covid undermining female participation in the workforce. We moved to a rather interesting study about how important it is to be born at the right time of year.

The study claims that young people born at the beginning of the year do significantly better in the labour market than their peers born later in the year.

The final piece of news is about the new piece of tech entering the market, The Korn Ferry Intelligence Cloud. An AI-trained cloud powered by external market intelligence and 4 billion Korn Ferry datapoints on work structures, roles and employees' skills and motivation.

I’m comforted by it, to know that the choice is there. But I completely agree, the word that kept screaming in my head was benchmarking. How much is it based on real tangible recent data?

Ian Addison-Smith

Absolutely, the is not one answer to this. And rightly so, teams are taking the multi vendor approach. No one is the single source of truth, so cross validation is the approach to take at the moment.

Toby Culshaw

At which point I felt like we had heard everyone's opinion about the world and its news, but we were eager to find out more about our guest, Ian. His world, his background. So I virtually passed the mic onto our only resident hard-hitting interviewer extraordinaire today - Alison.

As someone who currently works in Talent Attraction but is building out a Talent Intelligence team, do you see insights applicable? And how would you envision them being used?

I think with Talent Attraction, the way that a lot of teams operate has become really transactional. Which does delivers results. But it creates a blind spots as to how skills are evolving. While talent Intelligence has an ability to broaden the skills discussion and offer a more sophisticate voice, specifically when it comes to diversity.

Ian Addison-Smith

With enough time for one big final question, as we were approaching our 1hour cutoff mark, Alison asked Ian's top tips for creating a Talent Intelligence function.

Don’t rush. Don’t build it on the fly. Take time and assess what is your definition is of Talent Intelligence and what kind of questions are you seeking to answer for your C-suite and other departments.

Ian Addison Smith

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. A review or a share on social really does go a long way in helping us reach as many ears as possible.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

----------

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

Welcome, welcome, welcome to the 19th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

No major break this time. We're fully on the case, powering episodes out at an incredible rate of around once a month.

In this episode, Alison Ettridge, Toby Culshaw and I co-hosted an incredibly insightful conversation with Teresa Wykes of technology behemoth SAP.

Quite a bit was happening in the world of Talent Intelligence when we recorded this episode. A new report from the International Labour Organisation found the number of hours worked globally dropped in the first quarter of 2022 to 3.8% below the pre-crisis benchmark. While Microsoft said, it plans to "nearly double" its budget for employee salary increases to retain staff and help people cope with inflation.

In more news,  Apple has reported lost talent due to its return to office policy, and a survey of 1thousand US graduates are craving a more traditional work experience. “Stability is key”, stated the director of data insights and customer intelligence at iCIMS.

After this very heated news roundup, I thought it was time for us to learn more about our fantastic guest, Teresa. Starting with the background role at SAP, obviously. How she got to where she is, and if her commercial background helped with her success.

“For the first time, the business has to look externally more than ever. So our version of Talent Intelligence is educational. Primarily providing talent and competitor data to help the business make better decisions.”

Teresa Wykes

Talent Intelligence as a function is still relatively new. When you joined SAP, you were tasked to set up from scratch. How did you go about this? What qualities and skills did you look for?

“Someone who has a lot of patience, resilience, who is interested in the world and people, who can write for different audiences and tell a story.”

Teresa Wykes

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. Your support really does mean the world to us, and it is all we need to ensure this podcast continues to grow.

And if you want to talk more about all things Talent Intelligence join our Facebook Group or WhatApps, if that’s more your thing.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

Welcome to Episode 34 of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! Join hosts Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge, and Toby Culshaw as they welcome Cole Napper, VP of Research and Innovation at Lightcast and host of the Directionally Correct podcast, who shares his fascinating insights on integrating people analytics, talent intelligence, and workforce planning.

The market intelligence roundup kicks off with Toby exploring an intriguing Forbes article about talent supply chains, sparking a discussion about treating workforce management with the same strategic rigour as other business assets. The conversation then shifts to the global shortage of AI talent, with insights into how different nations are approaching this challenge, including China's talent shortages and the Middle East's strategic investments in skills development.

Cole shares his unique perspective from working across multiple industries and roles, emphasising his "maniacal focus on adding business value." Drawing from his experience leading a 50-person team at FedEx that spanned people analytics, workforce planning, and talent intelligence, he discusses how combining these disciplines can deliver hundreds of millions in tangible ROI.

The discussion delves into the evolution of human capital management, with Cole offering a fresh perspective on why finance hasn't taken over HR – because humans aren't interchangeable units. He explores how behavioural science plays a crucial role in understanding workforce motivation and potential, particularly in an era where employee loyalty and engagement are increasingly challenging.

The episode concludes with Cole's three interconnected tips for organisations looking to integrate their people analytics, talent intelligence, and workforce planning functions: seek each other out, share knowledge, and pool data resources. He emphasises that these functions are significantly more powerful when working together, capable of bringing previously unseen value to organisations.

Until next time, stay curious, stay analytical, and most importantly, stay intelligent!

>> Show Lightcast, our sponsors, some love <<

Welcome to the first episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

Whoop, Yey, Hooray! 🎉

Hosted by Alan Walker from Udder, Toby Culshaw from Philips and Alison Ettridge from Talent Intuition

During this episode, we interview our first ever guest, Annie Chae from Amazon. We discuss everything from US talent and how they struggle to produce enough talent to satisfy demand. To LinkedIn’s new functionality.

We also briefly address if there is still a need for companies to create Org charts and what is happening to the world of Talent Intelligence in general.

Finally, we consider key questions like what are the most common mistakes companies make when creating a talent Intelligence team for the first time? And where should Talent Intelligence sit within an organisation, and who should they report to?

As this is our first episode, we are still experimenting. We may still be a bit rough and ready. We are just going straight into this and trying stuff out.

But we would love to hear your feedback! Let us know what works, what doesn’t…

You can do this via our email, or reach out to us on our LinkedIn page or Facebook Group.

Till next time!

———-

Don’t forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition

Welcome back, dear listeners and readers, to another episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

In this riveting episode, we had the pleasure of diving deep into the world of AI in talent with our very own co-host Alan Walker in the hot seat.

We kick off this milestone episode with Toby taking the reins to provide us with the latest updates in the world of AI. Toby enlightens us about chatbot vulnerabilities, shining a light on the growing cybersecurity risks as AI adoption spreads.

Alison chimes in about the global race for AI talent, with tech giants rapidly expanding teams of AI researchers and engineers. However, we acknowledge the risks of large language models like GPT-3 hallucinating false insights without proper governance.

Now, shifting our focus to the main topic of this episode - our guest, Alan, Alison takes the lead in asking all the right questions.

Alan's journey into AI began with a passion for leveraging technology to transform HR processes. Little did he know that this enthusiasm would set him on a path to becoming a thought leader in applying AI in talent.

"The perception of intelligence is what really matters when defining AI."

Alan Walker

His experience co-founding the consultancy Udder provided him with remarkable insight into AI's potential. He gained exposure to innovative applications of AI across functions like recruitment, mobility and analytics. This experience has been invaluable in envisioning an AI-powered future of talent.

One of the key takeaways from our conversation is the importance of ethics, quality control and human oversight over AI systems. Data literacy is critical to ensure AI doesn't hallucinate false insights from incomplete data.

"AI won't necessarily create more jobs, but may allow more enriching lives with less work time needed."

Alan Walker

The world of AI in talent is evolving rapidly. Alan shed light on emerging multi-agent AI architectures that enable diverse algorithms to coordinate insights. However, what makes it even more intriguing is the simultaneous hype and uncertainty surrounding AI's impacts.

Looking forward, Alan envisions the future of AI as an integrated approach combining agents with specialized capabilities. By harmonizing workforce strategy, future of work initiatives, and AI, organizations can better act on insights.

It has been a pleasure having Alan Walker as our guest, sharing his profound insights on the dynamic field of AI in talent. And, as always, your support means the world to us. Be sure to tune in to the full episode and share your thoughts with us. Until next time – stay intelligent!

Welcome to an extra special edition of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

In honour of Toby, our fantastic colleague and friend, and the release of his book today, we’ve flipped the episode on its head, roped some extra exceptional help and instead of a guest, put Toby Culshaw in the hot seat.

In this one, it’s me - Alan Walker - Alison Ettridge of Stratigens and Joe Thompson of Booz Allen Hamilton co-hosting an episode.

The episode started, but not in its usual fashion. There is no news, no worldly updates, just tips, hints and tested tricks that Toby has learned over the years and poured into his book.

As I had the virtual mic, I kicked things off. Starting easy by asking the name of the book, the release date and why Toby ever decided to write a book.

“Throughout the last few years, so many companies have been branching out into the world of Talent Intelligence. And there is just so little information out there. No general how-to guide. So I thought - I could do that.”

Toby Culshaw

Toby started writing content way before it was ever meant to become a book, we’re talking hundreds of virtual notes and post-its, but he confessed that the overall process was very fluid.

“Thank you for doing this, Toby. The fascinating bit for me is that your book is from a completely different view. That of the client. It gives you a depth of understanding of Talent Intelligence as a whole”

Alison Ettridge

We’ve talked a lot about connecting the dots on the podcast, it’s our favourite saying, and that was very much one of the things that Toby wanted to talk about in his book. Talent Intelligence doesn’t just stop at one project.

Another element that we’ve talked about and discussed a lot on our podcast, which simply had to be included in the book, was Toby’s definition of Talent Intelligence. Which, funnily enough, changed after our latest episode with Joe Thompson.

“In the opening chapter, I actually included multiple definitions. But, the core thing for me, which is up for debate, is the word Talent.”

Toby Culshaw

The definition of talent refers to a natural aptitude or skill, not an element you would work to achieve. In contrast, Talent Intelligence is very much a learning experience for everyone. Therefore, such words as workforce or decision are possibly better suited.

The book is filled with tips about what to do, where to look and how to build a Talent Intelligence function. What about what not to do?

“I may be a bit biased with this answer, but don’t tie Talent Intelligence to filling jobs. The power of Talent Intelligence lies in de-risking decision-making, trying to be as broad-minded as possible and a whole host of other things. Not simply filling jobs.”

Toby Culshaw

A big big thank you to everyone who helped make this book a reality. Toby may have been the one who wrote, but it was thanks to everyone contributing. And as always, a massive thank you for supporting us.

And of course, if you liked this episode, Toby’s book: Talent Intelligence: Use Business and People Data to Drive Organisational Performance releases today and is available on Amazon here.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

Don’t forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

Welcome back for another fascinating episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! In episode 29, your regular hosts Alan Walker, Alison Etridge and Toby Culshaw have an enlightening discussion with Megan Reif, Talent Intelligence Lead at Volvo Cars.

Kicking things off, Toby provides an intriguing news roundup spanning topics like the rise of tech hubs in Canada, AI proliferation in HR roles, and the transition towards skills-based organizations. The trends spark thoughtful debate around data architecture challenges in HR, attracting technical talent to people-focused roles, and the complexity of fully adopting skills-based frameworks.

Shifting gears to our interview with Megan Reif, we uncover her eclectic career journey spanning academia, international development, recruiting and more. A recurring theme is Megan’s insatiable curiosity to dig deeper, learn something new and challenge assumptions with data.

Megan provides a fascinating window into the world of automotive manufacturing talent. We explore the intersection of software and hardware, blending agile and waterfall development approaches, and massive talent ecosystems including R&D, factories, suppliers and beyond. Megan emphasizes the highly technical skills involved in areas often dismissed as “blue collar,” like welders who will drive the green transition.

On talent issues, Megan explains how Sweden’s largest private employer collaborates with industry consortia, universities and government around long-term skills gaps like electricians and battery talent needs. We debate how to better expose youth to the exciting real-world opportunities in science, tech and manufacturing. Megan also shares thoughts on balancing national policies around freelance passions, labor market alignment and managed immigration.

Throughout the wide-ranging discussion, Megan underscores how she sees boundless potential for talent intelligence to bring context, challenge assumptions and transform workforce decisions. Her wisdom and optimism leave us delighted to have her perspective, with much still left to explore in future episodes!

Until next time, stay intelligent folks, and don't forget to share the podcast!

** Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → ⁠Stratigens⁠! **

Welcome to a rather different episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast.

That's all we're going to say. Oh, other than this - please get past the 6-minute 5-second mark. Otherwise, you won't listen to another episode ever again.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

Beep, beep, boop.

Say hello to episode number 3 of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast! 🎉

In this episode, apart from being joined by my amazing co-hosts Alison Ettridge and Toby Culshaw, we welcomed the incredible Megan Buttita from IDC.

Throughout the episode, we found out quite a bit Megan.

Did you know she started off as a librarian? She then spent 16 years as a practitioner before becoming an analyst. Now Megan is the Research Director for emerging trends and talent acquisition.

Quite a bit was happening in the world of Talent Intelligence when we recorded this episode. But a key element that Toby wanted to highlight was a presentation by Tom Davis on effective talent analytics.

Which then, obviously led me to ask: What actually is the difference between talent intelligence and talent analytics? It turns out that it’s quite the chunky question (who knew!?).

But I think Toby summed it up perfectly.

DATA AND ANALYTICS ARE LIKE KNOWING A TOMATO IS A FRUIT. THE INSIGHT PIECE IS KNOWING NOT TO PUT THAT TOMATO IN A FRUIT SALAD. AND THE ACTUAL INTELLIGENCE, IS THAT CONTEXTUAL PIECE AND THINKING IF THAT’S THE CASE – IS KETCHUP A SMOOTHIE?

We then moved into a discussion about where Talent Intelligence should sit. And the overall general importance of it being its own function.

We already give recruiters so many hats. Copywriting, print marketing, process change experts, headhunters… To impose the hat of talent intelligence experts as well it’s a lot of hats to ask someone to wear.

Shifting back to general worldly updates we discussed using talent intelligence as a form of talent mapping. How using data can be used to paint a picture. Where are the gaps? What are the future trends? What skills are required?

Alison and Megan then addressed the importance of using Talent Intelligence to shine light on diversity & inclusion. How should we go about capturing data for diversity? Especially when we need to take into consideration not just gender or ethnicity. But also the different types of backgrounds and experience that an individual can bring.

As always we hope you enjoy the episode. All we ask in return is if you like what you hear.

PLEASE TELL THE WORLD.

This podcast needs your support to reach as many ears as possible. A review or rating on your favourite podcast listening app does go a long way.

And of course, if there’s anything we can do better – drop us a line. You can do this via our email, or reach out to us on our LinkedIn page or Facebook Group.

Stay intelligent!

———-

Don’t forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition

Welcome to the 14th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

Before I jump into this episode - I wanted to let you know about an extra special offer our sponsors Stratigens are offering to all our listeners.

If you go to Stratigens.com, book a demo, and enter the promotional code "TIC2021", you'll get a discount and a free proof of concept. How wonderful!

It's been a while, but the group is finally back together. And we've all been pretty excited. Because in this episode, Alison, Toby, Nick and I were joined by a big hitter - Elke Manjet from SAP.

One of the most interesting articles that Toby saw this month was about women in the workforce. The Financial Times article quoted, "The biggest trend we will see over the coming years is women dominating and redefining much of the labour market."

If you look at the enrolment rates across the colleges, there is often a higher representation of females, but you see the drop off rate in the post-education. I think this will truly show the companies who are ready to embrace the future - they will be setting themselves up to capitalise on diversity as a competitive advantage. - Nick Brooks

It's a cultural change that is allowing this shift to happen. And the ramifications of this shift are likely going to affect a lot of departments outside of Talent Intelligence. Workforce planning, for example.

On the topic of the workforce, there are ample pockets of people that historically, companies have been terrible at engaging with. With over 790 thousand people aged between 50 and 64 years either actively seeking work or are inactive but willing to work, this is undoubtedly a gap that companies shouldn't be overlooking?

Ageism is still a colossal issue. We're talking about a group filled with knowledge and expertise. It's a real missed opportunity. And I find that most companies do try to hide behind the guise that the workforce is simply unable to keep up with digital transformation. - Toby Culshaw

However, digital transformation is ever-changing and with time out of the workplace, you can risk being left behind. So when looking at this gap as an opportunity, we also need to consider returnships. How do we re-introduce this workforce? How do we bring them up to speed?

Given the skill shortage, this part of the population is definitely not tackled enough. We should be looking at upskilling society. So at SAP, we've partnered with a company that offers digital upskilling regardless of their prerequisite. - Elke Manjet

Maybe you could tell, but as we were all quite eager to find out more about our fantastic guest, I figuratively passed the mic onto our hard-hitting resident interviewers extraordinaire, Alison and Nick.

Alison, in particular, was extremely excited to hear about Elke's thoughts on the rise of Talent Intelligence. From someone who is not a leader in Talent Intelligence but has spent years within the tech transformation industry, working for one of the biggest global tech industries.

While before we gathered insights anecdotally, Talent Intelligence is the professionalisation of information gathering. The need for data has also grown as companies globalise and labour markets grow tighter, which has fuelled the demand for Talent Intelligence. - Elke Manjet

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. A review or a share on social really does go a long way in helping us reach as many ears as possible.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

Welcome to 9th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

Where we, meaning me and my far more talented co-hosts Alison Ettridge and Toby Culshaw, stayed up late to welcome Chris Long from Preacta. Based all they on the other side of the world - Australia.

After our usual pleasantries, Toby dived straight in with his update on the happening within the world of Talent Intelligence.

We started by discussing a recently released article by Pawel Adrjan from Indeed, titled “The Office is not dead”. The article states that 60% of remote jobs posted by employers were marked as ‘temporarily remote’. Suggesting that many employers expect their workforce to return to the office post-pandemic.

“I find this really interesting. We aren’t seeing that massive spike in remote roles that we all expected and I think that’s because Zoom Fatigue is not being factored in when we talk about permanent work-from-home strategies” - Toby Culshaw

“I was actually back in the office in June. Working 4 days in the office and working Thursday from home. And I just don’t feel that fully remote is really going to be a model going forward.” - Chris Long

Toby continued with his worldly updates pivoting our chat to something that we already discussed on Ep. 5 with Lyndon Llanes - the mandate by the SEC. But now we are starting to see the data trickling in.

Even though, currently, it's not delivering a huge amount of value. It’s disjointed and from a varied amount of data sets.

Will this type of publicly available data give a company competitor advantage? And will it allow potential candidates to assess the company and decided if there would enjoy working there?

Alison pointed out that Australia was actually one of the first countries to mandate a quota for gender diversity - we were eager to hear Chris opinion.

“Gender diversity is the target for many big organisations, but there are also talks about other diversity mandates that we will likely see in the future-focused more on the internal workforce.” - Chris Long

Reaching the virtual halfway point and clearly, we were eager to find out more about our amazing guest, I figuratively passed the mic onto our resident hard-hitting interviewer extraordinaire - Alison.

We find out Chris’s definition of Talent Intelligence. Examples of how to use external data to influence the business strategy. And a bit more about Preacta, their typical client base and how they integrate Talent Intelligence.

“For me Talent Intelligence is fundamental. We can inform the whole organisation because we dissect such a varied amount of information. We don’t just use location, job title or the usual data points. But also external data to inform what we do internally” - Chris Long

Toby agreed, saying that the Talent Intelligence function wears multiple hats. It can influence the ‘here and now’ immediate decisions. But also the overall business strategy and where to source talent.

As always we hope you enjoy the episode. All we ask in return is your help in telling the world.

This podcast needs your support to reach as many ears as possible. A review or rating on your favourite podcast listening app does go a long way.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

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Don’t forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition

Welcome to Episode 32 of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! Join hosts Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge, and Toby Culshaw as they welcome Lou Griffiths, Senior Manager of Talent Intelligence at EY UK, who shares her remarkable journey in building and scaling talent intelligence capabilities.

Toby kicks off with an engaging news segment, covering the cooling UK labour market, the increasing trend of older workers in the workforce, and Japan's concerns about AI monopolies - particularly Nvidia's 80% semiconductor market share. The discussion also touches on Google's innovative "reverse aquahire" strategy, sparking an interesting debate about the future of tech talent acquisition.

In the main interview, Lou shares her fascinating transition from scientific recruitment to establishing EY UK's Talent Intelligence function. She discusses her innovative "Talent Screen" tool, which has captured over 5,000 recruiter conversations and 200,000 data points, providing valuable insights into candidate sentiment and market trends.

Lou delves into how her small but mighty team delivered 35 strategic talent intelligence projects in the past year, working on everything from location strategy to competitive intelligence. She emphasises the importance of transforming recruiters into "intelligence-led" professionals and shares practical approaches to embedding data-driven decision-making in talent acquisition.

The conversation explores EY's shift from role-based to skills-based talent strategies and the challenges of centralising talent intelligence in a global organisation. Lou's passion for proactive, strategic talent intelligence shines through as she discusses the future of the function and the importance of delivering what stakeholders need, not just what they want.

Throughout the episode, listeners will gain valuable insights into building and scaling talent intelligence functions, making data actionable for recruiters, and driving strategic value in a professional services environment.

Until next time, stay intelligent, and don't forget to connect with Lou on LinkedIn to learn more about her innovative work in talent intelligence!

Welcome back for another captivating episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! In episode 28, your regular hosts Alan Walker, Alison Etridge and Toby Culshaw engage in an intriguing discussion with Matt Higgs, Director of Organisational Capability at Arambol.

Kicking things off, Toby provides the latest news roundup, spanning topics like Corn Ferry’s 2024 talent acquisition trends report, the impacts of an ageing workforce and associated “grey tsunami”, and increased government attention on how AI will transform jobs and workplaces. The trends provide much food for thought on the external factors shaping workforce planning.

Shifting gears to our interview with Matt Higgs, we uncover his varied career journey through recruitment consulting, strategic HR business partner roles, analytics, strategic workforce planning and organisational capability building.

A key theme is the connection between proactive early careers planning and forecasting future talent needs. By scrutinising historical hiring patterns and projecting retirement trends, Matt was able to build a convincing business case for significantly expanding apprenticeship programmes. This demonstrates how data and analytics can transform typically reactive talent acquisition into forward-looking planning.

Matt explains how he has expanded this approach over time, leveraging analytics to bring rigour and metrics to “softer” areas of HR like leadership development. He also shares his experience spearheading a nascent strategic workforce planning pilot, demonstrating how integrated business planning principles can create an “organic” and sustainable planning capability.

Throughout the discussion, Matt emphasises the vital context talent intelligence brings to supplement internal workforce planning. By providing insights on external talent dynamics, TI enables more informed assessments of whether talent gaps can feasibly be addressed through hiring or require alternative solutions. We also cover the importance of translating long-range strategic plans into specific actions for talent acquisition to execute.

The conversation underscores Matt’s invaluable perspective on bringing together analytics, planning, talent intelligence and more to enable superior workforce decisions. His wisdom leaves us eager to have him back for future episodes to share more talent insights!

Until next time, stay intelligent folks, and don't forget to share the podcast!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens!

Get ready to geek out over data science and talent intelligence in this meaty new episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! Regular hosts Alan Walker, Alison Etridge and Toby Culshaw engage in an illuminating discussion with Ranjan Dhar, Principal Data Scientist at Stratagem.

Kicking things off, Toby provides a roundup of the latest TI news, spanning decentralised TI capabilities, major plays by Microsoft, SAP and others in skills intelligence platforms, early signs of cooling demand despite skill shortages, and more trends shaping the external talent landscape.

Shifting focus to our interview, we unravel Ranjan's fascinating journey into talent data science, stemming from his early days helping to scale a pioneering TI supplier from 20 to 200+ employees after its acquisition by Gartner. He recounts the challenges of working with complex, messy talent data sets, and explains typical day-to-day work ranging from data exploration to advanced machine learning modelling.

We explore a number of applied examples where Ranjan has leveraged natural language processing and other techniques to uncover insights from job postings, profiles, and more talent data sources. He emphasises how properly framing the business problem is vital before applying advanced analytics, so the techniques match the use case rather than being solutions seeking problems.

Ranjan shares thoughtful advice on working with data scientists as a business leader, highlighting the need for trust, data access, and taking an exploratory approach to the art of the possible. We discuss the pros and cons of centralised versus decentralised models for embedding TI and analytics capabilities through organisations.

With his extensive perspective spanning both the supplier side and in-house talent intelligence, Ranjan elucidates the huge potential impact when talent leaders effectively collaborate with data scientists. He demystifies how advanced analytics can transform messy, unstructured hiring data into actionable skills-based insights that drive better workforce decisions.

If you're interested in the intersection of data science and talent intelligence, don't miss this engaging insider view into the art of the possible! As always, stay intelligent folks!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens!

Welcome to the 15th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

Before I jump into this episode - we are excited to launch the 2021 Talent Intelligence Awards in partnership with Stratigens. Celebrating the most insightful, innovative, and best of talent intelligence.

If you want to showcase your amazing work - check out this link (deadline for entries is the 15th of November).

I was, as always, joined by my fabulous co-hosts Alison Ettridge of Talent Intuition and Toby Culshaw of Amazon, but unfortunately, no Nick Brooks. He was settling into a brand new role, but more on that in the next episode.

This show wouldn't be anything without our guests - and this time, we were joined by a longtime fan of the show - the fantastic Randy Bailey of Walmart.

We started off the episode in our typical fashion, with Toby updating us on the happenings within the world of Talent Intelligence. The news has been pretty active this month, but it has all revolved around the same topic - the widening labour jab.

I've found this whole discussion to be quite eye-opening. They've talked a lot about improving the business environment but fundamentally it's really about a skills gap. The declining supply of labour and skills.

Alison Ettridge

As the gap continues to widen, many organisations are going to be looking at their existing workforce planning. We will have to expand into other markets outside of the UK, which is how the issue really ties into Talent Intelligence.

It's the role of Talent Intelligence to help the conversation. We are often not solving the problem but bringing the conversation to the table to help get to an answer.

Randy Bailey

However, Europe is also facing a challenging labour environment, with Eurostat reporting their employment rate of people aged 20 to 64 was increasing quarter on quarter. Meaning their labour market slack - which comprises all people who have an unmet need for employment - is falling.

Even if we decided to look outside the UK, we aren't going to see this immediate influx in labour. That talent market is ridiculously tight anywhere. It's time we start thinking about transferable skills.

Toby Culshaw

After this very labour focused discussion, it was time for us to find out more about our amazing guest, Randy. Eager to find out how Randy became the Sourcing Grandmaster (and what that is), the skills he needed to transition into Talent Intelligence and how sourcing has changed over the years.

I was much more about the data initially, but I learned pretty early on within Talent Intelligence, making this information visually easier to read and explain is as important as the data you are presenting.

Randy Bailey

On that topic, is there any advice you should share with your past self about starting a Talent Intelligence team? Where to start? Or with what skills?

Always be curious. Take the extra time to present the ideas in a way that people can actually understand the information. Having an amazing diverse team as well really helps with diversity of thought and approach to the puzzle.

Randy Bailey

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. A review or a share on social really does go a long way in helping us reach as many ears as possible.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

Welcome to another episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

In this ‘not a milestone’ episode, my amazing co-hosts Toby Culshaw and Alison Ettridge and I welcomed the incredible Adrian Malatesta from Remitly.

After our usual pleasantries, Toby dived straight in with his update on the happening within the world of Talent Intelligence.

2023 started in the worst way possible, talent-wise, with so many roles being laid off.  According to layoffs.fyi, there have already been 40,474 tech jobs cut in January 2023 from 151 different companies.

“I read an article on this. It really isn’t about decline. What we are seeing is a reversion to the norm after companies hired at a new rate in 2021/2022.”

Alison Ettridge

Looking to move towards some slightly more ‘sunshine positive’ news, we were thrilled to hear that Josh Bersin highlighted Talent Intelligence as a critical area of focus for many companies in 2023.

The hated term, ‘war for talent,’ may be a thing of the past as companies also start to focus more on skills. Ensuring that even as unneeded roles are eliminated, employees with critical skills are retained and redeployed to different areas.

At this point, I felt we had heard everyone's opinion about the world and its news, and we were eager to learn more about our guest, Adrian. About his world and his background. So I virtually passed the mic onto our resident hard-hitting interviewer extraordinaire - Alison.

There is research that shows that 75% of C-suite leave an organisation within three years of acquisition. So is that where the use of Talent intelligence comes in?

“I think in the early stages, maybe. We go back a lot to our conversation from before about skill sets. Answering the question - are we buying and acquiring the skills we need.”

Adrian Malatesta

During the Talent Intelligence Jamboree back in November, Andrian touched on the topic of Global expansion and location, and here on the podcast, we talk a lot about joining the dots between the labour market, economy and locations. What other dots  should be connected for maximum insight in terms of Talent Intelligence?

“Probably a mix of qualitative aspects. Like immigration, culture & values, and DEI. And their overlay on data. ”

Adrian Malatesta

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. A review or a share on social really goes a long way in helping us reach as many ears as possible.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

Welcome back to 4th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast.

Where we, as in myself, Alan Walker, and my amazing co-hosts Toby Culshaw and Nick Brooks, joining for his debut podcast episode, chatted to Talent Intelligence superstar Alethe Denis.

Alison Ettridge our other usual co-host was unable to join us. The combination of a biblical storm. The fact she lives in the sticks. And her broadband – basically two tin cans and a long piece of string – was knocked out because of said storm.

Anyway! Not to worry, Alison will be back for the next episode – and we’ll finally have the full band together!

As we are still on episode 4, I started off with a quick round of intros. With Nick going first since he’s been absent for the first episodes raising two still very small humans. He is the Talent Intelligence Programme Manager at Microsoft, for anybody who was wondering.

While our guest for this episode is Alethe Denis, is part of the Market Intelligence Manager at ManpowerGroup Talent.

A big topic that we discussed in the episode is how companies are using the data and the insight that comes from Talent Intelligence to make their decisions. How to pivot and change accordingly with the challenges they face.

Toby, Nick and Alethe all mentioned how organisations are beginning to understand how Talent Intelligence can be used across the business. Fully understanding how data can be used to influence departments decisions and anticipate risks.

Alethe also mentioned that some additional common themes were things like cost efficiency, maximisation of the job force mix and location strategy.

Which Toby picked up on, saying that location strategy is something that we have touched upon before, in past episodes.

ARE WE GOING TO SEE DE-URBANISATION? A BIG SHIFT IN SALARIES? AND WHAT ARE GOING TO BE THE KNOCK-ON EFFECTS GOING TO BE? BUT ALSO, HOW MUCH OF THIS IS PERMEANT, AND HOW MANY ORGANISATIONS ARE ONLY ENABLING THIS ON A TEMPORARY BASIS.

Toby’s final update was around an article about how Facebook used data, trends and insight to choose where their first European hub was going to be based. Unfortunately, though, it gave no mention to the Talent Intelligence team.

And when I questioned why that would be: Athene said:

“TALENT INTELLIGENCE TEAMS ARE REALLY THE UNSUNG HEROES. HENCE WHY THIS SHIFT IN MAKING DATA AND INSIGHTS ACCESSIBLE FOR THE WIDER TEAM IS A STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION.”

Nick then, stepping into for Alison, and asked Athene about her day-to-day. The total workforce index, the biggest challenges that she and her team face when choosing which metrics to look at. And what type of customers does she usually deal with.

I may be a bit bias when I say this, but I really do think this was such an interesting episode. Especially when Athene walked us through her experience with DeathCon and terminology of source intelligence.

As always, we would love to hear your feedback!

Let us know what works, what doesn’t.. review, spread the word and give us a rating about the podcast, your support is very much appreciated.

And of course, if there’s anything we can do better – drop us a line. You can do this via our email, or reach out to us on our LinkedIn page or Facebook Group.

Stay intelligent!

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Don’t forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition

Welcome back, dear listeners and readers,  to another episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

But, fear not. This episode is 100% robot-free. In this riveting episode, we (the usual motley crew of myself, Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge and Toby Culshaw) had the pleasure of diving deep into the world of Talent Intelligence with the brilliant Anastasiia Kolos. 

We kick off this milestone episode with Toby taking the reins to provide us with the latest updates in the world of Talent Intelligence. Toby enlightens us about an intriguing product called dot ai, which demonstrated an AI-driven sales conversation, making us ponder the future of AI in recruitment and sales.

Alison chimes in about the skills-based hiring trend that's gaining momentum. LinkedIn's research on skills-based hiring in the European labour market and the shift away from traditional degrees toward skills-based qualifications are causing ripples in the talent pool. However, we acknowledge that while skills-based hiring is exciting, its practical implementation presents numerous challenges.

Now, shifting our focus to the main topic of this episode - our amazing guest, Anastasiia Kolos, Alison takes the lead in asking all the right questions.

Anastasiia's journey into Talent Intelligence began with a fortunate encounter during her master's program in strategic management. Little did she know that this chance encounter would set her on a path to becoming a thought leader in the field.

"Exploring the whole new world of being in a big corporate environment was like solving a complex puzzle."

Anastasiia Kolos

Her experience at Philips, a global giant, provided her with a remarkable training ground. She gained exposure to the inner workings of a corporate powerhouse, from mergers and acquisitions to strategic execution. This experience has been invaluable in her current role at Nexperia.

One of the key takeaways from our conversation is the importance of shifting the conversation from hiring individuals to addressing an organization's broader strategic challenges.

"Understanding the broader strategy is the first step to providing meaningful Talent Intelligence insights."

Anastasiia Kolos

The world of Talent Intelligence is evolving, and Anastasiia shed light on how it plays a pivotal role in addressing talent shortages—a pressing issue in her industry, semiconductors. However, what makes it even more intriguing is the simultaneous existence of talent shortages and oversupply in other areas of the industry.

Market intelligence and competitive insights are also on Anastasiia's radar. She emphasized the importance of understanding how different elements within an organization interconnect to provide more meaningful insights to drive success.

Looking forward, Anastasiia envisions the future of Talent Intelligence as an integrated approach that combines internal and external data sources. By harmonizing workforce strategy, future of work initiatives, and Talent Intelligence, organizations can better answer the "So what?" question and act on insights effectively.

It has been a pleasure having Anastasiia Kolos as our guest, sharing her profound insights and experiences in the dynamic field of Talent Intelligence.  And, as always, your support means the world to us. Be sure to tune in to the full episode and share your thoughts with us. Until next time – stay intelligent!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

Welcome to the 18th episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast!

After one of our famous ‘longer than expected’ breaks, we're back strong with what we believe is one of our best episodes yet.

In this episode, Alison Ettridge, Toby Culshaw and I co-hosted an incredibly insightful conversation with Kim Bryan, Head of Global Insights & Intelligence - Sourcing Centre of Excellence at AMS.

Throughout the episode, we cover some meaty old topics. Starting with some recommended listening - yes, we like other podcasts. For example, The IntelliCast Podcast latest episode on How Strategy & Intelligence Work Together at Target gave some great ideas about how Talent Intelligence could mature.

We then discussed the cyber security industry's growth (or potential growth), as a new report has found that Ireland could grow its cybersecurity workforce to more than 17,000 by 2030.

Yet the most prominent factor restricting it is the lack of qualified individuals.

“I’m going to sound like a broken record, but this is yet another example of how we (as countries) must learn to tie in our economic growth ambitions with education.”

Alison Ettridge

Stemming from the news of Eightfold AI entering into a partnership with the US Defense Innovation Unit, tasked with creating a platform to identify undiscoverable expertise within the Department, we discussed the age-old question. Should companies start hiring individuals based on their skills, not their existing job title?

“The potential for this is HUGE. The pandemic has accelerated this to a degree. People have had the time to fine-tune skills and learn new ones. Especially when learning code, website development, and other things have never been easier.”

Kim Bryan

Believed that to be enough news and insights - as informative as it was - Alison was eager to start questioning our guest, Kim. With questions like: "How has her team at AMS changed over her five years with them", and "What does a typical work day look like".  And “How do you present your findings? How much detail should you include?”

“The important thing to remember is being mindful of who your end-user will be. From Heads of Talent Acquisition to HR to the CFOs or CEOs. That will inform how big that piece of insight is, the terminology you use, and the whole set-up.”

Kim Bryan

We’ve definitely mentioned this on the podcast before. While the insights are interesting to us for most clients or end-users, they are simply looking for direction on what to do next and where to look.

“I most likely say this countless times a day. “So what?” Whether it’s a small tactical piece or a huge strategic one if you don’t have that, it’s just data and stakeholders using it if they don’t know what to do with it.”

Kim Bryan

As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. A review or a social share really goes a long way in helping us reach as many ears as possible.

Till the next one – stay intelligent!

Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.

And we’re back with the second episode of the Talent Intelligence Podcast. And what a cracker!

In this episode, we, being me and my far more talented co-hosts Alison Ettridge and Toby Culshaw, are joined by Sean Armstrong from Standard Industries.

After our usual introductions (can I say usual on episode 2?) a report by McKinsey&Company, which states that by 2030 22% of the EU workforce would be automated, kick-started our conversations.

Is there a need for a clear distinction between jobs and job tasks? Is the solution to possible job losses simply a shift in work? And an up-skilling of the workforce?  And while automation has been on the agenda for a while, the use of AI tech to recruit talent is still quite a controversial topic. As Toby mentioned:

AI COULD EQUALLY BE THE SOLUTION TO RECRUITMENT BIAS BUT JUST AS EASILY BE THE CAUSE OF APPLICANT EXCLUSION (LIKE FOR THE NEURODIVERSE).

Our conversation then moved to work environments. Which caused us to try and address questions like:

• If in theory, the talent market is frictionless, do you pay people the same? Regardless of their local economy?
• And whether not having a physical office or having the ability to meet colleagues would affect an employees loyalty to the company/brand?
• Which in turn could cause a much more fluid career choice? Will this realisation cause organisations to improve jobs? culture? and pay?

However, these questions only really apply to roles that can be accomplished from home. What about the people who need to go into a physical workplace? At which point our guest Sean commented:

IT REALLY IS ABOUT MAKING A WORKPLACE INCLUSIVE AND PRODUCTIVE FOR EVERYONE

We then asked Sean a few questions about his typical day, his opinions on what leaders should be asking from their TI teams and what he thinks the future of TI looks like.

We even discuss the possible connection between the world of Talent Intelligence and The Big Short (yes the movie).

This really was such an interesting well-rounded conversation and we hope you enjoy it. If you did don’t forget to like, leave a review, spread the word and give us a rating about the podcast, your support is very much appreciated.

Till next time!

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Don’t forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition