Low unemployment is great for the economy (rising wages!), but challenging for employers (higher quit rates and a smaller available talent pool). This can lead to many creative recruiting strategies and looking at (relatively) untapped sources. I came across two not-so-new ideas around this recently.
One is the idea of returnship—these are programs designed for people (primarily women) with white collar education and skills to transition them back into the workforce after raising their families. These are initially short term job tryouts (like an internship). I do find the idea somewhat patronizing in that it seems like companies that use it are saying, “We’ll let you take baby-steps (pun intended) back into the workforce and we’ll see if you’re ready.” It seems exploitative of returning workers’ self-confidence and makes them compete (again) to get jobs that they have already shown they can do. Having said that, companies that use the program are providing opportunities for a very talented pool of candidates. The programs are VERY selective, so it is not surprising that more than half (but not always 100%) of those who are chosen to participate transition to full time positions.
The other is providing job training for older workers. I’ve written about ageism in recruitment and selection before and the problem is not getting any better. This article outlines the pros and cons around re-training older workers. Of course, part of the issue is that companies will force out older (more expensive) workers while they are still productive, and then the employer finds that they are missing important skills. Where the article misses the point is that if given a choice between hiring skilled people or retraining employees (of any age), hiring good talent is less expensive. With so many skilled older workers available, companies with talent shortages (and not just McDonalds) would be wise to recruit from this talent pool.
Creativity often comes when we are faced with a dwindling resource, no matter how temporary. Creating paths for working parents to come back to the workplace and retaining skilled older workers should always be part of HR’s recruitment and retention strategies. Now is as good of a time as any to implement them.