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5 key capabilities of business leaders

Are you meeting the challenges of today's post-recession environment?

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The firm surveyed 386 organizations nationwide earlier this year, receiving responses from all levels of employees. The majority of respondents were either directors (32%) or managers (30%), primarily in human resources roles.

The survey results found that leaders play a vital role in delivering desired customer service (53%), meeting business goals (40%) and profitability targets (40%), and retaining talent (35%).  However, only 14% believe their leaders are extremely effective at delivering quality service, while their ability to meet business goals and profitability targets is ranked at 8% and 10%, respectively. As for retaining talent, just 5% rated their leaders as extremely effective.

“Now that the Canadian economy is recovering, survey respondents named employee engagement as their primary post-recession business concern, followed by the retention of top talent,” said Robert Carlyle, vice president at Aon Hewitt in Toronto. “If leaders aren’t able to keep pace with shifting demands, they run the risk of losing key employees to competitors.”

According to Aon Hewitt, leaders must be more creative in this post-recession environment. Key capabilities include:

1. Focusing on the most valuable talent and pay for performance
2. Demonstrating speed and agility
3. Developing middle management
4. Increasing employee engagement
5. Developing leadership resiliency

A focus on middle management is also important.

“Leaders must invest in developing middle managers – they’re the ones who can bridge the gap between leadership strategy and employee actions and can effect change,” stated Carlyle.

Hiring Trends

In addition, the survey revealed 39% of respondents are planning to hire more employees in 2011 than they did in 2010, and only 13% expect to hire fewer employees this year than they did last year. However, just 24% of organizations believe they are very or extremely effective at hiring quality employees. Half of the responding organizations say they are effective at securing quality hires and 26% think they are only somewhat effective or not at all effective at hiring quality workers.

According to Aon Hewitt, one of the reasons for this poor perspective on organizations’ ability to effectively hire quality employees is due to the fact that many HR departments lack recruiting resources to process and screen the large number of candidates applying for positions. Forty per cent if respondents state it is very or extremely important for then to fill positions faster, while only 17% think they are very or extremely effective in doing so.

“Improving the hiring process is critical if employers are planning to ramp up their number of new hires,” said Carlyle. “We are seeing organizations focus on improving the candidate experience, upgrading selection and assessment approaches that will yield increased performance from new hires, and redesigning the on-boarding process.”

The survey results also revealed:

• Just over half (51%) of respondents agree or strongly agree they have a stated HR strategy and plan.
• When recruiting entry-level employees, the three sources organizations rely on the most are employee referrals, job boards and unsolicited applications received through the company website. For more experienced hires, employers again turn to employee referrals and job boards, but also look to agencies for help in finding candidates.
• According to 28% of respondents, it is not important for their organization to leverage social media for recruitment. That’s just as well, given that 38% believe their employer is ineffective in leveraging social media for this purpose.