The Future of Talent Acquisition

James Phanyasaeng, Manager, Talent Acquisition Technology & Pensions at OMERS

Before becoming the talent acquisition manager for technology and pensions at OMERS, what were some of your experiences that empowered you to pursue human resources?

I got my Bachelor of Business Administration with a specialty in Human Resources at Wilfrid Laurier University. One of my favorite courses was recruitment and selection, and I pursued it as a career once I finished university. 

I spent the next seven years at recruiting agencies in Toronto, where I specialized in technology hiring and supported the recruitment needs of multiple clients. Later, I landed a position at Shopify, which officiated my move to an in-house corporate recruitment career. I learned a lot and grew quickly as I became a manager of talent acquisition during my one year there. I am currently at OMERS, where I specialize in hiring for technology and pensions across the entire organization.  

What are some of the obstacles that most companies are facing in the recruitment and hiring space, and how is that impacting the industry as a whole?

Two recent environmental factors had a major impact on talent acquisition. The first was pandemic, where we were in lockdown for two-plus years and had to switch from in-person to remote. Many organizations were not equipped for that. 

However, humans are very adaptable–once we begin adjusting to situations, we accept them as the norm. After two years of remote work, many people began to prefer it, creating a huge shift in the candidate market. Companies attempting to resume in-person work are facing pushback from employees who want that flexibility from the pandemic to continue.

I came from Shopify, which transitioned into a remote-only company. It created a lot of challenges regarding interacting, connecting, and collaborating with people, as well as gaining trust with colleagues you have never met in person. Team collaboration was majorly affected as a result.

The second factor is the impact of inflation and recession on the technology industry. Salaries and benefits are an organization's biggest costs. Interest rates in Canada are on the rise, and many companies, especially tech startups that expanded too quickly, are experiencing a severe need to reduce their workforce by 10, 20, and sometimes 50 percent, which we observed with Twitter. That was a turning point for the technology industry, which previously spent money without restraint. Free lunches, massage, gaming, and nap rooms, are a few of the many perks and benefits companies offered employees before resorting to cost-cutting and recalibrating how they spend money.

In light of these challenges and complexities that have emerged in the marketplace, how significant is the pre-employment screening process itself in today's world?

The current layoffs are driving people into the job market, pushing the urgent need for background screenings, education, and employment verification, references, assessments and pre-employment screening processes. There is an intense focus on the quality of hires from a talent acquisition perspective. Essentially, evaluating how accurately online pre-employment screenings verify a potential hire's ability to positively impact an organization. As everyone is cutting costs, it is crucial that the ROI from a hire is greater than before. 

With these requirements that have risen within the marketplace, what is the particular leadership strategy that you, as a manager of talent acquisition technology and pensions, are using?

Be cautious while hiring, and ensure that any hiring you do is for the right reasons and there is a budget allocated for it. People in the past have been flexible with regard to how much hiring they do, the cost of it, and why it is needed. However, resources are tighter now. As talent recruiters, we need to challenge our peers and hiring managers and question whether a new hire is necessary for the team and if the budget allows it. 

Being more thoughtful and intentional with new hires is going to be the new trend. Ultimately, hiring a mass of individuals for the sake of increasing headcount leads to future reductions because they weren't necessary. It is important to learn from mistakes and be more proactive about our work, which are the values I am fostering within my team and peers.

How do you see talent acquisition and pre-employment screening advancing in the future? 

Technology is advancing at a rapid pace. AI and machine learning is being utilized across industries, especially finance, and we are already seeing its impact on work processes. Soon, it will enter the HR and talent acquisition sector and help make decisions about the type of people we want to hire and decide the screening processes and assessments we need to do. 

The bulk of assessing a candidate's hard skills will be handled by technology, while humans evaluate their soft skills and alignment with company values. The technology sector, in particular, will reach a point where a candidate's programming skills can be assessed through technology that analyzes their previous code and grades its quality. 

To this day, many companies have a slow and manual process for checking resumes. An AI tool can help filter, screen, and assess thousands of applicants in a matter of minutes. We already see that happening with technologies like ChatGPT and language learning models, which support an individual's work and quicken their process.

We have even seen tools that uses AI to anonymize resumes to help conduct unbiased reviews. Some of these tools have been around for a while, so it is just a matter of time before more of this technology takes over. AI and automation will make talent acquisition more efficient and help humans make better decisions.

Pre-Employment Screening

ROI

Machine Learning