How to recession-proof your company’s digital transformation

“Digital transformations are necessary for a company’s survival in today’s market.”

 

Easy enough to say when the economy is doing well, but what happens when a recession hits, markets contract and revenue dries up? You still need to update your technology and processes, but recessions make it harder to bring those projects to completion, since they bring threats of cuts to operational budgets and hiring.

 

However, the good news is that smart hiring from the beginning is the way to recession-proof your company’s digital transformation and keep your business alive and relevant throughout the ups and downs of the market. And direct sourcing is your key to smart hiring.

 

The problem with traditional tech hiring

 

During the last major recession, in 2008, it was easier for many companies to simply shelve digital transformation projects until things got better. Not so much now, though: we live in an increasingly digital, virtual world, and companies and organisations alike that cannot keep up will lose revenue and market share.

 

Unfortunately, the way many companies hire workers when they’re taking on digital transformations is flawed from the beginning. They will usually pay attention to obvious things from the get-go, such as reviewing how much time a project will take, analysing the speed to production, calculating risk level and return on investment. But the two biggest mistakes businesses often make when hiring developers, project managers and other technical roles for a digital transformation are not thinking about the availability of talent until the final steps, and having an unclear idea of both the hard and soft skills needed to complete a project.

 

This leads to hasty hiring decisions and poor recruitment, which can tank a project, drive up costs and leave companies in a bad place financially when a recession hits. Calculating recruitment costs is complex, and each tech hire is expensive enough on its own. According to hiring expert Dr Bradford Smart, the estimated cost of a mis-hired worker that does not work out can be anywhere from five to 27 times that person’s actual salary, depending on their role and leadership level in the organisation.

 

Bad hires can deliver fatal blows to digital transformation projects that could have ultimately kept a company afloat. But what if we made understanding the skills needed for a role, recognising the on-hand talent available and hiring accordingly a critical early step in building every digital transformation project? This is possible, and it’s done through a good direct sourcing program.

 

Direct sourcing recession-proofs your digital transformation

 

In a full direct sourcing program, the employer brand is at the forefront of talent acquisition endeavours instead of a staffing provider. Employers engage and interact directly with job candidates, but it’s not simply “DIY hiring”. Ideally, a reputable direct-sourcing partner that works with a given company to implement their program will give them clear data and insight on appropriate compensation in their market and the actual availability of different types of talent.

 

There are many short- and long-term benefits of a direct sourcing program. Right off the bat, it costs 35 percent less to hire a worker through a direct sourcing program, according to research from Staffing Industry Analysts (SIA). However, the benefits extend beyond immediate savings. The same SIA study shows that companies who use direct sourcing programs are more likely to understand exactly what their talent pool looks like, and develop strong, brand-forward, long-term relationships with potential workers by engaging with them more directly, enabling them to hire faster and smarter down the road.

 

So, how can you use a direct sourcing platform to restructure your digital transformation hiring and recession-proof those projects? Prioritise your projects based on available, highly matched talent. The key is to think of a digital transformation project as a collection of skills needed, identify those skills, understand what skills are in your market and then plan out the project accordingly. As the projects commence, you can then spend the necessary time to build up the future skills needed.

 

SkillGigs is an e-commerce talent marketplace that pairs skilled job seekers with AI-matched work opportunities. The skilled technology workers on our marketplace have all built out in-depth skill profiles using our patented 3D Resume technology, which makes it easier to understand exactly what they bring to the table. We help our employer clients build a successful direct sourcing program that hires the best talent by developing a skill density rating per project, clearly mapping out the hard (such as coding languages) and soft skills (proven success managing remote teams, for example) needed to make a digital transformation project successful. Our clients then take that skill density and compare it to the skills possessed by the pre-vetted, qualified candidates in our talent marketplace, and then evaluate what the speed of hiring could be, how quickly they can begin work, and budget accordingly.

 

Conclusion

 

Considering the skills needed and the talent available for your technical projects early in the planning process will keep it on-track and cost-efficient, thereby effectively recession-proofing your digital transformation. The talent is out there – all you need to do is find the right people for the right job. A direct sourcing partner such as SkillGigs can help you hire smart and evolve, no matter the economic headwinds.

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Kashif Aftab is Founder and CEO of SkillGigs, an e-commerce talent marketplace that pairs skilled healthcare and technology job seekers with AI-matched work opportunities.

 

Learn more at SkillGigs.com