All Things Talent Acquisition: Tech Stack, Adoption, & Budgets with George LaRocque

We’re over a quarter into 2023, and we’ve seen that the labor market today is just as turbulent as it was throughout the last year. So, now seems like the right time to pause and reflect on what’s happening now in the world of hiring. During our May webinar, we were joined by George LaRocque, Founder of WorkTech and leading work tech analyst and advisor, to discuss the current state of recruiting and all things talent acquisition when it comes to the tech stack, adoption, and budgets.

Check out the full 1-hour webinar below or read on for a brief synopsis of the 5 topics George discussed related to the current hiring landscape, market challenges, and more. Much of the conversation was centered around a recent WorkTech report on new technology shaping the future of work. If interested, you can download the report here.

Before we dove in, Edisa, our Head of Growth and monthly webinar host, always likes to kick things off by asking our guest about the one thing that people would be surprised to know about them. George’s fact might have something to do with a famous actor that he went to highschool with. You’ll just have to watch the recording to find out who! Now, let’s get into the 5 major topics George discussed…

1.) Current Hiring Landscape

Answering what the current hiring landscape looks like today has never been a more loaded question than it is now! But, it really depends on how you look at it. At the macro level, unemployment has dropped, but we’re still seeing a ton of lay-off headlines, which can get quite confusing. George describes the current landscape as “choppy”. Organizations either can’t hire fast enough or they’re downsizing and are trying to do a lot more with a lot less from a resource perspective. However, George just sees this as a point in time, not as a major shift in the labor market as the macroeconomic trends are driving us in the other direction.

‍2.) Current Market Challenges

‍“Doing more with less” is the theme of the day. George mentions that the major challenges organizations are dealing with today include: 1.) Talent availability - there aren’t enough people to do the jobs available 2.) Skills crisis - do people have the right skills to do the jobs? 3.) Go-to-market from a recruiting perspective - where should organizations be investing in their people and where can tasks be automated? George offers some advice that you need to look at the whole person when you’re recruiting, especially when it comes to a candidate’s potential. It might take someone without the perfect profile a little longer to ramp up, but they’ll stay longer because they’ll recognize the investment you’re making in their growth and success.

‍3.) Tech Stack

George breaks down work tech into 6 key categories (watch the recording or check out his report linked above to see the categories). He mentioned that going forward, he thinks we’ll see a lot of consolidation, and it might seem like some of the more traditional ATS’s, learning systems, etc. are scaling back, but it’s just a sign of the space moving forward and meeting candidates where they are.

‍4.) Adoption & Budgets

According to George’s research, current hiring work tech budgets are increasing. The categories representing the largest increases include talent acquisition analytics, DEIB, candidate sourcing, and chat bots. From an adoption perspective, the tech stack categories that hiring teams are adopting most frequently now are skills assessments, ATS’s, background checks, and new hire onboarding.

5.) Future State of Talent Acquisition ‍

There’s been a lot of hype around skills-driven hiring, and we’re going to see that hype continue. George mentions that recruiters are going to become less concerned with job descriptions and more concerned with focusing on the overall hiring decision and who the best candidates are. He also believes there’s going to be a shift with recruitment marketing, especially with Google’s recent change in how they’re going to be displaying search results, so you’ll have to think about this related to how you find people. Overall, be ready for some major changes in how you spend your time finding and selecting individuals, which is going to be driven by candidate expectations.

Thanks to George for joining us, and see you on June 22nd for our next monthly webinar with Gerry Crispin, Principal & Co-Founder of CareerXroads: Radical Transparency in Hiring.