The Three C’s: Understanding how to communicate in TA

We have two ears and one mouth so that we can listen twice as much as we speak – Epictetus.

Communication was ranked as the most important soft skills for recruiters to have over the next five years, according to LinkedIn’s Future of Recruiting 2023 report – with 78% of recruiting pros choosing it above relationship building, adaptability, problem-solving and business acumen.

Communication is of immeasurable importance to the success of Talent Acquisition (TA) teams. Doing it well can help answer questions like: How do people see our company? What do candidates want from the workplace? And what are my teams missing? 

In this blog, we will lay out the three c’s of communication: collaboration, clarity and compromise. These are just three important areas to keep in mind when thinking about how TA teams can improve their communication strategy.  

Collaboration

Collaboration is often an element that makes or breaks teams – especially those that work in fast-paced environments. TA leaders should therefore aim to create meaningful connections between themselves, candidates, stakeholders, and all internal departments to drive the best decisions. 

Cross-team collaboration is a strategy that some leaders forget to lean on. TA professionals should look to increase their engagement with several areas of their business including:

• Marketing – Improve TA teams’ understanding of marketing strategies that can enhance employer branding and ensure alignment on unified company messaging.
• Finance – Help TA teams keep track of commercials to understand where they can be made more efficient.  
• Operations – Pull together data together from different parts of the business to help TA teams communicate the right messages and make the best hiring decisions – with up-to-date information in real-time. 
• Learning and Development (L&D) – Help TA teams create better strategies for upskilling when looking to fill open roles with internal staff. Interestingly, 81% of in-house recruiters say they need to work more closely with L&D – a big step up from just 45% a year ago. 

Clarity

TA teams need to continuously develop their emotional intelligence (EQ) in order to foster an environment of connection, trust and empathy. That is the place that drives productivity and engagement. 

One way that this shows up in practice is through clarity of communication at work. But, as we see an increasingly remote workforce distributed across the globe, asynchronous messaging makes this difficult to do. Have you ever received a text message and not been sure whether they are angry or sarcastic? Well in the talent acquisition industry, that can make conversations difficult when speaking to candidates – with 72% of leaders and 53% of workers saying that they pay more attention to the tone of messages lately. 

Lack of clarity is a huge time waster for TA teams, with the same report finding that 63% of workers report spending too much time trying to convey messages in the right way. The outcome of this deliberation is essential as 62% of workers say that a positive tone drives a faster response. 

Compromise

TA teams’ ability to understand when to compromise is one of their biggest strengths in today’s market. With so much change in the way we work, it has never been harder for businesses to truly understand the candidate journey. TA experts can actively listen to candidates, reflect on their story and relay this back to leaders who otherwise wouldn’t necessarily have such insight. This is essential at a time when layoffs in industries such as gaming and journalism are leaving candidates questioning: “Will people judge me because I have been let go?”. 

Compromise is also important for how TA teams set their boundaries within their business. Often, TA teams find themselves without full control of their budgets, with the allocation of resources dependent on seniority rather than expertise. However, by actively communicating with leadership and adapting controls, TA can regain autonomy. This empowerment allows teams to push back against forceful stakeholders when necessary, ultimately improving the efficiency and quality of their work. 

Empowering Future-Proof Talent Acquisition

By following these principles of collaboration, clarity, and compromise, TA leaders can empower their teams, build stronger relationships and improve productivity. It is not just about what you say that makes your team better; it is about how you say it, when, and why. 

In the next blog posts of this series, we will delve into one last pillar of future-proof TA teams just in time for 2024 planning: Strategy.

Stay tuned!