WORKING skills continue to act as the new currency when it comes to job qualifications, outshining education or experience.
This was shown in LinkedIn’s recent report, it was found that employers in Malaysia are putting in effort to reskill and upskill existing talents in their organisations via dedicated training programmes, apart from hiring externally.
According to the report, companies in Malaysia prefer to hire candidates with technical skills (38%) and transferable skills (28%) and that 67% companies are open to hiring employees from another industry if the skills they possess match the job requirements.
“The pandemic caused new roles to be created and evolve. Therefore, hiring talent with the right skills set for these roles is very important to organisations. It matters less that the talent has the traditional qualifications or industry experience,” said LinkedIn vice president of talent and learning solutions (APAC) Feon Ang.
From this approach, employers are able to plug vital skills gaps while reaping the rewards of a more diverse and adaptable workforce.
In fact, 85% of Malaysian companies now are even more willing to hire internally to fill open roles, with 72% believing the employees would have the additional advantage of an insider’s perspective and 65% believe it would give a sense of progress in the employees’ career.
Importance of data
In order to implement a hiring process based on skills, HR leaders are tapping on the power of data and insights. 55% of Malaysian companies lead the region in using data very frequently for mapping skills with open position requirements.
Among the top areas of data usage are in identifying skills needed in the future (57%), top technical skills required for a particular role or profile (55%) and measuring employee performance (52%).
On this, Ang said: “With skills being an engine of growth now and into the future, it is critical that HR and business leaders are equipped with advanced tools like data analytics. These tools can help them to identify both potential candidates who have those set of skills and internal hires who can be reskilled.”
Data can also help companies design effective employee engagement activities. 30% of companies in Malaysia experienced higher employee attrition due to COVID-19 where 42% of Malaysians have left an organisation for a career change.
Diversifying HR’s roles
Based on the report, the pandemic-induced evolution of job roles also applies to the roles of human resource (HR) personnel. Malaysia saw 55% of HR in companies play an important role in employee training and development, while 54% showed that HR played a significant role in shaping business strategies.
During the pandemic, the importance of HR was elevated further in 68% of organisations as many companies recognised the importance of having the right talent in reshaping business strategy. – April 22, 2021
