There’s an ongoing arms race to grow, attract and retain talent. Aging workforces, emerging technologies, outdated education systems are combining to prevent businesses from accessing the talent they need.
By 2030, more than 85 million jobs could go unfilled because there aren’t enough skilled people to take them, with talent shortages in everything from accounting to software engineering.
Businesses are fighting back. According to the Global Talent Competitiveness Index, Switzerland, Singapore, and the USA are winning the talent race with increased emphasis on “organizational dynamism, human-centered leadership, and HR as a consulting and product organization.” To put it more bluntly, we’re heading towards a world where only the dynamic will survive – but in order to be dynamic to your full potential, you need to have the right talent in your organization.
Why now?
Of course, for many organizations, that requires a lot of uplift. Businesses might wonder if it’s truly worth going to all that effort. Even if they don’t address their talent issues, surely there are other paths to prosperity?
Talent isn’t the only problem we are facing, after all – organizations are under pressure to do more with less, budgets are being squeezed, profitability is more important than ever.
The problem is simply that nothing is as imminent and existential as the talent crunch. A recent report from IDC found that, by 2026, more than 90% of organizations worldwide will experience an IT skills crisis, causing $5.5 trillion of revenue loss.
In the face of the talent crunch, what actually makes a difference is not a silver bullet like AI. It’s about fundamentals: having the right talent and resources to deliver against an organization’ ambitions.
Who should I hire?
So what does a dynamic approach to talent mean in practice? It begins with rethinking the kinds of candidates businesses should pursue.
The old rules of degrees or experience are falling away. In response, companies are increasingly prioritizing candidates’ abilities over their official credentials or geographic location – marking a growing trend toward “skills-based hiring”.
According to recent research, as many as 45% of businesses agree that a candidate’s degree is not as important as their experience. And that’s translating into real-world action. As of 2023, 19% of job postings in the US no longer require degrees, up from 15% in 2021 – suggesting that companies are indeed responding to changes in the talent market.
So far, so dynamic. And yet, not enough businesses are taking skills-based hiring to its logical conclusion. If we truly prioritize skills over any other factor, that should include location.
And it’s only by fishing from a vast, global talent pool that we can access the workers we need to beat the talent crunch.
Where should I hire?
Businesses need to stay agile when it comes to where they’re hiring from or else risk missing out on countless talent opportunities. But searching the entire globe for talent is an intimidating concept. Which is why it’s best to find the areas specializing in a given skill.
At Multiplier, we help businesses employ thousands of global employees. Using the data this produces, we’re able to pick out insights and trends from across the globe to help pinpoint the places emerging as talent hubs.
For instance, companies in the US hiring on the Multiplier platform make almost a third of their hires from the Philippines, in diverse roles such as web development, project management, and recruitment, highlighting the country’s role as a talent exporter.
We’re also able to identify the countries specializing in talent for different sectors and industries. As outside data corroborates, India has long been the go-to place to get software engineers. But as the domestic market continues to grow, demand pressures on key roles like developers mean other talent markets are becoming increasingly attractive to organizations looking for competitive hires.
So in five years time, India is unlikely to be the most attractive market to hire engineering talent for organizations looking to hire highly skilled talent. In fact, our internal hiring data suggests that Bangladesh and Pakistan are hot on India’s heels as a source of software engineers, along with Ukraine and Serbia – all places to keep an eye on in the coming years.
It’s this inherent changeability of the global talent marketplace that means global hiring can never be a simple “set and forget” activity. That’s backed up by the findings of our recent accountant shortage white paper; that the percentage of international accountants hired by US-based companies through Multiplier increased fourfold over the last few years, as businesses shifted their hiring strategies to pursue global talent.
How should I hire?
But achieving this level of dynamism in hiring strategy often feels out of reach for many companies. There remains an instinctive belief that global hiring is hard. Too hard. And too often, organizations delay building global teams assuming it’s not the right time or it’s overly difficult to manage.
This reputation for difficulty can be attributed to the traditional methods of onboarding global teams: opening legal entities. It’s an approach that comes with a litany of barriers, including:
- The difficulty of navigating legal complexities in multiple territories.
- Compliance issues such as the misclassification of workers.
- Exposure to risk including local labor laws, business laws, and corporate governance laws.
All of these factors severely compromise agility – and with such a diverse range of hurdles, it’s little wonder that, according to Deloitte Legal, “Global compliance is perceived as a major issue for in-house lawyers, with over a quarter (26%) saying it is the biggest challenge within their department.” Entities, and the rules they expose you to, are simply more hassle than they’re worth for most businesses.
In 99% of cases, however, you don’t need a local entity to hire local employees.
There are better ways to approach global employment. Chief among them, Employer of Record (EOR) services and global payroll platforms like Multiplier can help employ global talent as seamlessly as though they were local.
Maintaining organizational agility with an EOR
An EOR is an organization that legally employs workers on behalf of another company. Not only is this easier than the alternative, it also affords you the agility to employ workers from different territories without becoming entangled in local bureaucracy. In essence, it breaks the status quo.
That’s a must have in the dynamic talent marketplace – especially with business agility in as bad a state as it already is. Shockingly, only 18% of US employees believe their company is agile, mired as they are in talent shortages. Setting up entities exacerbates the issue, locking you into hiring in a given country because of the costs and time associated with dissolution.
With an EOR employing workers on your behalf instead, companies can improve this statistic. As they assume the local risks, you no longer have to deal with the compliance challenges of employment in unfamiliar markets.
You can’t use traditional methods to unlock access to global talent, break down barriers to human-powered growth in organizations, or enable a world without limits. You need technology to support you in this journey of building global teams without friction
Technology-led EOR firms like Multiplier have made the process simple with self-onboarding tools and automation that lower the cost of transaction, making global employees available to businesses of all sizes.
Tap into the global talent pool with Multiplier
Let’s recap. How do you build global teams without friction?
- First, have a radical focus on skills. Don’t make compromises when you don’t need to.
- Second, take a data driven approach to your global hiring strategies. Don’t let received wisdom dictate where your talent should come from.
- And finally, leverage technology to hire the best talent for your organization.
If you’re still hiring based on location, you’re missing out. While leveraging global talent was previously thought to be prohibitively difficult thanks to the clunkiness of setting up your own entities, an EOR makes maintaining organizational agility much simpler – a must in today’s dynamic global talent marketplace.
Global hiring should and can be for everyone, not just giant multinationals with deep pockets and armies of lawyers. At Multiplier, our mission is to democratize global talent by offering ways to employ global talent simply and effectively. Speak to one of our experts today.
