Why quiet hiring might be the answer to your talent shortage

Is quiet hiring the latest employment trend worth keeping an eye on? If your company is looking to grow, optimize and innovate in 2023, this growing movement might be the best way to do so!

If you’re familiar with quiet quitting, you know the concept of employees slowly vacating their roles until they either don’t show up or you’re forced to officially let them go. Quiet hiring is somewhat like the opposite by shifting employees around your company in an effort to keep them engaged and effectively working towards your business goals. 

Traditionally known as employee redeployment, quiet hiring is the process of matching your talent to your needs, instead of posting another full-time job or looking for traditional candidates. And it’s not just about moving employees from one role to another. 

It can also involve creating new roles to put employees’ skills to work, or upskilling employees to expand your offerings. Quiet hiring encourages leaders to take a closer look at the skills, talents and interests of their current team, and match those skills with their biggest needs. No interviews, resumes or callbacks required. 

How does quiet hiring work?

There are two main ways to leverage quiet hiring to benefit your business: Start comparing your gaps to your existing employees’ skills and passions, or hire independent contractors instead of employees. 

The talent shortage of 2022 isn’t ending any time soon, so companies looking to fill an empty role, create a new one or solve a short-term pressing need can start looking at their current employees for potential candidates. Search for roles that are now redundant or outdated. 

Can those team members be shifted to areas of higher need? Think about your high-performance employees. Is there an opportunity to internally promote them — if not vertically, horizontally?

For short-term needs or highly specialized roles, independent contractors offer companies a unique way to fill critical roles without stretching their resources. In 2022, over 21 million people worked independently, spending 15 hours a week or more filling independent and contract roles.

And because these independent contractors can each support a number of companies simultaneously, this talent pool can be deeper and wider than what’s available internally. Many large companies, like Amazon, FedEx, the NFL, DirectTV, BMW and more, have used independent contract labor to improve their efficiency and reduce overall employment costs. 

These companies benefit from the easier onboarding process, larger pool of talent, ability to scale quickly and employee benefits savings.  As long as your work meets the regulatory requirements of independent contractor work and you have oversight in place to monitor the work completed, this can be a simple and cost-effective way to meet your growth goals. 

Why quiet hire when you can hire using traditional methods?

The biggest benefit of quiet hiring is retaining your most valuable employees. 

According to a Gallup survey, 48% of workers would change jobs if offered the training opportunities needed to qualify. And 65% of workers surveyed believe upskilling opportunities are very important when evaluating a potential new job. 

If you aren’t upskilling your current talent, there’s a good chance they’ll be looking for another company that will. But by training your existing team — those who already know your business’ culture and systems — you gain access to a group of loyal, highly-skilled employees ready to grow and engage. 

By reducing your company’s turnover, you also save considerable costs and time. Did you know the average cost to hire an employee is now $4,700? When you add in the cost of missed opportunities and the added stress on the employees filling in for the empty position, that makes finding talent not just time-consuming, but detrimentally expensive! 

Especially if you’re in need of highly skilled and specialized talent, where the pool of qualified workers is limited. Overall, employee redeployment is a strategy that can benefit both employees and businesses, by boosting job satisfaction, strengthening employee retention and streamlining your organizational efficiency.

Before you start quiet hiring, read these tips. There’s an art to the trend. 

In order to successfully leverage quiet hiring, you have to be strategic. No employee wants to be forced into a role they weren’t ready for. And the “quiet” in quiet hiring doesn’t mean you move your team members without telling them!

Here’s how to make quiet hiring work for your business: 

Clearly communicate the shift. Always talk to your employee about the new role and opportunity before moving them. Ask for feedback, and listen to it. 

Look for enthusiasm. The worst thing you can do is move an employee into a role they aren’t authentically enthusiastic about. That’s a recipe for low engagement and lower productivity! Look for workers who are interested in developing, want to grow and have a strong skills match, with room to learn. 

Always match promotion or redeployment with training and support. Just because they’re already on your team doesn’t mean the onboarding process isn’t important. New roles will require new skills and training, so be generous as you bring your existing team members into their new role. 

Want more? Escalon has helped over 5,000 companies across a range of industries to optimize routine business functions, like taxes, accounting and HR. Talk to an expert today.

This material has been prepared for informational purposes only. Escalon and its affiliates are not providing tax, legal or accounting advice in this article. If you would like to engage with Escalon, please contact us here.

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Grace Townsley

As a professional copywriter in the finance and B2B space, Grace Townsley offers small business leaders big insights—one precisely chosen word at a time. Let's connect!

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