The use of talent pools is one recommendation in the Secretary-General’s System-wide Strategy on Gender Parity, in this article we list 7 best practices to build effective talent pools in your organization and what has made talent pools to fail in the past. Use our tips how you best use talent pools to reach gender parity in your organization!

The Secretary-General António Guterres calls for gender parity at the UN. One of his solutions in his UN System-Wide Strategy on Gender Parity is the creation of talent pools. In this article we provide you with the definition of different common terms used to group talents to increase diversity and recruitment quality, to reach gender parity and last but not least to speed up recruitment at the UN and at International Organizations.
 

Conflict is inevitable. Many humanitarian or other development employment posts are located in areas affected by conflict. With unfamiliar surroundings, strenuous work, little food, and the need for cross-cultural communication, these situations are ripe for conflict. Luckily our ability to transcend it is unbelievable. Here are four skills you can develop to better manage conflict.

Identifying the key metrics to measure the success of your International Organization’s recruitment process may be challenging. Over time, I have taken part in several studies of recruitment process performance with the aim of speeding up the recruitment of International Organizations. We have prepared a free white paper based on these studies, where we present 11 HR metrics to monitor improved efficiency and increased diversity, that could be your starting point for formulating your key recruitment metrics.

For every new hire at Google, leadership is one of four key skills that is assessed. Leadership is important even for talents not applying directly to a managerial role. It is key to be able to manage a project, but further down the career the candidate may be exposed to leadership roles, says Martin Eriksson, who has a long career at Google. He is now based in Stockholm, but he has worked for Google at their HQ in California as well in their European headquarter in Ireland

I have studied many International Organizations, time-to-fill, the recruitment time from published job advertisement to the candidate’s acceptance of job offer takes in average 100 days. Google gets the world’s best talents, they conduct 4 interviews and receive the accepted job offer within 4 weeks from the first interview. Can International Organizations learn anything from Google?

Competency Based Interviewing (CBI) is the far most common assessment method at International Organizations. It has become popular as it has proven a pretty high validity at a low cost. In this article, we have gathered six risks and weaknesses associated with using CBI in a multicultural context that every HR professional and Interview Panelist should be aware of.

Just as the theory and quote from Benjamin Schneiders main thesis (1987), we believe that  "the people make the place", not the other way around.  In this blog we  use his theory as starting point when designing an employer brand. 

Have you ever felt that you did not fit in a group or an organisation, just being the odd one out? If you are able to discover the core personality of your organisation, what are the common behaviours? What are the dos and don'ts? How do people behave, when no one is looking? What is recognised, rewarded and encouraged in your organization? An organisation's story starts with its founders as they determine the "right" and "wrong" behaviours. Their story will attract those with the same attitudes and values if the story is honestly communicated. 

If your organisation is presented in a way that reflects the common attitudes and behaviours truthfully you will be able to attract people who would share your values, interests and your objectives.  These individuals are more likely to enjoy your organisation, stay longer and contribute. The better fit you have between a talent's expectations and the reality of your organisational life, the higher the job satisfaction and the longer the talent will stay and deliver in your organization (Premack & Wanous, 1985). Honesty and clarity pays off, that is. 

Organizations that invest in staff engagement strategies realize stronger results because they create environments where employees thrive and can be their best. Absenteeism rates are lower, productivity rates are higher and performance levels are better.  It only makes sense to provide staff with a clear expectation of their role, tools and resources to accomplish goals and development opportunities to continuously grow and develop.