Toolkit: How to succeed in your first 90 days as a talent acquisition leader

The first 90 days in any leadership role have their challenges. There’s a lot to take in and digest. But if you’re a talent leader stepping into a new role, it can be even more intimidating, especially in such a competitive labor market. Many new leaders are brought in with directives to "fix recruitment," or overhaul everything about the talent acquisition process in three months. To say it's a massive undertaking is putting it lightly.

You’re expected to not only build a future workforce, but also support growth through talent, HR technology, and real-time labor intelligence while also advising the C-suite. In today’s tight talent market, with ever-changing candidate and employee expectations, this can be challenging to say the least.

To get started, we recommend creating a 90-day plan. This will help you can stay on track in your new role as a talent acquisition leader. Leadership 30 60 90-day plans help focus your plan on the company's objectives, strategic goals and future workforce, while also considering the impact that external challenges can have in digestible pieces. (Of course, all while factoring in you'll need to be agile and ready to pivot if the need arises). If the last few years have taught us anything, is that things can change at the drop of a hat — highlighting the importance of staying agile and open to new things as needs arise.

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Start your talent acquisition 90 day plan with a comprehensive assessment

Your new leadership 90-day plan should include an assessment of the current state of your people, talent acquisition technology and processes so that you can develop an effective talent acquisition strategy. When you’re assessing the people element, be sure to identify those, both internally and externally, who will be able to help you achieve your objectives.

It’s important to remember that every organization is unique and has different challenges based on skills, scale, breadth and depth of what they’re trying to achieve. Remember to prioritize tasks based on feedback from key stakeholders, employees and candidates.

How to succeed in your first 90 days as a talent acquisition leader

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The first 30 days of your new talent acquisition leadership role

During the first 30 days, you should spend time examining the current and future business strategy and the impact talent has in achieving those goals. An important step, it will inform all your decision-making.

Try and understand the business strategy of the executive leadership team and assess their appetite for change and investment in talent. This will give you clear parameters to help shape your thinking. Engage with as many senior leaders within your organization as possible, preferably in regular business meetings rather than in talent acquisition-focused sessions, as that will provide greater insight into opportunities.

Once you understand the objectives, look at what’s already in place across your talent acquisition function. There will be ongoing operational delivery issues that you need to get involved with but try not to get too deep too early. Remember, those first few weeks are the only time you’ll have a truly independent view while being able to ask the questions that will become more challenging later. Review and assess everything in your team’s remit including the skills of your people, the processes they operate within, hiring metrics and the talent acquisition technology supporting (or hindering) them.

To get in-depth insights about tasks during the other 60 days, please download our toolkit below.