Talent Pool Management: How to Maintain Your Talent Pools

Learning how to manage a talent pool is important for maintaining interest among candidates. This guide will provide you with some steps on how you can successfully perform talent pool management. Even if you have loads of candidates, you can still find ways to engage with them all. Keep on reading to find a helpful definition, a list of benefits and 5 tips that will improve your talent pool management! 

What is talent pool management?

Talent pool management is the process of engaging with candidates and ensuring they’re still interested in the company. Talent pool management also relates to developing skills among candidates to maintain their relevance in the industry. You can aim to improve the performance of candidates in the talent pools and provide them with training programs that encourage skill development. 

‍Why is talent pool management important?

A well-functioning talent pool is important for hiring strong candidates and attracting diverse talent. You can converse with candidates about their job preferences even if there aren’t jobs currently available. Here are some examples of why talent pool management is important for recruitment:

• Access to a Live Pool of Candidates: You can review candidates’ profiles on a recruiting platform that comprise their up-to-date skills, job availability and previous employment. 

• You Can Expand the Talent Pool: If you notice a lack of skills, you may confer with High5 about using advanced AI-matching to find the best candidates with relevant skills.

• Candidates Have Regular Interactions: Regularly engaging with candidates ensures they feel comfortable when expressing concerns or asking questions about open jobs.

• You Build Relationships With Candidates: You can gain trust from candidates by gauging their level of interest and understanding their preferences for certain positions in the company.

Top 5 tips on how to manage your talent pool

Talent pool management will help you ‌understand current talents in the group and areas of skills that might be lacking. This evaluation ensures you find more candidates that have the relevant skills and experience for available jobs. Below are our top five tips for talent pool management: 

• Use the applicant tracking system

The first thing you can do is to monitor the applicant tracking system to evaluate everyone in the talent pool. Applicant tracking systems will organize resumes and save time by showing top candidates that have the best ranked applications. This system usually searches for the most job experiences and skills. For example, if you’re looking to add more technical skills to the talent pool, you might type the keyword ‘technical skills’ into the ATS and view relevant candidates on the system. 

You can also use the ATS to update candidates’ contact information. This will help you manage their personal details if you need to notify them about future roles. This tool prevents you from managing physical documents or losing track of email applications from candidates.

• Segment your talent pool

You can split your talent pool into groups based on their specialties. For example, one group may comprise in-demand skills and another group could represent candidates with more educational qualifications. This way, you will create segments of candidates that suit different roles in the company. Also consider writing personas for each candidate that represents their strengths. You could answer the following questions for each candidate when splitting them into groups:

• Who is this person?
• What skills do they have?
• How can you contact them?
• What job suits them most?

Creating candidate personas is a good management strategy for understanding the diversity in your talent pool. The more diversity you have, the more chances you will find suitable candidates for open roles. If you discover personas that don’t contain many skills suited for your company, you can seek the help of High5 to offer free online classes to keep their skills relevant and strong.

• Organize offline events

To engage with and manage your talent pool, you can arrange offline events that are great for candidates to understand your company’s goals and meet current employees. Although online events are convenient for everyone, gathering for social meetings in person can help candidates to feel more comfortable. You can host meetups with local experts or plan educational events for talent pool candidates to attend. 

Here at High5, we give candidates the opportunity to talk to recruiters about coaching lessons or job advice. For example, candidates might want to know how to strengthen their applicants. You could use this opportunity to arrange personal meetings at events for candidates to express concerns. 

• Give updates to candidates

Communicating with candidates through mobile apps will ensure you retain their engagement in the talent pool. High5 offers text messaging company-branded apps that send updates to candidates regarding new jobs or skill development opportunities. You could use our services to stay in contact with candidates who haven’t made it to the interview stage yet. Mobile apps are also good for sending automatic notifications to candidates interested in different roles, which means you don’t have to manually write each update.

Talent pool management includes nurturing, which ensures you build excitement and anticipation among candidates who feel passionately about your company. If you don’t keep candidates in the loop, they might distance themselves from the application process, which could make your talent pool redundant.

• Survey candidates

Consider sending surveys to candidates to find out their job preferences and ideal roles in your company. Candidates may feel engaged with your company if they can voice their opinions and offer suggestions for your recruitment process. Here are some examples of questions you can include in the survey: 

• What position did you apply for? 
• How would you rate your understanding of the role? 
• How well did the employer communicate? 
• Did you think the interview was well prepared?
• What do you think would make our hiring process better?
• Would you refer others to an open role here?

High5 acknowledges that you’re not just filling roles, but connecting with humans to understand their values and work ethic. This is why gaining their feedback is essential for improving your hiring methods in the company. 

Summary

Managing your talent pool is important for maintaining engagement among candidates. You can stay in contact with candidates and update them on new roles that match their skills. At High5, we’re passionate about offering new immediate opportunities to candidates who don’t get jobs.

FAQs

How do I organize my talent pool?

You can use the applicant tracking system to divide candidates into groups. These groups might comprise in-demand skills, professional qualifications and relevant work experiences.

Why are talent pools important?

Talent pools are important for retaining strong talented candidates. Employers can review the talent pool to find suitable candidates for open roles. Talent pooling also encourages diversity across the workforce.

How do you stay connected with candidates?

High5 will keep candidates engaged with your business through social media posts and text messaging apps. Staying in contact with candidates ensures they’re still interested in your company.

Are You Ready For The High5 Experience?

Our team of industry leaders are ready to help your talent management program become the best it can be. Register with High5, your transformative talent management tool and make your next new hire the best decision you ever made.

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