When you’re looking to fill a role in your team, your first idea will be to advertise externally. Sifting through CV’s and online assessments may be the way to fill it, or there could be an easier solution to consider: internal recruitment.
There will undoubtedly be times in your own professional career where you will have thought a sideways move was possible. After all, we all learn different skills and have different interests. Your employees will feel that as well, so when an opportunity comes for a transfer into a new team or onto a new project, why would they not be considered a suitable candidate?
It’s true, we can pigeonhole staff, even ourselves sometimes, but we need to acknowledge that for many, a sideways move can be a great solution. Not only does this keep some of your best talent engaged with the business - showing trust and faith - but, also, it could be making that employee utilise some of the other skills acquired over the years in a different capacity, helping the business out without having to learn processes or culture from scratch.
Through assessments, 121s and personal development plans, you will know which of your team members may have expressed interest in moving departments or taking on new challenges. They may have a passion for the subject area or they may have the skills which aren’t being utilised in their current role.
We’re going to take a look at the benefits of an internal staff transfer and what steps may be required.
What are the benefits of an internal staff transfer?
Transferring members of staff across the business can hold many benefits, for the employee, team, manager as well as the business.
Of course, whilst it isn’t common, some businesses have developed their business around this model to retain their best staff. GE, for instance, has been known to approach top performers who’ve been in their roles for around one-and-a-half to two years and ask about their next position in the company.
One of the biggest advantages of internally hiring/transferring an employee is that they know who the people in the business are, the goals, the processes and importantly, the culture of the workplace. This helps integrate the employee into the role quicker and they can hit the ground running with their duties.
Another advantage is that this helps foster a growth culture in the workplace. This promotes loyalty to the company whilst also demonstrating that the organisation is proactive in upskilling the workforce whilst recognising talent in the business.
Ensure your internal transfer policy is up to date
Internal transfers require that you have a policy in place, especially to provide transparency and fairness to the process. As mentioned earlier, the usual route for fulfilling a role is done with interviews and assessments, so this shouldn’t be any different for internal transfers.
Things to consider include:
- How you communicate that there is a position available in a department or a team. It may be an internal email, a notice on the company intranet or a direct message that all managers must pass on to their employees in a meeting.
- A role description needs to be provided with any associated benefits and pay structure.
- You will need to carry out interviews and assessments as you would if you were hiring externally. Be sure to have the same criteria and keep in mind any internal assessments to help provide additional information and establish fairness and objectivity.
- Finally, whatever other information about the process for transfers is, make sure that this is available in the company handbook and internal HR process.
With all things considered, hiring internally can be of an advantage to the company, management and naturally the employee. Transferring your best talents may not always be the first thing that comes to mind, but managed correctly it may be the best “hire” that your business could make in the coming months.
Improve your internal transfer processes with Thomas
Our employee development platform helps you identify and nurture future leaders, improve employee engagement and keep people development at the heart of your business success.
We can also help you to remove unconscious bias from your internal recruitment processes by defining the traits required for a given role and using assessments to match candidates to these traits as well as creating targeted interview questions to delve deeper into their strengths and weaknesses. This can be particularly helpful for internal recruitment to ensure objectivity when a candidate may already be known to management.
To learn more about how Thomas can help you with internal recruitment, please speak to one of our team.
