At the end of November we sent our “roving reporter” Felicity to the HR Leadership Alliance's annual event . However, in all the end of year excitement (mostly me buying presents online rather than working!) I managed to forget to post this on the blog. Sorry it's a bit late, however, here is her overview of the event.
Recently I attended The HR Leadership Council’s Annual Congress at the Thistle Marble Arch. It was a wonderful venue and was superbly organized.
I unfortunately missed the keynote address by Dave Ulrich, Professor of Business at Ross School of Business, University of Michigan. However, I heard that he gave a rousing introduction to the day that set the scene for what was to follow.
For me, first stop in the superb lineup was “Recruiting Generation Y - Understanding the New Internet Generation” given by Anika Rose from Hilton Hotels. This was a great talk and was significantly attended. She took us through who generation Y are, what they most value, how to attract them and of course how to retain them. One interesting fact she shared was that by 2014 Gen Y will represent 48% of the workforce!
Next up was “Developing and Improving an Online and Technological Presence in the Search for Talent” presented by Andrew Wilkinson CEO for TMP Worldwide and Helen Munro Deputy Director of HR and OD at GHCQ.
To start this session were some key historic facts for example in 1996 Hotmail was launched on the 4th of July but there was no Google and there were only 248 computers per 1000 people in Great Britain a little different from now!
Today is different – it’s a digital jobseeker. Andrew talked about extending the digital reach through applications such as Google gadgets, you tube and social networking and also the amount of people that search on Google for jobs.
Helen Munro went on to explain the challenges of recruiting for an organization that is limited to what they can advertise and how they use recruitment as a marketing tool to build a brand for GCHQ.
Then it was time for a break and some lunch which was delicious!
A small group then turned up for the panel discussion which was very well moderated by Philip Holder who is the CEO at Staged Coaching. Panelists where Alison Hodgson Group Director Talent and Resourcing Royal Mail Group, Rodney Moses, VP Global Talent Acquisition at Coca- Cola Enterprises and Richard Roberts Head of Resourcing and Culture at Virgin Mobile.
It was interesting to hear the backgrounds of each panelist and the Group certainly posed some interesting questions which prompted some good grounds for debate.
The final session of the day that attended was the “Power of Brand allegiance: becoming the employer of choice” presented by Stephane Le-Camus, Global HR Branding Director at Unilever. Well you could not squeezed another body into this room Stephane engrossed the room and had it not been for the last session I am sure it would have run on. Brilliant talk highly interesting and engaging.
Stephane explained the challenges that Unilever have when recruiting and how to market the brand accordingly. A couple of key points he raised are that the success of brands are that the delivery every time and also that the best ambassadors are your people so give them the right experience.
There was a packed schedule of events but unfortunately I could not attend all the sessions such as Enabling and enthusing line manager in performance and talent management by Joanna Keeling People Director at Red Bull although I did hear people talking very enthusiastically about this session. Another session I would like to have attended was Executive Leadership search at Coca – Cola: sourcing talent from the top presented by John J Goldberg.
I felt I got great value from this event and whilst it was a full schedule everyone seemed to enjoy it and be taking a lot away from this event.
