Meet your Direct Sourcing champion: Why companies need program ambassadors
Direct Sourcing leads to a host of benefits, from faster hiring and longer retention rates to better quality candidates and significant cost savings.
While every company has a unique hiring strategy, those with full company-wide buy-in may have an easier time reaching their talent acquisition goals.
That’s where program ambassadors come in. Acting as the main contact for Direct Sourcing vendors, the program ambassador is quite literally your boots on the ground, ensuring all stakeholders get the support they need to fully understand and implement talent acquisition best practices.
We look at why program ambassadors are essential and what you need to know.
What is a program ambassador?
Direct Sourcing is no longer a brand new concept. According to a Staffing Industry Analysts (SIA) report, 84% of large organizations have either adopted a Direct Sourcing program or were planning to start one in the next two years.
And yet, implementing a successful Direct Sourcing program with full company buy-in is a complicated journey. A program ambassador (PA) acts as an organization’s liaison. They help promote, manage, and coordinate each company’s Direct Sourcing strategy, ensuring that there’s consistent communication with all stakeholders.
TalentNet, for example, have built best practices around the program ambassador role, giving us the experience needed to provide onboarding support.
What do program ambassadors do?
PAs play a number of roles, including:
Building strong internal relationships
As the primary contact point for hiring managers and key stakeholders, a program ambassador is responsible for on-site collaboration, ensuring all questions are answered and support is provided when needed. From managing intake calls to helping with best practice implementation, the PA works to build strong communication and solid relationships built on trust.
Essentially, program ambassadors are Direct Sourcing advocates. They:
- Make sure the program is aligned with changing business goals
- Encourage buy-in and awareness
- Provide white glove, customized service to hiring leaders
- Address any issues or concerns that may come up as the program evolves
Providing program engagement
One of the program ambassador’s most important goals includes driving higher engagement while getting stakeholders excited about Direct Sourcing’s hiring potential. This includes holding lunch and learn sessions, encouraging and responding to feedback from key company players, and setting up workshops to help organizations better understand how to properly implement industry leading best practices.
Managing and developing Direct Sourcing strategy
Program ambassadors are central in ensuring each customized strategy is executed well. As the hiring market continues to shift and react to a difficult economy and skills shortage, it’s essential to have the flexibility to change course when needed. The program ambassador works with stakeholders to adapt to changing market needs while ensuring business goals are always being met.
For example, let’s say you own a software development company that originally implemented a Direct Sourcing strategy to find contingent hires in the marketing and project management department. If you’re suddenly experiencing rapid growth and need to quickly hire more technical skill sets, the program ambassador would work with you to build new talent pools and more technical pipelines, ensuring all stakeholders understand the company’s new hiring goals.
Tracking key analytics
Part of advocating for a Direct Sourcing program includes managing important metrics and handling reporting. This ensures companies understand how well the program is doing while allowing Direct Sourcing partners to change direction when needed.
TalentNet’s platform, for example, includes TalentInsights, a feature that lets companies view and download relevant analytics like application activity, time to hire, talent community registration and hiring outcomes.
Why do we need program ambassadors?
A healthy Direct Sourcing program requires strong advocacy and company buy-in. If all departments aren’t invested in the process, it becomes harder to leverage brand power and create strong candidate experiences, all of which are key to finding top talent. Having a program champion leads to:
- Better decision making and continued program success. PAs review program feedback and Direct Sourcing metrics to understand what’s working and what needs to change. Not only does this create a more effective strategy, it supports program success.
- Improved branding. Direct Sourcing depends on a company’s natural brand power. A strong advocate that’s fully integrated into an organization can reinforce brand values by creating positive candidate experiences, then using social media to highlight success stories.
- Higher retention rates. Retaining top talent is a pillar of Direct Sourcing. By supporting a company’s talent community and pipeline, a program ambassador can help ensure candidates are experienced and aware of an organization’s values, leading to higher retention rates.
Working with a trusted partner
Direct Sourcing partners that provide knowledgeable program ambassadors are able to increase internal engagement, secure company buy-in and help your organization pivot when needed to ensure all hiring needs are met.
As the originator of Direct Sourcing, TalentNet has a team of experts that understand your industry’s challenges and support our clients through initiatives like Program Readiness, a workshop that uses real-time data to encourage better decision making and create solid best practices.
To learn more about TalentNet’s platform and experienced team, reach out here.