In 2016, A notable Multinational (An FMCG) visited Jane’s University for an external engagement, after which an announcement was made about a campus ambassadors’ program. Few weeks later, Jane and her reading partner both in their penultimate year applied and after two telephone interviews, they were both selected as campus am. Their roles included marketing the brand to their colleagues, monitoring product turnovers and customers’ responses to their products. organising campus engagements and other related activities which they executed excellently, winning an impact award for their result-oriented contribution during their annual ambassadors’ conference.
ASUU went on their regular strike after their third year, and the friends decided to intern with the company they represented, fortunately for them, there was a department in the company that needed extra hands and being campus ambassadors saved the company a lot of recruiting cost. While Jane’s colleague watched Telemundo and John’s colleagues watched champions league, they were getting integrated into a multinational system, adding a lot of value to the business during the process. They went back to school after three months (because their lecturers decided to take a mandatory 30 days break after the ASUU strike) They aced their final papers, tidied up their projects and went back to the company for their graduate internships and got recommendation letters that let them serve in the company during their NYSC. It’s 2019, and Jane had just bagged the most influential people leader award, while John won an impact award for sealing the biggest deal for the previous financial year, all the internships add succeeded in creating outstanding employees. Familiar story?
Internal Labour Market in layman terms simply means- Hiring from within. It is the process of filling up vacancies with potential candidates within the firm. A more deliberate Internal Labour market often encompasses of strategic workforce planning which involves the juxtaposition of business needs with the available employees to meet those needs while recruiting training new talents to meet future needs. It comprises of targeted learning and development programs, internships, trainee programs and other pivotal leadership and development programs that are tilted towards achieving a balanced, functioning workforce, not just for the present but for the future. (Isn’t that why we do workforce planning?). ILM also assist in succession planning’s as potential C-Level candidates are being nurtured early enough.
Internships play a big role in ILM, as talent acquisition specialists and technical recruiters are now seeing the benefits of nurturing a talent and watching the talent appreciate while contributing immensely to the growth of the business during the process-isn’t that killing two birds with ILM has been questioned by some school of thought, the most recurring weakness being the lid on availability of new talents to explore, but isn’t it more economical to nurture a talent and watch the talent add value, than recruiting a talent whose quality is seen but not ascertained yet? It is more advantageous for companies with detailed culture as ILM saves them the recruiting cost. on-boarding time and another non-quantifiable element
Takeaways: For The HRMs- While different internships and training programs are proliferating and the chasm between the educational system and the corporate world is continuously being breached, it is germane that the business needs, goals and objectives is communicated with lucid clarity to people leaders, managers and supervisors, as this helps them watch out for talents that can be retained and retrained to meet the organisation’s needs. It also helps if an incoming intern or trainee is hinted of the potential long run goal as this strengthens the commitment of the employee (trainee or intern) to the business. Some talents also see this as an advantage for personal and professional goals which is the second incentive or driving force of employee’s loyalty after compensation. We all want to grow, don’t we?
For the talents: In my book, Chronicles of an intern, I talked about “Not just working, but showing that you are working”. Internships, Graduate Trainees and other related programs are opportunities to learn voraciously, contribute productively and shine resplendently, showing your recruiter how passionate you are to be the next superstar employee. While there might the constraint you never can tell, you might be the next C-level candidate in the making.
While Recruitment and selection remains one of the fascinating fields in HR, ILM continues to be a fallow field yielding optimum productivity with mutual benefits for both talents and organisations.
EMMANUEL FAITH
Faith is an Associate of Chartered Institute of Personnel Management (ACIPM) and the author of the self-instruct book “Chronicles of an Intern”. I can be found on LinkedIn or reached through [email protected]
