The one with Megan Reif (of Volvo Cars)

🎉 Wrapping Up 2024 with the Talent Intelligence Collective! 🎙️ Welcome to our special year-end wrap-up episode! Join hosts Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge, and Toby Culshaw as they reflect on the year that was—packed with milestones, incredible guests, and unforgettable moments in the world of Talent Intelligence. From standout episodes featuring professionals like Megan at Volvo, Martin at Novartis, and Lou’s practical tips on building TI functions, to industry-defining events like the Amsterdam Talent Intelligence Conference and the debut of a Talent Intelligence stage at RecFest—2024 has been a whirlwind! Our hosts also share personal highlights, including: Alison's transformative year, marked by resilience after a personal challenge and the exciting acquisition of Stratigens by Lightcast. Toby's insights into the thriving TI community and the importance of collaboration amidst challenging times. Alan’s journey with Udder, growing the business globally and hosting the Talent Intelligence Conference. Together, they unpack key themes from the year: the evolution of internal and external data integration, the rise of strategic workforce planning on national scales, and the ongoing adoption of AI in HR and beyond. With humor, heartfelt moments, and plenty of industry wisdom, this episode is a celebration of the Talent Intelligence community’s growth and resilience. As the year ends, the hosts look ahead with big predictions for 2025—consolidation in the TI vendor space, growing strategic workforce planning at a national level, and more meaningful AI adoption in business. Tune in for laughs, reflections, and a glimpse of what’s to come in 2025. Stay curious, stay brilliant, and most importantly, stay intelligent!

Welcome to Episode 33 of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! Join hosts Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge, and Toby Culshaw as they welcome Chris Rowe, Head of Talent Acquisition at DHU Healthcare, who shares his fascinating journey from military service to championing talent acquisition in healthcare. In this month's market intelligence roundup, Toby delves into Saudi Arabia's strategic investment in AI infrastructure, with the nation setting its sights on becoming a global hub for data centres and AI development. This sparks a fascinating discussion about the future of talent mobility in the region and the environmental considerations of AI advancement, including surprising insights about the energy demands of AI systems. The discussion then turns to UK disability employment statistics, revealing both progress and persistent challenges, with the disability employment rate at 53% compared to 81.6% for non-disabled people. The hosts explore the complexities of workplace accessibility and the broader implications for diversity, equity, and inclusion. The spotlight then turns to Chris's compelling professional journey, as he recounts his path from military service to healthcare recruitment, revealing how his passion for making a difference shapes his approach to talent acquisition. He discusses DHU Healthcare's role as a social enterprise providing frontline NHS services and explains how his team's approach to talent acquisition directly impacts healthcare delivery. Chris offers valuable insights into strategic workforce planning, particularly in healthcare settings. He shares how his organisation has achieved significant cost savings through predictive talent management and discusses their partnership with Foresight to better understand and anticipate workforce needs. The conversation explores the challenges of healthcare recruitment, agency proliferation, and the importance of sustainable talent sharing within the sector. The episode concludes with Chris's perspective on mentoring first and second-generation migrants, encouraging listeners to use their privilege to create opportunities for others. And yes, there's even a brief discussion about what makes the perfect cup of tea! Until next time, stay curious, stay brilliant, and most importantly, stay intelligent!

Welcome to Episode 32 of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! Join hosts Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge, and Toby Culshaw as they welcome Lou Griffiths, Senior Manager of Talent Intelligence at EY UK, who shares her remarkable journey in building and scaling talent intelligence capabilities. Toby kicks off with an engaging news segment, covering the cooling UK labour market, the increasing trend of older workers in the workforce, and Japan's concerns about AI monopolies - particularly Nvidia's 80% semiconductor market share. The discussion also touches on Google's innovative "reverse aquahire" strategy, sparking an interesting debate about the future of tech talent acquisition. In the main interview, Lou shares her fascinating transition from scientific recruitment to establishing EY UK's Talent Intelligence function. She discusses her innovative "Talent Screen" tool, which has captured over 5,000 recruiter conversations and 200,000 data points, providing valuable insights into candidate sentiment and market trends. Lou delves into how her small but mighty team delivered 35 strategic talent intelligence projects in the past year, working on everything from location strategy to competitive intelligence. She emphasises the importance of transforming recruiters into "intelligence-led" professionals and shares practical approaches to embedding data-driven decision-making in talent acquisition. The conversation explores EY's shift from role-based to skills-based talent strategies and the challenges of centralising talent intelligence in a global organisation. Lou's passion for proactive, strategic talent intelligence shines through as she discusses the future of the function and the importance of delivering what stakeholders need, not just what they want. Throughout the episode, listeners will gain valuable insights into building and scaling talent intelligence functions, making data actionable for recruiters, and driving strategic value in a professional services environment. Until next time, stay intelligent, and don't forget to connect with Lou on LinkedIn to learn more about her innovative work in talent intelligence!

Welcome back to another enlightening episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! In episode 31, your hosts Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge, and Toby Culshaw are joined by the insightful Patrick Coolen, a seasoned HR analytics expert and Partner at Kennedy Fitch. Toby starts the show with a thought-provoking news segment, discussing topics such as the UK's reliance on foreign workers, the challenges of upskilling the workforce, and the World Economic Forum's take on combating STEM talent shortages. The conversation sparks a lively debate on the societal and political factors influencing talent strategies and the importance of evidence-based decision-making. In the interview, Patrick shares his fascinating journey in HR analytics, spanning over two decades at ABN AMRO. He delves into the evolution of people analytics, the challenges organizations face in adopting and institutionalizing advanced analytics, and the factors that drive success in this field. Patrick emphasizes the importance of aligning people analytics initiatives with strategic business goals and integrating various evidence-based HR services to effectively answer critical workforce questions. He highlights the need to balance data science with behavioral science expertise and the significance of proper data management. The discussion also touches on the future of people analytics, with Patrick sharing his insights on the potential of machine learning and AI in democratizing intelligence for end-users. He stresses the importance of governance and the trend towards enterprise-wide analytics practices that share data and skills across departments. Throughout the conversation, Patrick's passion for evidence-based HR shines through, leaving listeners with valuable advice on starting and scaling people analytics functions. His unique perspective, shaped by his extensive research and practical experience, offers a fresh understanding of how talent intelligence can drive strategic workforce decisions. Until next time, stay intelligent, and don't forget to connect with Patrick on LinkedIn to learn more about his "10 Golden Rules of People Analytics"! ** Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → ⁠⁠⁠Stratigens⁠⁠⁠! **

Welcome back to the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast for another insightful episode! In episode 30, your hosts Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge, and Toby Culshaw are joined by the "workforce geek" himself, Maarten Hansson of Novartis. Toby kicks off the show with a thought-provoking news segment, covering topics like the war for AI talent, the UK's controversial immigration salary threshold hike, and Latin America's tech talent boom. The discussion sparks debate around the challenges of attracting and retaining top AI talent, the potential impact of immigration policies on various industries, and the factors driving the growth of tech hubs in Latin America. In the interview with Maarten, we dive deep into his fascinating career journey, spanning roles in the Dutch military, IT engineering, and his transformative experience living and working in India. Maarten shares how his time in India fuelled his passion for leveraging global talent and the importance of consciously choosing how to interact with and manage distributed teams. Maarten introduces us to the concept of "total workforce" and the proprietary workforce drivers he uses to help organisations make informed decisions about their talent strategies. He emphasises the importance of visibility into all aspects of the workforce, including employees, contingent workers, and outsourced or automated work, to effectively manage costs, risks, and access to talent. Throughout the conversation, Maarten stresses the value of combining internal workforce data with external labour market insights to provide actionable advice to the business. He shares examples of how his work has triggered procurement teams to change their category strategies, HR to rethink workforce policies, and finance to optimise total workforce costs. Maarten's unique perspective, shaped by his diverse background in procurement, HR, and engineering, leaves us with a fresh understanding of how talent intelligence can drive transformative workforce decisions. His passion for the topic is infectious, leaving us eager to explore more in future episodes! Until next time, stay intelligent, and don't forget to share the podcast with your network! ** Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → ⁠⁠Stratigens⁠⁠! **

Welcome back for another fascinating episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! In episode 29, your regular hosts Alan Walker, Alison Etridge and Toby Culshaw have an enlightening discussion with Megan Reif, Talent Intelligence Lead at Volvo Cars. Kicking things off, Toby provides an intriguing news roundup spanning topics like the rise of tech hubs in Canada, AI proliferation in HR roles, and the transition towards skills-based organizations. The trends spark thoughtful debate around data architecture challenges in HR, attracting technical talent to people-focused roles, and the complexity of fully adopting skills-based frameworks. Shifting gears to our interview with Megan Reif, we uncover her eclectic career journey spanning academia, international development, recruiting and more. A recurring theme is Megan’s insatiable curiosity to dig deeper, learn something new and challenge assumptions with data. Megan provides a fascinating window into the world of automotive manufacturing talent. We explore the intersection of software and hardware, blending agile and waterfall development approaches, and massive talent ecosystems including R&D, factories, suppliers and beyond. Megan emphasizes the highly technical skills involved in areas often dismissed as “blue collar,” like welders who will drive the green transition. On talent issues, Megan explains how Sweden’s largest private employer collaborates with industry consortia, universities and government around long-term skills gaps like electricians and battery talent needs. We debate how to better expose youth to the exciting real-world opportunities in science, tech and manufacturing. Megan also shares thoughts on balancing national policies around freelance passions, labor market alignment and managed immigration. Throughout the wide-ranging discussion, Megan underscores how she sees boundless potential for talent intelligence to bring context, challenge assumptions and transform workforce decisions. Her wisdom and optimism leave us delighted to have her perspective, with much still left to explore in future episodes! Until next time, stay intelligent folks, and don't forget to share the podcast! ** Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → ⁠Stratigens⁠! **

Welcome back for another captivating episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! In episode 28, your regular hosts Alan Walker, Alison Etridge and Toby Culshaw engage in an intriguing discussion with Matt Higgs, Director of Organisational Capability at Arambol. Kicking things off, Toby provides the latest news roundup, spanning topics like Corn Ferry’s 2024 talent acquisition trends report, the impacts of an ageing workforce and associated “grey tsunami”, and increased government attention on how AI will transform jobs and workplaces. The trends provide much food for thought on the external factors shaping workforce planning. Shifting gears to our interview with Matt Higgs, we uncover his varied career journey through recruitment consulting, strategic HR business partner roles, analytics, strategic workforce planning and organisational capability building. A key theme is the connection between proactive early careers planning and forecasting future talent needs. By scrutinising historical hiring patterns and projecting retirement trends, Matt was able to build a convincing business case for significantly expanding apprenticeship programmes. This demonstrates how data and analytics can transform typically reactive talent acquisition into forward-looking planning. Matt explains how he has expanded this approach over time, leveraging analytics to bring rigour and metrics to “softer” areas of HR like leadership development. He also shares his experience spearheading a nascent strategic workforce planning pilot, demonstrating how integrated business planning principles can create an “organic” and sustainable planning capability. Throughout the discussion, Matt emphasises the vital context talent intelligence brings to supplement internal workforce planning. By providing insights on external talent dynamics, TI enables more informed assessments of whether talent gaps can feasibly be addressed through hiring or require alternative solutions. We also cover the importance of translating long-range strategic plans into specific actions for talent acquisition to execute. The conversation underscores Matt’s invaluable perspective on bringing together analytics, planning, talent intelligence and more to enable superior workforce decisions. His wisdom leaves us eager to have him back for future episodes to share more talent insights! Until next time, stay intelligent folks, and don't forget to share the podcast! Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens!

Get ready to geek out over data science and talent intelligence in this meaty new episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective podcast! Regular hosts Alan Walker, Alison Etridge and Toby Culshaw engage in an illuminating discussion with Ranjan Dhar, Principal Data Scientist at Stratagem. Kicking things off, Toby provides a roundup of the latest TI news, spanning decentralised TI capabilities, major plays by Microsoft, SAP and others in skills intelligence platforms, early signs of cooling demand despite skill shortages, and more trends shaping the external talent landscape. Shifting focus to our interview, we unravel Ranjan's fascinating journey into talent data science, stemming from his early days helping to scale a pioneering TI supplier from 20 to 200+ employees after its acquisition by Gartner. He recounts the challenges of working with complex, messy talent data sets, and explains typical day-to-day work ranging from data exploration to advanced machine learning modelling. We explore a number of applied examples where Ranjan has leveraged natural language processing and other techniques to uncover insights from job postings, profiles, and more talent data sources. He emphasises how properly framing the business problem is vital before applying advanced analytics, so the techniques match the use case rather than being solutions seeking problems. Ranjan shares thoughtful advice on working with data scientists as a business leader, highlighting the need for trust, data access, and taking an exploratory approach to the art of the possible. We discuss the pros and cons of centralised versus decentralised models for embedding TI and analytics capabilities through organisations. With his extensive perspective spanning both the supplier side and in-house talent intelligence, Ranjan elucidates the huge potential impact when talent leaders effectively collaborate with data scientists. He demystifies how advanced analytics can transform messy, unstructured hiring data into actionable skills-based insights that drive better workforce decisions. If you're interested in the intersection of data science and talent intelligence, don't miss this engaging insider view into the art of the possible! As always, stay intelligent folks! Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens!

Welcome back, dear listeners and readers, to another episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast! In this riveting episode, we had the pleasure of diving deep into the world of AI in talent with our very own co-host Alan Walker in the hot seat. We kick off this milestone episode with Toby taking the reins to provide us with the latest updates in the world of AI. Toby enlightens us about chatbot vulnerabilities, shining a light on the growing cybersecurity risks as AI adoption spreads. Alison chimes in about the global race for AI talent, with tech giants rapidly expanding teams of AI researchers and engineers. However, we acknowledge the risks of large language models like GPT-3 hallucinating false insights without proper governance. Now, shifting our focus to the main topic of this episode - our guest, Alan, Alison takes the lead in asking all the right questions. Alan's journey into AI began with a passion for leveraging technology to transform HR processes. Little did he know that this enthusiasm would set him on a path to becoming a thought leader in applying AI in talent. "The perception of intelligence is what really matters when defining AI." Alan Walker His experience co-founding the consultancy Udder provided him with remarkable insight into AI's potential. He gained exposure to innovative applications of AI across functions like recruitment, mobility and analytics. This experience has been invaluable in envisioning an AI-powered future of talent. One of the key takeaways from our conversation is the importance of ethics, quality control and human oversight over AI systems. Data literacy is critical to ensure AI doesn't hallucinate false insights from incomplete data. "AI won't necessarily create more jobs, but may allow more enriching lives with less work time needed." Alan Walker The world of AI in talent is evolving rapidly. Alan shed light on emerging multi-agent AI architectures that enable diverse algorithms to coordinate insights. However, what makes it even more intriguing is the simultaneous hype and uncertainty surrounding AI's impacts. Looking forward, Alan envisions the future of AI as an integrated approach combining agents with specialized capabilities. By harmonizing workforce strategy, future of work initiatives, and AI, organizations can better act on insights. It has been a pleasure having Alan Walker as our guest, sharing his profound insights on the dynamic field of AI in talent. And, as always, your support means the world to us. Be sure to tune in to the full episode and share your thoughts with us. Until next time – stay intelligent!

Welcome back, dear listeners and readers,  to another episode of the Talent Intelligence Collective Podcast! But, fear not. This episode is 100% robot-free. In this riveting episode, we (the usual motley crew of myself, Alan Walker, Alison Ettridge and Toby Culshaw) had the pleasure of diving deep into the world of Talent Intelligence with the brilliant Anastasiia Kolos.  We kick off this milestone episode with Toby taking the reins to provide us with the latest updates in the world of Talent Intelligence. Toby enlightens us about an intriguing product called dot ai, which demonstrated an AI-driven sales conversation, making us ponder the future of AI in recruitment and sales. Alison chimes in about the skills-based hiring trend that's gaining momentum. LinkedIn's research on skills-based hiring in the European labour market and the shift away from traditional degrees toward skills-based qualifications are causing ripples in the talent pool. However, we acknowledge that while skills-based hiring is exciting, its practical implementation presents numerous challenges. Now, shifting our focus to the main topic of this episode - our amazing guest, Anastasiia Kolos, Alison takes the lead in asking all the right questions. Anastasiia's journey into Talent Intelligence began with a fortunate encounter during her master's program in strategic management. Little did she know that this chance encounter would set her on a path to becoming a thought leader in the field. "Exploring the whole new world of being in a big corporate environment was like solving a complex puzzle." Anastasiia Kolos Her experience at Philips, a global giant, provided her with a remarkable training ground. She gained exposure to the inner workings of a corporate powerhouse, from mergers and acquisitions to strategic execution. This experience has been invaluable in her current role at Nexperia. One of the key takeaways from our conversation is the importance of shifting the conversation from hiring individuals to addressing an organization's broader strategic challenges. "Understanding the broader strategy is the first step to providing meaningful Talent Intelligence insights." Anastasiia Kolos The world of Talent Intelligence is evolving, and Anastasiia shed light on how it plays a pivotal role in addressing talent shortages—a pressing issue in her industry, semiconductors. However, what makes it even more intriguing is the simultaneous existence of talent shortages and oversupply in other areas of the industry. Market intelligence and competitive insights are also on Anastasiia's radar. She emphasized the importance of understanding how different elements within an organization interconnect to provide more meaningful insights to drive success. Looking forward, Anastasiia envisions the future of Talent Intelligence as an integrated approach that combines internal and external data sources. By harmonizing workforce strategy, future of work initiatives, and Talent Intelligence, organizations can better answer the "So what?" question and act on insights effectively. It has been a pleasure having Anastasiia Kolos as our guest, sharing her profound insights and experiences in the dynamic field of Talent Intelligence.  And, as always, your support means the world to us. Be sure to tune in to the full episode and share your thoughts with us. Until next time – stay intelligent! Don't forget to say hi to our wonderful sponsors → Stratigens from @Talent Intuition.