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Just a couple years ago, companies were conducting hiring sprees, scooping up a seemingly unlimited supply of talent. Today, however, more talent professionals are asked to do more with less, while facing intense competition for individuals with the most business-critical skills. But this reset has given rise to a new way of thinking about talent—the skills-based transformation, in which candidates are hired, and internal talent developed, based on their unique skills and strengths.To make the skills-based transition successful, companies must ensure their talent acquisition (TA) and learning and development (L&D) teams work more closely together. This will be especially important since talent with key skills is harder to find than ever. According to Randstad Enterprise’s latest in-demand skills research, global hiring complexity for AI and automation skills is two times higher than average, while data analytics skills are 2.3 times higher.In this landscape, rather than always turning to recruiting external talent, consider how individuals with key skills—or at least the potential to learn them—may already be in the organization. But without insights and development plans from L&D, those high-potential employees, and their skill sets, may remain hidden. Along the same lines, when new talent is brought in, L&D should be involved as well, helping to ensure they continually learn and grow to develop the skills needed for the future.But for TA and L&D to collaborate most effectively, they must leverage the right data to help guide their decisions. With access to up-to-date talent intelligence—about the supply of skills both within your organization and outside it—TA and L&D teams gain the insights to better work together and ultimately ensure the company acquires the right skills.Identify the skills you need.Due to the growing use of AI, the skills companies need are changing constantly. With access to the right talent intelligence, companies can better predict the skills that will be most critical for their organizations today and into the future. And if talent with those skills is too difficult to find internally or externally, the data can help identify talent with the adjacent or transferable skills most indicative of success in attaining those needed skills. Once those skills are identified, TA and L&D can work together to determine the best way to acquire those skills, whether hiring externally or developing internal—or even external—talent.Build a skilled and diverse workforce.As part of the skills-based transformation, many organizations leverage talent intelligence to conduct skills mapping or create skills ontologies to better understand the skills already in the organization. Such insights can also reveal the individuals who show strong potential to learn the new skills that TA may be struggling to find externally. This approach is also helpful for enhancing workforce diversity and creating equity. With female talent largely under-represented in some of the most in-demand skills, like AI and automation, providing promising female employees with the right training and development can improve diversity while ensuring the company gains those needed skills.Understand the external talent market.Strong talent intelligence can help you find the best sources for the skills your organization needs. It can also uncover essential data about what those individuals are looking for in their next role, like salary expectations and desire to work remotely, so TA can be better positioned to attract and engage them. If talent with the exact skills can’t be found, TA can still hire based on the potential and inherent skills of the top candidates, working with L&D to create the development paths to fill those crucial gaps.Make smarter decisions with talent intelligence.While finding talent with the most in-demand skills may be challenging, companies that drive collaboration between their TA and L&D teams will be better positioned to identify the right people, or nurture promising talent to help them learn those skills. When guided by robust talent intelligence, the result is a streamlined approach to acquiring the skills needed immediately, while providing the training that keeps up with the skills needed for the future.Download Randstad’s latest in-demand skills research. See the supply and demand of the skills you need with the in-demand skills dashboard.

Why Talent Acquisition and L&D Must Work Together to Find Talent With Key Skills

Burnout is pervasive in today’s professional world, particularly among leaders. In fact, DDI’s research reveals that 72 percent of leaders report feeling used up at the end of every day, with rates even higher among women and minorities. It’s no wonder given the relentless demands they face—balancing packed schedules, coaching teams, executing initiatives, and shaping strategy—all on top of personal responsibilities.Given these pressures, HR professionals cannot afford to ignore burnout. Its long-term effects can be damaging for your leaders and organization: retention drops, quality of work declines, and for leaders, physical and mental health can suffer.The good news is that burnout isn’t inevitable. By providing the right environment and tools, HR can play a critical role in supporting leaders and preventing burnout.Ahead, we’ll explore three important ways you can prevent leader burnout: cultivating psychological safety, providing personalized training and support, and developing a strong leader pipeline.Build a Culture of Psychological SafetyTo create a resilient workplace, begin with culture. An organization’s culture profoundly influences how people behave and feel about their work.Protecting leaders from burnout requires cultivating an environment where they (and their teams) feel empowered to give candid feedback, collaborate effectively, and voice dissenting opinions without fear of retaliation. These behaviors thrive in a culture defined by psychological safety, empathy, transparency, and ethical integrity. Between deadlines and high-stakes presentations, occasional stress is unavoidable. However, when organizations lead with empathy, they see higher employee engagement and productivity, and lower rates of burnout.HR should establish and maintain workplace norms that encourage psychological safety and empathetic leadership.Strategies for HR to foster a psychologically safe culture include: Consistently champion and reinforce organizational values.Model vulnerability and transparency from leadership. Implement processes for safe escalation of concerns. Hold all employees accountable for ethical standards. Celebrate actions that reflect the desired culture. Provide Personalized Development for LeadersDeveloping capable leaders is another powerful way to prevent burnout. The key? Start by assessing each leader's strengths and growth areas to focus on development needs.Today’s leaders can’t wait for comprehensive 360-degree assessments that only appear every few years. They need immediate, objective feedback on exactly what to continue doing and where to adjust to support their development. One-size-fits-all training that doesn’t target specific needs only contributes to their time crunch and burnout risk. With real-time assessment results, HR can provide highly relevant, targeted development, giving leaders tools and a safe environment to practice their skills ahead of challenging situations.DDI’s research has identified seven critical skill areas that are associated with lower rates of burnout: Empathy Coaching and Delegation Influence Leading Change Leading Virtual Teams Driving Inclusion Developing Future Talent HR is uniquely positioned to help leaders address skill gaps to not only improve their capabilities but also reduce burnout risk. Finally, consider incorporating peer learning into your development program. While leadership can be isolating, bringing together leaders who face similar challenges helps build empathy, strengthen networks, and encourage mutual learning and coaching for shared growth.Develop the Pipeline of Emerging LeadersA plan to protect leaders from burnout wouldn’t be complete without designing a strategy to cultivate future leaders within the organization.As experienced leaders become overburdened, HR can ease their workload by building a robust pipeline of emerging talent. Nurturing future leaders not only provides growth opportunities that retain top performers but also ensures a steady supply of skilled leaders who can step in and share the responsibilities. Try these strategies to strengthen your leadership pipeline: Leverage a strategic, data-driven approach to identifying high potentials.Identify and develop high-potential talent at all levels.Focus on leadership potential—not just performance—by carefully observing critical skills like interpersonal skills, coaching, and building trust. Roll out development initiatives to nurture emerging leaders, including formal training, stretch assignments, and coaching.ConclusionHR's role in preventing leader burnout extends beyond crisis management. By fostering psychological safety, offering tailored development, and cultivating a strong talent pipeline, HR can proactively build a sustainable, high-performing workplace where leaders truly thrive.For more on preventing leader burnout, visit our blog, Understanding Burnout Culture: 10 Ways Leaders Can Reduce Workplace Stress, and discover how leaders can fight burnout at work.

3 Keys for Preventing Leader Burnout

Let me share something that might surprise you: Most organizations are getting performance management completely backward. They’re piling on more systems, frameworks, and “best practices,” yet 82 percent of HR leaders say their efforts aren’t working. Why? They tend to add more complexity when they should be removing interference—the stuff that gets in the way of people giving their best.Here’s my truth: Performance management isn’t about complex systems—it’s about conversations—simple, human conversations that clear the path between where someone is and where they want to go. In my work with organizations, they often tell me they need better tools, frameworks, and processes. There’s nothing wrong with that, but what they really need is to get better at having real conversations that matter.Whether we like it or not, every interaction between a leader and team member has an impact. Whether it’s a scheduled performance review or a quick hallway chat, these moments build trust and capability or create interference and resistance. What makes the difference? It’s all in how we navigate through each conversation.Let’s break this down into two scenarios we all recognize:The Formal Performance ConversationYou know these well—the structured reviews, the goal-setting sessions, the KPI discussions. Many organizations load these moments with so much process and paperwork that they create exactly what they’re trying to avoid: interference and resistance. The key isn’t adding more structure—it’s removing the barriers that prevent honest, productive dialogue.What if instead of focusing on forms and ratings, we approached these conversations with curiosity and partnership? When leaders adopt a coaching mindset, something remarkable happens:Goal-setting becomes a collaborative exploration rather than a top-down directive.Feedback transforms from a one-way broadcast into a two-way discovery.Development plans shift from prescribed paths to journeys of self-discovery.The Informal Performance ConversationThese are the golden moments—the “do you have a minute?” conversations that happen naturally throughout the day. They’re often where the real magic happens because there’s less interference from formal structures and expectations. These spontaneous interactions are always opportunities for:In the moment, course corrections that feel like support rather than criticismBuilding trust through showing up as caring, candid, and being constructiveBringing a growth mindset to everyday challengesHere’s what I’ve learned after decades of working with leaders: The most effective performance management isn’t about managing at all—it’s about creating space for people to access their own knowledge and capability. When leaders approach both formal and informal conversations with a coaching mindset, they remove the interference that blocks natural development and growth.Remember: Your team members already know more than they think they do. Your job isn’t to pile on more knowledge or create more complex systems. It’s to help clear away the noise, so they can access what they already know and connect it to what matters most—both for them and for the organization.The inclusion of a coaching approach into performance management is less about adding new tools to your toolkit and more about removing the barriers that make these conversations feel forced, formal, or threatening and more busy work. When we do that, performance management transforms from a dreaded institutional requirement into a natural, ongoing dialogue about growth and possibility.

Putting the Humanity Into Performance Management Conversations

In October 2022, the US Surgeon General named “meaning at work” essential to improving the nation’s mental health. The declaration underscored decades of research linking meaningful work to well-being, motivation, and productivity.The announcement also responded to shifting societal dynamics, transforming how people view work. Surveys reveal that millions of Americans have reexamined their work’s role in their lives over the last four years. In one poll of more than 1,000 employees, two-thirds said they had reflected on their life’s purpose since 2020, with more than half reconsidering their careers. Seventy percent recognized work as a significant source of meaning in their lives.What Is Meaningful Work?Meaningful work is defined as work that individuals perceive as positive, purposeful, personally significant, and worthwhile.Research consistently shows that we experience meaningfulness in work when we can see how our efforts make an impact, use and develop our strengths, align our tasks with personal values, and build high-quality relationships that foster connection and support.Scholars describe it as a fundamental human need directly linked to psychological, emotional, and physical well-being. People who experience meaningful work report higher job satisfaction, stronger motivation, deeper engagement, and reduced turnover intentions.How Leaders Can Foster Meaningful WorkAs an instructor and researcher in Colorado State University’s Organizational Learning, Performance, and Change program, I partnered with colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania to investigate how leadership influences meaningful work.In a study published in Occupational Health Science, we interviewed leaders in 12 companies and analyzed more than 1,500 employees’ ratings of their managers’ behaviors across nearly 20 industries. We identified six core leadership practices that consistently foster meaningful work.These practices account for almost 50 percent of whether employees experience their work as meaningful. They are also associated with increased motivation, job satisfaction, and reduced turnover.Here are the six practices leaders should prioritize: Communicate the Work’s Bigger Impact. Help employees understand how their tasks contribute to a broader purpose. Show how their work directly affects others and aligns with the organization’s goals.Recognize and Nurture Potential. Identify employees’ unique strengths and capabilities. Provide tailored opportunities for them to grow and apply their talents in ways that highlight their value.Foster Personal Connections. Build strong interpersonal relationships within teams. Show genuine interest in employees’ lives beyond work, creating a culture of care and mattering.Model Integrity Through Values-Based Leadership. Live the organization’s values through consistent and ethical actions. This creates a culture of authenticity and trust, inspiring employees to align their actions with shared principles.Grant Employees Autonomy. Empower employees by giving them decision-making authority and freedom in approaching their work. Autonomy fosters ownership and creativity.Make Onboarding Purposeful. From recruitment to onboarding, emphasize the organization’s values and mission. Set the tone by connecting employees’ roles to the team’s larger purpose early on.By fostering meaningful work, leaders can meet a basic human need, drive engagement, retain top talent, and foster a healthier organization. 

6 Ways Leaders Can Make Work Meaningful

I once had a nurse manager come to me and ask, “How do I tell a master’s-prepared registered nurse that sleeping at their workstation is unprofessional? In many of my previous management jobs, finding an employee sleeping at their workstation was a fireable offense. In this environment, the employee appears to see no difference between sleeping in a designated break room and sleeping at their workstation.”While it may not always be an employee sleeping on the job, managers in all sectors need to address a variety of unacceptable behaviors. But how can you do so without causing drama?When I ask people what feeling comes to mind when I use the phrases “talk about a problem” or “address an issue,” the most common response is “Ugh!” – which isn’t really an emotion, but you probably get the idea. So, first tip: recognize this as a simple gap between what you were expecting and what you are observing. Your job as their manager is to describe the gap and partner with the person to close it. Here are three suggestions for how to do that:Master Your StoryYou will be far more effective at holding this conversation if you can suspend judgement. For example, even if you believe everyone should know that sleeping at the workstation is unprofessional, hold open the possibility that maybe this person was trained or taught differently. Or maybe, just maybe, they slept at their workstation all through school and no one ever got up the courage to give them feedback about it. After all, it is easy to mistake silence for approval.Catch It EarlyThe time to talk about the bad behavior is the first or second time it happens. Imagine how easy it would be, the first time a new employee falls asleep at their workstation, to gently shake them awake and kindly say, “We want all our nurses to sleep in the breakroom, not their station. Let me show you where it is.” When you catch it early, you are kindly onboarding a new employee and making sure they know what they need to be successful.When you let the poor behavior go on for a while without addressing it, two things happen. First, your own irritation likely builds, fueling your negative story. Second, you make the issue bigger. Now it is not just once or twice that this has happened but months’ worth of bad behavior. When you make the issue bigger through delay, you are more likely to create embarrassment and subsequent defensiveness in the other person.Have and Share a Good IntentIf you use the first two tips, it will be much easier to use the third one. Before any gap conversation, stop and ask yourself: what do I really want for this person? For them, not from them. Asking and answering this question will require you to flip your perspective 180 degrees. After all, we step up to gap conversations because the gap is causing a pain or problem for us. We are acutely aware of how their behavior is affecting us. The question you must ask is: How is it affecting them?What do you want for them and how will sharing this help? It can be as simple as, “I want you to be successful here and that is why I want to talk to you about this.”When you care about someone, and they know you care about them, gap conversations become about improvement, not reproof.

3 Tips for Addressing Unacceptable Behavior in the Workplace

Bridging the TD Skills Gap: Preparing for the Future explores potential gaps in the ATD Capability Model we can expect to see in the next five years.

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