Human resources in the cloud

A blog post by Mike Black, Managing Director, Deloitte Consulting LLP and Sahithi Bayana, Senior Manager, Deloitte Consulting LLP 

In today’s rapidly changing, increasingly competitive environment, health care organizations must have a productive, agile workforce to meet the needs of their consumers. To recruit the right workers, to the right positions, at the right time, it’s essential to deploy modern cloud-enabled technologies, coupled with a talent-development framework for understanding, articulating, and meeting talent needs across businesses and IT.

However, as health care organizations migrate many of their IT systems to cloud, it can be difficult for traditional HR practitioners to understand how cloud talent needs differ from other talent needs within the organization. Nearly 64% of IT executives see the talent shortage created by the Great Resignation in the past few years as the most significant barrier.¹ Many health care organizations are also struggling to attract and retain skilled employees because of ever-growing adoption to emerging technologies.

Cloud can be an enabler to meet this challenge. So, the HR function at health care enterprises should implement a cloud-centric talent-development framework to help it become more proactive, innovative, and successful in finding the right talent.

The rapid rise of cloud in health care

Cloud is transforming health care, and the pace of change is accelerating rapidly. Health care organizations that are migrating to cloud need specialized talent to help them get there. Further, as cloud matures, talent models will change. So, HR must keep up with career planning goals for cloud talent and develop new training plans, development pathways, and compensation models for these innovative, ever-changing talent pools.

To increase their understanding of cloud talent and needs, it’s essential for HR practitioners to be able to speak the language of both cloud and the business and its associated innovation. They must recognize the skill sets needed, understand cloud culture, and map talent needs to technologies like cloud and artificial intelligence—as well as current and emerging business trends in health care.

To recruit, develop, and retain top-level talent, it’s essential to have a sound talent-development framework, coupled with experienced advisers. With the right framework, supported by expert guidance, health care organizations can move from a reactive recruiting mode, where they’re always playing catch-up, to a proactive mode where they can anticipate their talent needs and begin filling those needs before or as they arise.

A holistic talent-development framework 

The driving principle of an HR cloud talent-development framework is that it enables HR to address issues holistically. That means it helps enterprises understand cloud, cloud technologies, and the roles talent will play in a cloud environment. It helps them make the right technology decisions, and it also helps them realize that cloud talent will most likely have a different career path than other information technology (IT) talent and develop specific processes for cloud talent recruitment and retention. 

Further, building a strong CIO/CHRO relationship is now more important than ever to solving tech talent challenges. Together, they will identify and match organizational pain points with the existing talent strategy as it relates to the tech talent market and assist in driving yearly budget allocation for the talent management life cycle. Also, CIOs should consult with CHROs during planning strategic initiatives to measure the tech talent impact.

Experienced, collaborative advisers 

With the plethora of HR software available, as well as constantly changing needs for talent skill sets, it’s often difficult for HR and IT leaders to make cloud decisions that align with their strategy. That’s why it’s important for companies to have an experienced, collaborative adviser to help them on their journey. Having the right adviser can provide valuable insights into the latest HR trends, standards, leading practices, and, ultimately, how to structure their IT operating model to be focused on cloud service delivery. It can also help companies make better-informed decisions on cloud implementations—ones that align with their talent strategies and objectives.

Moreover, having a knowledgeable adviser can help companies identify the critical cloud skills and competencies required for success—now and in the future—in a cloud environment that’s rapidly changing. Finally, the right adviser can assist health care companies in selecting the cloud technologies that best meet their business objectives and budgets and that align technology with their overall strategies.

Talent selection

The talent-development framework should help organizations select talent that has subject-matter expertise, to be sure, but that also has general IT and cloud knowledge. A solid framework will enable HR personnel to understand and differentiate between cloud roles and write job descriptions that help them recruit specialized talent like DevOps and Agile practitioners, site reliability engineers, automation engineers, and cybersecurity engineers, etc.

However, it’s also essential that the framework provides the ability to help organizations find those workers who have business knowledge as well. That way, their roles can be dynamic, and they are part of the conversation about what the organization’s needs are and what their role is in meeting those needs.

The ability to work on flexible teams is also a key talent factor. Cloud practitioners need to have deep knowledge in one or two areas, but broad knowledge of cloud in general, so that they can understand what’s going on in their teams—and in other teams. Building a talent pool like this requires developing new career paths that are both detailed and flexible, so that HR can recruit the best available talent to fill needs that will surely change over time.

There is no single approach to building the perfect tech talent strategy. Identifying the subset of levers needed to better attract, build, and empower your organization’s workforce is the first and most critical step. However, as each organization is unique, its levers will be unique as well. Therefore, each organization must find and activate the levers that best empower its workforce.

Talent placement

The next component of an HR talent-development framework is that it provides the HR function with the ability to put talent in the right place at the right time. Needs change, and team structure will need to change with the demand. So, it’s essential for HR to have a good understanding of what team structures look like now, and how those teams might morph as needs change—to enable them to anticipate and problem-solve to get the right mix of talent in place.

Compensation

Compensation is a thorny issue, even when cloud isn’t in the picture. But cloud’s relative novelty on the HR scene sometimes makes it difficult to establish fair compensation for cloud talent. Cloud roles are new, and they change as cloud changes. Further, cloud talent is part of a new generation of workers that change jobs often. Therefore, it’s not just understanding the skill sets needed, but also the relevance of worker experience, and which skill sets are in highest demand. 

So, one of the key parts of an HR talent-development framework is the ability to help match compensation to roles to individuals. As cloud changes, roles change and talent needs change, so compensation plans and paths must be flexible and transparent. If people have a difficult experience trying to understand their career path and how they can achieve success, they leave their jobs. Then, HR teams struggle to find replacements. Thus, it’s essential to create and publicize compensation plans that are understandable, fair, and flexible.

Innovative recruiting processes

Most companies have moved away from traditional recruiting processes. It’s not just “send us your resume” anymore. Recruitment is active and challenging, and it must be innovative. However some organizations aren’t innovating as much as they could to attract top talent. 

A sound HR cloud talent-development framework helps companies modernize their recruiting. A good framework, coupled with powerful SaaS solutions, will help companies develop innovative recruiting strategies based on how and where their targeted talent prefers to interact—mobile phone, tablet, job boards, social media, conferences, and other events. It’s all part of a strategy to meet talent where they are.

The benefits of a sound HR talent-development framework

Using the right HR talent-development framework has many benefits, but there are a few benefits that rise above the rest and help health care organizations become proactive and innovative in recruiting and retaining top talent:

• The right talent, at the right time: Organizations’ ability to address their needs and find the right solutions becomes more efficient, and the talent they recruit is able to make a better impact and help the organization reach its goals more quickly. 
• Enhanced problem-solving ability: The right framework helps organizations become more proactive in how they recruit, and they can recruit talent before or as needs arise, which leads to quicker solutions.
• An innovative, cloud-centered culture: Health care organizations can use the right framework to build a collaborative culture that is highly integrated and has a stake in building solutions that move the organization forward. In such an innovative culture, there is the ability between tech and the business to understand the organization’s needs and to build systems that better meet those needs.

The bottom line: Better outcomes to thrive

Today, health care chief human resources officers are experiencing a sea change in ways of working. Previously siloed operations to fill talent needs won’t cut it any longer. Instead, it’s essential to have an HR talent-development framework that enables the HR organization to understand how cloud affects their talent needs, become proactive in meeting those needs, provide collaborative guidance in selecting the right HR technology for their business, and develop innovative recruiting methods and compensation. Those organizations that embrace new talent models will be positioned to achieve better business outcomes that move their business forward and enable them to thrive in an uncertain market. 

¹ David Roe, “What to do about tech skills shortages,” CMSWire, September 29, 2021.