By Johnny Campbell
✨ AI Summary:
- Shift from measuring raw hiring productivity to increasing TA capacity by delivering strategic, value-based services.
- Centralize and enable TA teams by automating admin tasks and simplifying processes to free recruiters for meaningful candidate engagement.
- Optimize spend by mapping hiring workflows to eliminate underused tools and reinvest savings into technology that expands candidate reach.
- Expand TA’s role beyond recruitment to own internal mobility and post-hire onboarding, influencing skills development and retention.
In the current business climate, “productivity” has become the ultimate corporate buzzword. For Talent Acquisition (TA) leaders, the mandate is often a familiar, exhausting refrain: do more with less. But as Johnny Campbell, CEO of SocialTalent, and industry veteran Kevin Blair discussed in our latest ST Live, this relentless focus on maximum output might actually be a “race to the bottom.”
If you missed the session, don’t worry. We’ve distilled the core insights from Kevin Blair (Exec TA Social), Sarah Jackson (Sage), and Seth Ware (Wabtec) on how to stop defending your headcount and start expanding your strategic remit.
Productivity vs. Capacity: The Strategic Shift
The debate kicked off with a challenge to the traditional TA mindset. While productivity focuses on output (the “sausage factory” of grinding out hires), capacity is about sustainable potential and value-based services.
- The Defensive Trap: Measuring success solely by “hiring X people with X recruiters” makes the function vulnerable to automation.
- The Offensive Weapon: By framing success around capacity, TA leaders can transition from being “servants of demand” to strategic partners who influence business outcomes before a req is even opened.
- “No one’s coming. This is on you.” – Sarah Jackson, quoting a powerful reminder that TA leaders must own their transformation.
The Three Pillars of Modern TA Optimization
Our guest speakers highlighted three distinct paths to reclaiming capacity and driving Hiring Excellence:
1. The “Brilliant Basics” (Sarah Jackson, Sage)
Sarah shared how Sage centralized a global team, cutting staff from 100 to 50 while maintaining and even elevating delivery.
- The Secret Sauce: A dedicated Enablement Team. By stripping away administrative duplication and simplifying interview layers, they reclaimed thousands of hours for recruiters to focus on human connection.
- Key Takeaway: You don’t know what you’re capable of until you challenge the “sacred cows” of your legacy processes.
2. The Self-Funded Transformation (Seth Ware, Wabtec)
Seth faced a common hurdle: no budget for new tech. His solution? Rethinking the existing spend.
- Process Over Tech: Before buying tools, Seth’s team mapped every step of their workflow on a whiteboard to identify Black Box Hiring traps.
- The Pivot: By cutting expensive, underused sourcing licenses, they funded an integrated ecosystem that captured 800,000 previously lost candidates.
3. Expanding the Remit (Kevin Blair, Exec TA Social)
Kevin argued that TA must “start eating other people’s lunches” by moving into spaces like internal mobility and post-hire onboarding.
- Bridging the Gap: TA is uniquely positioned to own the “forgotten land” between Day 1 and the first performance review.
- Orchestration: Instead of being the servant to L&D, TA should hold the demand and dictate what skills need to be incubated within the organization.
What’s Next?
Are you ready to move beyond “squeezing the lemon”? Join us for our next SocialTalent Live event where we go deeper into the technical execution of these strategies.
SocialTalent Live: The AI Transformation Playbook for Talent Acquisition
- Date: March 25, 2026
- Time: 4:00 PM GMT
- Featuring: Leaders from Deutsche Bahn and Morningstar.