What is a company's talent worth?

How to assess talent

When it comes to measuring the talent that companies are looking for, various techniques and tools can be used.

One of the main ones is candidate interviews. In fact, the contracting process usually includes several such meetings, both with human resources managers and with immediate superiors, or even with senior management. In addition to asking about past experiences, skills and goals, these meetings serve for candidates and employers to get to know each other better and to detect possible incompatibilities.

Tests are also usually taken to certify that the candidate possesses the skills that are required or that he or she claims to possess. In some cases these tests include basic psychological and technical aspects. But they do not all have to be purely technical; there are also those about emotional intelligence or critical thinking skills.

Once inside the corporation, performance appraisals are another fantastic tool for showcasing a company's talent. It also serves to detect possible points of improvement for staff who are dissatisfied with their positions.

In addition to the corresponding battery of questions, HR departments can also make use of analytical tools to measure an individual's performance against that of the rest of their team or the industry. This can help determine whether an individual has a high potential for business talent.

In any case, all these tools should not be conceived as something isolated, either in time or in form. Measuring business talent is an ongoing process and multiple methods must be used to get a complete picture of the individual.

External assessment

But in addition to these systems that all companies use to assess talent and see if someone fits in the corporation or not, there are also external measurements that seek to assess talent.

These rankings are also an attempt to measure how capable companies are of attracting the best talent. Some of the most commonly used are:

• "Great Place to Work": This is an international recognition based on employee surveys and evaluations that measure a company's culture, work climate and benefits.
• "Fortune's 100 Best Companies to Work For": Fortune's annual ranking is based on employee surveys and expert assessments to measure corporate culture, policies and benefits.
• "Glassdoor's Best Places to Work": Glassdoor's annual ranking is based on employees' evaluations of their employers to measure company culture, work climate and benefits.
• "World's Most Attractive Employers": This annual Universum ranking is based on surveys of university students to measure the attractiveness of companies as employers.

Each of these systems and rankings has a different approach and methodology for measuring companies' talent, so results may vary. It is important to keep in mind that these rankings are only one indicator and should not be the only factor to consider when assessing a company's talent.

Other lists and methods are often available locally. Some of them are essentially the local application of these same measurements, but in other cases they are formulated by other sources, such as that which is produced every year by Actualidad Económica.