Change is a fact of life, especially in business. People come and go as their career goals and trajectories shift, but sometimes those shifts are hard to plan for. When seats in your organization become vacant, it’s natural to initially focus on the immediate impacts transitions cause like lower team capacity, timeline delays due to lack of leadership and filling accountability holes.
But the truth is the impact is far deeper, and it’s costing your organization more than you think.
An empty seat isn’t just a gap on the org chart, it’s a hole that impacts your entire team and your overall profitability. Research from the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) shows that the average unfilled position costs companies an average of $4,000-$10,000 for every month a role goes unfilled (with leadership and executive roles costing much more). And that cost increases even more when you consider productivity losses and potential damage to employee morale that leads to more vacancies.
So, what can you do about it?
- Be proactive about developing a talent pipeline
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- It’s impossible to predict the future, but it is possible to prepare. Building a strong talent pipeline before you need it will help you hire more quickly and efficiently when it’s time. Recent research from LinkedIn shows that “passive candidates” make up 70% of the workforce, and recruiting candidates who aren’t actively looking for work is becoming a strategic hiring priority for managerial and leadership positions. Keep your connections warm through networking and intentional engagement – you never know when you’ll need them.
- Align on what really matters for each role
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- A common strategy in HR and recruiting roles is to build ideal candidate profiles for each role in an organization. With clearly defined accountabilities and skills needed, teams are able to identify the best candidates more quickly, closing the gap between a vacated and filled position. Defined candidate profiles aren’t just a good resource for hiring the best-fit candidate when a position is vacant – it’s also a great framework for developing your internal teams. Share those ideal candidate profiles with your existing employees on a steep growth trajectory to give them a clear path to what’s next.
- Be transparent with your team
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- Just because a seat vacates doesn’t mean the work associated with the position disappears. Your remaining team will have to stretch to fill gaps during times of transition, and shouldering that extra work can become a heavy burden over time, leading to burnout and, potentially, additional turnover. Keep your team up-to-speed on efforts to fill that empty seat, and look for opportunities to lighten their load in the meantime. Sometimes bringing on freelancers can be a short-term fix to capacity strain.
These tools are just the tip of the iceberg – the trick is to use them intentionally. Urgency is important when filling empty seats on your team, but be wary of rushing. Placing the wrong person on your team simply to fill a seat can be a costly mistake. If you need support, recruiters and HR professionals are a great resource to get you started or offer support along the way. Reach out to learn more about how we can help.