Talent acquisition: what it is, how it's done, why it's important
How many hires, despite being "right on paper," start to show cracks after a few months?
The position is filled, the resume was consistent, the interview went well, but despite everything, there are difficulties in adapting, misaligned expectations, and performance below expectations.
To understand why this happens so often, we need to start with an important assumption: for years, many companies have focused their efforts on filling a position quickly, rather than building the organization's ability to attract and integrate the right people over time.
Recruiting has long been treated as a reactive process: a vacancy opens up, the selection process is accelerated, and the focus is mainly on what is visible and immediately verifiable. The problem with this approach is that it tends to overlook elements such as potential, alignment with the actual work context, and the ability to grow and contribute beyond the initial scope of the role.
Talent acquisition was created precisely as a response to this limitation.
What is talent acquisition (and why it's not just recruiting)
Talent acquisition is the set of strategies and processes that a company uses to identify, attract, evaluate, and develop the people it will need not only today, but also in the future. When we talk about what talent acquisition is and its meaning, therefore, we are referring to a broader approach that links recruitment, skills, and long-term goals.
The difference compared to traditional recruiting lies mainly in the level of intentionality. Recruiting is often tactical: it responds to an open vacancy, works on timeframes and volumes, and seeks to fill a position as quickly as possible. Talent acquisition, on the other hand, is strategic: it starts with understanding which skills are critical to the organization, which will become critical, and how to build a pool of people capable of supporting them over time.
In this context, the focus is not on individual recruitment but on the medium to long term. Decisions are not based solely on current needs, but on how a role may evolve, what kind of contribution a person may make over time, and how well they will be able to adapt to changes in context, technology, or organizational model.
For this reason, talent acquisition integrates elements that go beyond selection in the strict sense: employer branding to attract consistent profiles, skills assessment to reduce the risk of mismatch, and planning to align people, roles, and future priorities.
Talent acquisition vs. recruiting: the differences
Although the two terms are often viewed as synonyms, the difference between talent acquisition and recruiting becomes clear when you consider why and how people are hired.
- Recruiting arises as a response to an immediate need: there is an open position, someone is needed to fill it, and the main objective becomes filling the vacancy as quickly as possible. We can define this as a reactive approach, often driven by urgency and operational pressure.
- Talent acquisition, on the other hand, works as a continuous system. Instead of starting from a single vacancy, it starts from a broader vision: what skills are needed today, what skills will be needed tomorrow, and how to build a pool of people over time that is consistent with the evolution of the organization.
The first major difference concernsthe time frame. Recruiting focuses on the short term and measures success based on how quickly a position is filled. Talent acquisition works on a medium- to long-term time frame and considers whether the person hired will be able to grow, adapt, and continue to generate value over time.
The reference metrics are also changing. In recruiting, the focus is often on time-to-hire or the number of applications handled. In talent acquisition, however, we must consider indicators such as quality-of-hire, retention, contribution to performance, and consistency between skills, role, and organizational context.
Another distinguishing feature is the role of data and skills. In traditional recruiting, decisions are still largely based on CVs, previous experience, and interview impressions. Talent acquisition, on the other hand, uses structured data on skills, potential, and observable behaviors to reduce the risk of mismatches and make choices more predictive.
Many companies confuse the two approaches because, in everyday practice, the urgency of hiring tends to take precedence over planning. The result is "fast" recruiting, which is not always sustainable.
How to build an effective talent acquisition strategy
A talent acquisition strategy works when it connects people, skills, and the future direction of the organization. Translating this into a practical plan, if you work in HR, this means a multi-level work strategy involving a series of steps. Here are the most important ones.
Start with skills, not job titles
A solid talent acquisition strategy always starts with one question: what skills are really needed to do the job today and in the coming months? Job titles alone say very little.
We know that similar roles can require very different skills depending on the context, the stage of the company, and the level of autonomy required. For this reason, working on critical skills allows you to anticipate future needs, avoid hires that look good on paper but are weak in practice, and build more targeted and predictive selection processes.
Align recruiting and employer branding
Employer branding and talent acquisition cannot run on separate tracks. If what you communicate externally does not reflect the real way of working in the company, you will attract poorly aligned candidates and increase the risk of early turnover (by the way, if you are interested in understanding how to reduce turnover, you can download our free white paper).
A strategy that works requires consistency between messages, stated values, and observable behaviors in HR processes, from selection to onboarding to development. In this way, recruiting becomes a natural extension of the organizational culture.
Build a talent pipeline over time
Talent acquisition does not begin when a position opens up, but much earlier.
One of the most important steps you can take is to build a talent pipeline, i.e., start cultivating relationships with potentially relevant professionals even when there is no immediate need. By working in this way, you can reduce time pressure, improve the quality of your hires, and be more selective.
Use data and objective assessments to make decisions
A mature talent acquisition strategy is not based on intuition or interview impressions, but on comparable data and clear criteria.
The best approach is to incorporate objective assessments of skills, potential, and behaviors to better distinguish between similar candidates on paper and reduce decision-making bias. For you, this means being able to explain and defend your selection choices, improve the quality of hires over time, and create a solid foundation for subsequent people development.
Talent acquisition and internal development manager
A good strategy does not only look outward: talent acquisition and internal development must constantly communicate with each other. Before looking for new people on the market, it makes sense to ask whether certain skills are already present in the company or can be developed through targeted upskilling and reskilling programs.
This approach strengthens retention, enhances internal potential, and makes growth more sustainable.
Measure what really matters
To ensure your strategy works, you will need to monitor it by choosing metrics that are consistent with your objectives. Simply monitoring time-to-hire risks rewarding speed at the expense of quality.
There are indicators such as quality of hire, performance over time, retention, and consistency between role and skills that can give you a much more useful insight.
How Skillvue supports a robust, skill-based talent acquisition strategy
If talent acquisition aims to build the skills that the organization needs over time, the most important point becomes how to make reliable decisions before hiring, when uncertainty is at its highest and mistakes are most costly.
Skillvue was created precisely to support you in this phase: to help you shift the selection process from comparing CVs and impressions to a structured assessment of skills, behaviors, and potential, consistent with a skill-based approach.
Through quick and standardized skill assessments, you can evaluate candidates based on clear and comparable criteria, thanks to:
- situational questions based on the BEI (Behavioral Event Interview) methodology, which reveal how a person makes decisions, tackles problems, and handles real responsibilities;
- targeted tests on hard skills, aligned with the skills that are truly necessary for the role, not just those that are declared;
- indicators of potential, autonomy, and learning ability, which are fundamental when selecting with a view to growth and not just immediate coverage.
In this way, Skillvue allows you to:
- improve the quality of hire, reducing hires that are "right on paper" but fragile over time;
- compare different candidates based on objective evidence, limiting bias and decision-making distortions;
- build a talent pipeline consistent with the future needs of the organization;
- align selection, development, and internal mobility within a single competency-based framework.
To learn more about Skillvue, start here.
