Champions In The C-Suite: Reimagining Talent Strategy For ‘Wild Success'

Forbes

19-05-2025

In today's dynamic work environment, matching employee talent to business needs is a challenge for most organizations. Yet recruiters often miss a huge pool of high-potential candidates for one simple reason: They rely on a talent strategy that focuses on credentials at the exclusion of equally important success indicators — such as local knowledge and the ability and motivation to learn.
Stand Together
Casting a wider talent recruitment net can significantly boost business results. Three organizations that are engaged with the Corporate Coalition of Chicago — an alliance of companies working to address inequities in the Chicago region — are proof. Leaders at each had breakthroughs in their thinking about talent that delivered major business benefits:
Each had a different catalyst that inspired them to make the change, but they all drew the same conclusion: Thinking outside the box on hiring practices created profound, positive change in their organization. Here's how Accenture, Brown, and University of Chicago Medicine did it.
A 'wild success' is how Jim Coleman, former managing director of Accenture Chicago, described the company's learn-and-earn apprenticeship program, which launched in 2016. Tapping into and developing a new source of talent, Coleman said, 'gave us a more informed and diverse workforce.'
This was a mission-critical goal for the people-oriented management consulting company. Prior to expanding its recruitment parameters, Accenture Chicago had a hiring system that required most job candidates to have a four-year college degree. This meant motivated talent without the credential didn't have a way to get in the door.
Inspired by a talk from then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel about the need to make Chicago's community colleges more relevant — and reflecting on his own experience as a community college student when he was young — Coleman and his team crafted the Chicago Apprenticeship Network as well as Accenture's apprenticeship program. For the latter, Accenture recruiters identify promising local students and invite them to join a 12-month, on-the-job training program with salaries and benefits. Those who are judged to be a good fit at the end of the 12 months are offered full-time employment.
'The apprentices were … very dedicated, very hardworking — they brought a different perspective to our business,' Coleman said of the initial cohorts. Because they came from different backgrounds, they approached work from a nontraditional perspective. 'They were immediately additive to our culture — not only in the office, but in our client work as well.'
Coleman noted that Accenture Chicago's goal in launching the program was never about philanthropy or being just a 'nice thing to do.'
'I knew it had to be purposely built into our P&L,' he said. 'To really achieve scale and full potential, it needed to have a place in our DNA.'
Now, nearly a decade later, Accenture's apprenticeship program has proven to be good business for Accenture and transformative for the individuals involved.
Coleman acknowledged that it's 'a big change,' in that it offers a different way to think about recruiting, onboarding, mentoring, and day-to-day management of the people who now constitute a significant portion of Accenture's national entry-level roles.
While it can be challenging to alter the way things have always been done, according to Coleman it's well worth the journey.
For Brown's Super Stores, a supermarket chain in the Philadelphia area, hiring from the local community gave it unparalleled insight into its customers that no degree could have provided. CEO Jeff Brown's inspiration came when he was challenged to solve another problem — food deserts, which were impacting health outcomes in disadvantaged parts of Philadelphia.
Brown said these conversations revealed an important insight: Many customers had criminal records, creating barriers to employment and participation in the community. That realization reinforced the importance of removing those barriers and creating pathways for people to get a second chance and contribute.
He also learned a hard lesson. At a town hall, an employee called Brown out directly. Overlooking hardworking people just because they've interacted with the justice system, they said, is a 'bad business model.'
Brown knew that for a store to succeed, it has to meet the real needs of its community. In this case, that meant more than selling groceries — it was about creating a space where people could connect and feel a sense of belonging. That pushed him to ask a new question: What would it look like to build something that works for everyone?
'Investing in the community is good for business,' Brown said.
Despite some pushback from his team, Brown made the call to hire six individuals with criminal records at a store in Southwest Philadelphia — giving people who had been impacted by the justice system a shot at meaningful work.
'I said, 'We're going to judge the future based on how these six people do. We're going to give them a fair chance and we're not going to worry about what they did in the past.'' Over time, the success of those six people led Brown's to hire thousands like them.
Adopting a fair chance employment policy turned out to be a game changer (and inspired Brown to support the Chicago Coalition's efforts to promote these practices). 'While our competitors struggled during the pandemic and other times when the labor market was tight, we did not struggle at all,' Brown said. 'We could out-operate our competitors. Our policy led directly to better business performance.' Before implementing the new approach to talent recruitment, Brown said, the Southwest Philly store had annual revenue of $5 million. Afterward, he said, 'We ended up doing $35 million a year.'
Brown admitted that developing more flexible hiring practices took some imagination, but the results created a new mindset among managers. A lot of the applicants had not graduated high school, and some had been in the drug trade, but they understood business. 'They're not permanently broken people,' Brown said. 'So many of the problems that occur can be addressed through education and training.'
These hires also brought something new to the table: an elevated understanding of the business's social context. Brown recalled one supermarket that was having a problem with a local man with mental health issues. He would disrupt the store every day, late in the afternoon. The group replaced the store manager with a local hire and the problem evaporated.
How? With food. 'When I asked what had changed, the new manager said, 'Yes, he's got problems, he's homeless, he comes every day at 5 p.m. for dinner, we make him a bologna sandwich. He leaves.' A Harvard MBA wouldn't see it, but a person from the neighborhood could.'
Tom Jackiewicz, president of University of Chicago Medicine, which employs 13,000 people, adjusted his hiring practices after a chance conversation with an Uber driver in Las Vegas. She'd moved away from the South Side of Chicago, due in part to the fear of random violence in her neighborhood. 'Only innocent people get shot,' he recalled her saying.
Her story was a reminder that barriers like safety and limited opportunity can quietly hold people back. For business leaders like Jackiewicz, addressing those barriers is part of creating a future where more people can contribute and thrive.
Jackiewicz realized there was a huge untapped source of workers on his doorstep. If he could invest in them, it could rejuvenate the area and bring real benefits to the university's health system. The key to success was to look at what the community needed and build from there.
'It wasn't a case of 'here's what we're going to do,'' he said. 'We talked to community leaders to analyze the need and try to fill it, rather than just focusing on what we could bring.'
The results of this experiment are paying dividends:
'Our participation is going to be tremendous for the South Side community, but it's also going to be tremendous for the University of Chicago,' Jackiewicz said. 'It's a true win-win situation.'
Jackiewicz now understands firsthand the cost of untapped potential when people aren't given a chance. He sees this moment as a call to action: While business leaders can't fix everything, they can lead by removing barriers and creating opportunities. 'This is a time to be bold,' he said. 'We have a chance to change things for the better.'
The Stand Together community is proud to support the Corporate Coalition of Chicago.