I am preparing to make a presentation to members of the Minnesota High Tech Association this week. As I have been thinking about my topic, “Strategic Talent Management,” I have been trying to hone my message down to just the basics. Here are a few highlights that I plan to discuss:
1. Strategic Talent Management starts with top management understanding that having the right people with the right skills in the right jobs is vital to the accomplishment of organizational objectives. Now this is nothing new. Just about every HR, talent, or learning and development person will start by talking about how important top management support is. Without top management support, it is hard to create a culture that values development of people. But in the case of talent management, the importance of top management engagement is particularly vital. This is because it is the only way to get a meaningful linkage between the strategic goals of the enterprise and the talent management effort. It is usually not enough to “link” to a strategy after the discussion of the strategy is over and decisions have been made. Unless the talent management agenda is explicitly considered during the strategy discussions, the talent discussion will start out behind the eight ball. The focus will need to be on trying to fill in essential gaps in understanding about the implications of strategy for specific jobs, skills, people, and timing.
Unfortunately, in many companies, the political realities of the strategic planning process are such that HR (and the owners of the talent management process) have to struggle for a seat at that table with a meaningful voice. Forward-thinking companies give HR that seat, but many do not. (for an interesting side-bar on this discussion, you may be interested in this article by Bob Bogart, my former boss from Thomson Reuters who published a piece on getting HR a seat at the board room table).
2. There are 2 aspects of “Strategic” when thinking about talent management: 1) the linkage to strategy, which was referred to above; and, 2) adopting a strategic approach in the management of talent once that linkage has been made. Both meanings of word “strategic” are important. The second meaning, taking a strategic approach, is all about investing in the development of the right talent. Which jobs in the organization are the most critical for success? If you were to invest a dollar in getting the right talent into those jobs, either by hiring the right person or developing an incumbent’s skills, would you get a big return? I have blogged about this notion of “pivotal jobs” before. A great concept developed by Pete Ramsted and John Boudreau. Identifying these jobs requires a segmentation approach. Then, investment can be funneled into those most important segments.
That is all for now…
Filed under: Talent identification, Talent Management
Mark:
Great post! Especially important is your recommendation that the talent piece be discussed as part of strategy formulation – not as an afterthought once the cement of the new strategy had hardened.
As for John Boudreau, when he worked with us at The Concours Group, he used to sum up pivotal talent this way: “Where would the biggest difference (in talent investment) make the biggest difference? (in organizational impact). That about says it all!