HR Professional - August/September 2008 - (Page 47)

TA L E N T M A NAGE M E N T f the key to success in the next decade is talent management, many companies face some tough going. Their talentmanagement functions are inconsistent, unfocused and largely reactive. By and large, they focus on senior management and high-potential employees—leaving the majority of the workforce underserved. But what does it take to manage talent successfully? A recent Hackett Group survey found that of the 200 global organizations surveyed, many were falling short on six critical talent management practices. 1. Establish links between business and people strategies: Top performing organizations undertake workforce planning and development based on their strategic direction, required organizational capabilities and necessary people competencies. Two-thirds of participants include talent management as part of overall business strategies and operating plans. In 40 per cent of organizations, HR leads the process linking talentmanagement strategy to business strategy. Only 17 per cent have a formal learning and development plan linked to the business strategy, instead using employee-based measures more often than business results to gauge training effectiveness. 2. Define talent management broadly: The study confirmed the lack of a common understanding and definition of talent management. More than 75 per cent included workforce development, succession planning, recruiting and staffing, and skill and competency development (other choices were strategic workforce planning, retention planning and organizational effectiveness), but only 41 per cent included all seven activities. 3. Consider the entire workforce as talent: This is not to say top-performing companies treat all employees equally. Instead, they categorize the workforce based on business criticality and apply tailored solutions to these categories. For example, their recruiting strategies reflect the importance and difficulty of attracting different position levels or skill categories, and they offer benefits that correspond to workforce w w w. HRT houghtLeader. c om BY STEPHEN JOYCE GAINING AN EDGE ON TALENT MANAGEMENT I demographics. Finally, they use succession plans and retention plans to maximize their talent investment. 4. Create a culture of engagement: Research has shown that engaged employees are more likely to stay with their employers and contribute in ways that improve business performance. Interestingly, only 27 per cent of study participants described their employees in terms that can be classified as engaged—involved in their work, committed to their organizations and aware of their contributions to business success. Only one-third of participants administered an employee-engagement survey during the past 12 months. 5. Emphasize people-management skills: Successful organizations put as much emphasis on people-management skills as they do on talent-management processes. For example, performance management requires managers who are trained to provide feedback in the most positive sense. In the same way, salary and incentive systems are most effective when managers are equipped to distinguish individual performance differences and empowered to reward them. More than 75 per cent of participants rated people-management skills very important; however, only 19 per cent of senior managers, 10 per cent of mid-level managers and eight per cent of supervisors were rated highly effective at managing people. 6. Tie talent management to business measures: Enhance visibility and strategic relevance by tying talent management success to business measures like sales, profits, productivity and shareholder value, as well as HR measures like turnover. Most HR organizations measure their progress in HR terms, such as time to ﬁll a position or cost per hire and turnover, but organizations in the study that correlated business improvements with talent-management activities had the greatest opportunity to impact company performance. Stephen Joyce (www.thehackettgroup.com) is practice leader for The Hackett Group’s HR Executive Advisory Program. A u g u s t / S e p t e m b e r 2 0 0 8 47 http://www.thehackettgroup.com http://www.HRThoughtLeader.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of HR Professional - August/September 2008

HR Professional - August/September 2008 Contents Editor's Letter Contributors Leadership Matters Upfront Legal Compensation Human Capital The New Frontier On Message Strategy HR 101 Interview with Annette Veschuren Talent Management Training Work/Life Balance Off the Shelf The Last Word

HR Professional - August/September 2008

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