Talking Talent with the CEO…the Litmus Test
…The Talent Information Chasm Charles H. Bishop, Jr., PhD
The Talent Information Chasm…C-Level requirements and the Inadequate Data available!
Introduction: Too many organizations do not have the talent they need to meet present needs and for the future. That picture is well documented and is a major stumbling block to success by CEO’s who cite growth, expansion and innovation as critical for the future.; however, also cite a’ lack of talent’ as the biggest barrier to organization health. C-Level teams need good information on which to base talent decisions…but that information is poor!
Why is talent management generally viewed by C-level executives as needing an over-haul? There are a number of systemic reasons…because it is HR’s fault! Commonly heard…
- Not a key corporate priority…’sure, people are our most important assets and highly valued; however.’
- Elitism “rub” . . . by its very nature talent segmentation, assessment and development is an exercise in differential treatment; …and, we want to treat people equally-
- States Rights —tension around who do the people belong to; “my people”…when in fact talent should be considered a corporate asset;
- Leaders of most organizations don’t take the lead and convey that management is accountable; much of leadership is about delegation–building talent is not;
Our contention is that while all of the above does exist, the seminal cause is lack of good information on which to base plans and make decisions about people. Why is that? Bad data! That bad data comes from inadequate assessment of individuals in the system.
Assessment of Talent…the organization Achilles heel in ‘getting to the future’:
It is amazing how companies will acknowledge that their managers cannot, at a macro level, provide quality ratings of individual performance. Yet, they still develop and accept succession plans based on “assessments” by those same managers, of the same individuals, of performance to be delivered in 3 to 5 year’s time!
Yet that is the situation in too many cases. So the information is neither believable nor used. That is too many times the source of Bad Data!
And, it builds!
Each day, leaders throughout your organization make judgments, or “calls,” to select talent for more challenging and complex jobs. When these decision-makers fail to make astute talent assessments and predictions, a little bit of your company’s future is chipped away. When inept assessments from individual managers are combined across an organization into an overall picture of your organization’s talent strength and readiness, this composite view too often catches senior executives off guard as they scrutinize or “scrub” promotability lists to select key leaders for critical assignments.
Profound effects …flying under the radar, discovered after the fact!
With a ‘once a year mentality’ you will find the comment: “Glad that this exercise is over with…let’s get back to real world”! When that occurs the CEO’s talent management intentions are discredited, diminished.
For senior management–Credibility is damaged!
- When a poor performer is put into a critical position! –…’how could they have put someone like that in that job’;
- Individual assessment very high…but no one wants to recruit that person!
- Poor performer gets a high performance appraisal rating+ equity!
Engagement of our employees…so important, but damaged!
- New leader in position – no on-boarding plan;
- Lack of development plans with your best talent…they sign off–lost, confused, unsure…
- Solid talent reporting to a poor leader…disillusioned!
Performance Erosion
- Limited talent in position…tolerated…just one of many!
- Some Units are “Pyramids of Mediocrity!
- Limited talent in top two levels in the organization…teamwork compromised.
The outcome: Senior management is typically disappointed with these newly found talent deficiencies, but chalk up this problem as a natural aspect of talent management. Meanwhile, the ability of your organization to rapidly muster great talent for strategic moves in the marketplace is compromised by both quality and timeliness factors. When the talent-assessment process ultimately generates only “good enough” talent and teams, what is the outcome to your organization when those great competitors in your sector take aim at your markets and your customers?
The stakes are high. Boards and Wall Street don’t often have the patience for the uncertain adventure of evolving good teams into great ones when the individual talent does not measure up to winning. Better to start with great in building highperformance teams. And, more importantly, need to fix the input…and get better data.
A solution: A multi-rater, facilitated session… will produce solid information…so that you can build good information. In a latter post I’ll cover this tool–the Human Asset Inventory®