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Your talent store

In businesses across the world too many smart people feel that their talents are not being used, become frustrated and "fire the company". The disaffected either leave or resign themselves to unsatisfying jobs and do just enough to get by. Almost everywhere you look the investment in talent is failing to deliver a return. In a recent survey the Confederation of British Industry found that as much as 23 per cent of the payroll was spent on paying people during often unnecessary absence. If disenchanted individuals stay at home unnecessarily imagine the quality of their work when they choose to attend the shop, office or factory.

A knowledge based world

IN the modern, networked and knowledge-based world your people can be truly your most important business asset. Their talents, capabilities, skills, knowledge relationships and growth potential are a vital part of your competitive edge. People generate value.

To unleash that value you need to challenge your best people to become better yet. Training and education have a role to play, but training and education are most effective when they are used and learning by doing can be the best training of all.

As opportunities arise you need to find your talented people work that creates new skills and knowledge.

Return on the talent investment

RESEARCH demonstrates that companies with enlightened talent-management policies have higher returns on sales, investments, assets, and equity. It is not easy, but it is extremely worthwhile to proactively plan and support people's development by creating work opportunities that stretch them to perform.

Avoid silos

YEARS ago as an executive in a Blue Chip corporation I shared the frustration of those that were effectively imprisoned in organisational silos not so much in spite of their talent, but because of it.

Time and again I would find myself arguing with managers who wanted to deny people the opportunity to progress because they were seen to be of great value where they were. This is spite of the obvious facts that they could be of greater value to the organisation in a more challenging environment and that frustration would in due time cause them to leave, either physically or by withdrawing to do no more than was specifically demanded of them.

Frequently in the past people had left the company and considerable expense in finding a replacement had only led to replacing better with worse.

People are flexible

A CHARACTERISTIC of humanity is that in environments where it is impossible to thrive we learn to survive. The squarest peg can learn to get by in the roundest hole, but nobody benefits, least of all the employer. To get the best from your people and enjoy the biggest profits from your investment in them you need to challenge them to grow. They will grow in a "Talent Marketplace".

Talent incubators — small organisations

IN small organisations, particularly professional services with no more than 100 employees, there has been a tradition of creating and using a talent market. The best and brightest people have been made aware of new opportunities to perform exciting and challenging tasks under proper supervision and with essential training and as a result individuals and businesses have thrived.

The International Centre for Consulting Excellence seeks to prosper by making the best possible use of the best people so that they become better yet in a spiral of constant improvement. We work in partnership with smaller organisations giving training and support as they in turn make the best use of the best talents.

Talent incubators — large businesses

IN the large business things are not quite so straight forward. Without careful assessment it is difficult to know the potential of all employees, but it can be done and it is well worth doing as the prosperity of those firms that have made the effort demonstrate. You need to:

Make it a key strategic activity to constantly recruit the best people possible for the job. This should not be taken to mean employing people that are over-qualified, but for every task, no matter how routine, it should be an unshakeable policy to hire the best available person. The best person, even in a lowly position may have valuable capabilities that will surprise you.

Identify emergent talent within the organisation. Use the "Jack Welch Test" of assessing how people rise to the challenge of being invited to achieve more while using less resource.

Communicate opportunities to your talent pool and encourage people to compete to take the most challenging and exciting tasks.

Delegate and supervise effectively until you are confident that desired outcomes will be achieved.

Train people when necessary and not as a matter of routine. Ensure that they apply what they learn immediately so that new and useful behaviours become embedded. What we at the ICfCE call "Life-long Learning — Just-in-Time".

As people surprise you with their enhanced capabilities maintain talent profiles that indicate the enriched experiences that they have had, their enhanced performance and the specific business results that improved performance has brought to you.

Celebrate and reward success so that others compete for greater opportunities and challenges.

Wisdom

THE so-called "Information Age" had barely dawned when two Japanese business authorities, Nonaka and Tacheuchi announced that information is not enough. What the increasingly volatile and competitive global market demands is "Wisdom". An organisation has wisdom when it is able to integrate and apply the explicit knowledge of its people with that which is implicit. Explicit knowledge includes data, information, known skills, abilities and experience. Implicit knowledge embraces the hunches, ideas, beliefs and unrealised talents of your people.

By creating and sustaining a talent incubator and talent market within your business — large or small — you are making the best of the best people and ensuring your future prosperity. Can anything be more important in a global market in which the most deadly competition may spring without warning from an unsuspected overseas source to take you by surprise? By enabling committed and talented people to make the most of what they can contribute you build an effective defence against all comers and a sound foundation from which to attack competition.