Does the Talent You Have Match the Talent You Need?

Why It’s Critical to Get Clear Before You Get Going

“Overcommitment can be as serious an obstacle to change as believing that you don’t need fixing or that your flaws are part of the reason you’re successful.” - Marshall Goldsmith, What Got You Here Won't Get You There

In Marshall Goldsmith’s insightful book about understanding the necessity for change “What Got You Here Won’t Get You There”, he details all of the reasons why professionals hold on to habits and qualities that may have been useful in the past, but now have become self limiting.

This is absolutely true for individuals who are seeking to climb the ladder of professional success, but is it true for organizations and specifically the talent that make up those organizations as well?

The most amazing thing about seemingly successful organizations is that there is such a low emphasis on understanding the people that work there. Most egregious of all, there is a total disregard for motivators and potential.

It’s one of the most criminally neglected fields of People Operations: the inability to understand who is capable of doing what and how to get them to do it.

How confident are you that your organization has a firm grasp on who their high potential employees are?

How confident are you that your organization has the right means of assessing what a high potential employee even is?

How confident are you that your organization can get your employees to rise to their level of potential?

The number one pitfall of labeling an employee as “high potential” is to look purely at metrics, seeing who is producing the most and slap on the stick right then and there.

All that does is say “this person is working hard and we think they will keep working hard indefinitely”.

What a waste.

If push came to shove, not many leaders worth their salt would admit that just because someone is willing to put in extra time and grind day in and day out is of true high value to the company. That is because, more often than not, a hard worker can be more easily replaced.

Producers absolutely have their place in the organization – especially when they have a narrow, difficult to replicate, skill set. These are where subject matter experts come in.

When doing talent reviews, it’s important to label and reward appropriately.

Are all Subject Matter Experts High Potential Employees? No.

Are all High Potential Employees Subject Matter Experts? No.

The mistakes happen when organizations can’t tell the difference.

Always Be Reviewing

There is a lot to be said about review cycles.

They’re important.

They’re a waste.

They take too much time.

They are a dog and pony show.

They certainly are all of those things and more!

What they need to be is a systematic way of reviewing the talent that you have and rewarding it appropriately to the value that each person creates for the organization.

Easier said than done.

Strong organizations need to do at least two things with their talent review efforts.

• Understand what skills their people have.

• Understand if those skills help achieve their objectives.

Being able to have a finger on the pulse of your organization’s talent profile and its ability to deliver on your objectives means the difference between success and failure.

Don’t wait until the once a year review to make this happen.

Be reviewing, always.

What to Do When No One Can Do It

Strategies inevitably change.

Objectives eventually shift.

In a nutshell, shit happens.

Organization’s will always find themselves in need of filling their teams with new skills and people.

The important thing is to not be caught with your pants down without a plan in place to understand what talent you need and how you intend to get it.

If you’re always reviewing and you understand who your high potential employees and subject matter experts are, you will be in a fantastic position to make this happen.

In order to go out to market and get the talent you need in order to achieve your objectives, you need to have a responsive, agile and competent talent acquisition team.

The most important factor in a talent acquisition team’s success is having the clarity and support of their business partners. More often than not, the TA team will hear things like “I’ll know it when I see it” or “I’m not quite sure what I need” or the dreaded “I’ll have it all, please!”.

In order for you to staff your team appropriately, must get clear before you can get going.

Clarity is the key.

As the old adage says, “Fail to plan. Plan to fail”.

Ask yourself:

When the tides change and you need to set a new course, can you get to your destination with the crew you have or do you need to bring on a few new hands?