Managing talent, growing leaders
South African organisations that get their talent management right are going to be game changers. They are the ones that recognise, in a country hungry for direction, the way in which their people are engaged cannot be informed only by the needs of the business. An outcome must also be to create leaders who can change the course of a nation.
South African organisations that get their talent management right are going to be game changers. They are the ones that recognise, in a country hungry for direction, the way in which their people are engaged cannot be informed only by the needs of the business. An outcome must also be to create leaders who can change the course of a nation.
This is especially the case for professional service organisations where the majority of employees are statistically bound for the C-suite. It is well known that more than 70% of chief executive officers are chartered accountants by profession.
It is also well known that, to be effective, a talent management strategy needs to be aligned with, and linked to, business strategy - it is how this alignment is achieved. However, this characterises the more innovative talent management approaches.
Aligning a firm's people with its strategies involves, it is suggested, substituting the traditional top-down approach and replacing it with one in which employees - at all levels - are engaged in strategy formulation and implementation. When it comes to creating a corporate vision for the future and ensuring that this is realised, the message is one of co-creation and co-implementation.
On a practical level, this entails identifying projects that are central to the firm's strategy and empowering employees to implement these. From trainee to associate director, employees become accountable for implementing strategic projects under the auspices of a senior person. Not only does this facilitate the communication of strategy to the most junior levels, it creates healthy upward pressure on senior management to play their part as mentor and coach.
The project in question may, for example, relate to a company''s goal to become an employer of choice or to be instrumental in certain social responsibility initiatives. In commanding and implementing these projects, crucial management, organisational and leadership skills will be developed. At the same time, employees are consistently and actively engaged with refining and implementing the company's vision. In this way, a crucial marriage is forged between strategy and learning.
Many organisations have a learning and development department, centre, university or academy. Often these offer excellent content that is delivered through sophisticated channels. But if this learning is not woven into the way an organisation manages its talent, a significant opportunity to incubate leaders is lost.
It has long been recognised that traditional, formal classroom learning has severe limitations. Accordingly, to operate optimally a corporate academy should ideally not only ensure that an organisation's employees have the right knowledge and skills but also those which enable them to apply that knowledge in the real world. This gives rise to the need to integrate performance management and learning. Accordingly, scorecards, evaluation processes and key performance indicators need to be designed around the outputs of the strategic projects that employees are tasked to implement.
To foster a shared sense of ownership and responsibility, it is essential that the activities performed by employees are relevant to achieving the vision of the organisation. At the same time, learning must be self-directed so it occurs in a manner that empowers employees to become masters of their own strategic contribution.
Connected with the theme of active learning by implementing strategy is the matter of innovation. This is a focus area that can no longer been seen as separate from business strategy. Operating in the modern economy involves dealing with increasing levels of complexity and accelerated change. Those in the business of selling solutions can remain there only by fostering a culture of innovation.
This means allowing employees engaged in core projects the freedom to take risks, to “dive deep”. Today's generation of employees has a greater appetite for taking risks in their careers. A talent management system has to take this into account by building the management of risk into performance evaluation. In this regard, a mentoring culture becomes even more important to ensure that where risks are taken, these are educated ones.
It is clear that in South Africa today, the role of a corporate university or learning centre has become very broad indeed. To be relevant in today's economy it cannot remain a passive repository of technical knowledge. Rather, it needs to evolve into a dynamic catalyst for activating talent around business strategy and for the deployment of strategic initiates inside the organisation.
The corporate academy is a lever by which to develop leadership potential, to drive innovation and to promote behaviours in line with the corporation's values.
Ultimately, the goal of a corporate academy is to enable the company to grow by optimising the potential and contribution of its people. Organisations whose talent management models are successful in this regard are not the only ones who stand to benefit. Both the economy and the country's leadership will be enriched.
