Strategic partnerships of talent managers and other managers in companies are hampered by many obstacles. Typical examples contain the reactive nature and understaffing of talent managers' roles, the difficulty to convince senior management to support broader initiatives focused on talent management or isolated approach to talent management solutions.
A successful talent management strategy have to be based on two fundamental aspects - a holistic, systematic approach and aligning the basic building blocks of corporate talent management. These building blocks include (ordered by importance to the business results):
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Culture - corporate culture that promotes talent development and sharing
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Strategic alignment - links between talent management strategy and initiatives and broader strategic plans and business objectives
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Training and development - training and development tools and processes to support talent development and growth
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Leadership - senior management to be visibly and actively involved in talent management initiatives and show its support
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Assessing talent - objective, standardized mechanisms for assessing the most important skills and behavior od talents
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Working with HR - Human Resources as a partner in talent acquisition, evaluation, development and deployment
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Analytical tools - tools for data analysis and ability to analyze the impact of talent management initiatives
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Performance management - performance management processes for effective measurement and feedback on correct behavior and skills of staff
When preparing a talent management initiative, first ask yourself these questions:
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Is the initiative linked to your company's business strategy?
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It is a holistic initiative?
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Does it satisfy the requirement of linking the eight above-mentioned basic building blocks of corporate talent management?
Without meeting these conditions, your initiative will be only tactical and episodic, not strategic and sustainable.
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