2. LINE MANAGERS ARE TAKING
ON DUTIES THAT ONCE
BELONGED TO HUMAN
RESOURCES. HERE’S WHAT
THEY NEED TO KNOW.
3. WHAT REALLY IS HAPPENING IN THE ORGANISATIONS
Responsibility for talent management is shifting
from HR to frontline executives.
The transition is driven partly by cost cutting—
head counts in HR departments fell sharply
during the Great Recession—but it is also fuelled
by the recognition that many aspects of talent
management are best handled by dayto- day
managers.
4. EXECUTIVES NEWLY RESPONSIBLE FOR TALENT
MANAGEMENT—AND EMPLOYERS IN GENERAL—
MAY BENEFIT FROM THINKING ABOUT THE QUESTIONS
BELOW.
1. What Are our Talent Needs?
2. How Should We Meet Our Talent Needs?
3. How Can We Do a Better Job of Hiring?
4. How Can We Develop Internal Talent?
5. How Can We Manage Employees’ Career Paths?
5. 1. WHAT ARE OUR TALENT NEEDS?
• The first problem facing managers thinking about talent is the quality
of information at their disposal.
• For instance, one of the biggest misconceptions about managing
talent is the belief that performance problems spring from individual
failure. Research shows that the notion of “A” players is largely a myth.
Most people aren’t innately good, average, or poor performers; the
quality of their work depends in large part on context, including the
systems and support around them.
• hiring a rival firm’s starperformer rarely works, because the support
structure that helped her shine at that company doesn’t follow her to
yours. Getting the best performance from employees often depends
on putting them in the right job, with the right boss.
6. 2. HOW SHOULD WE MEET OUR TALENT NEEDS?
• Often when managers think about obtaining talent, they think only
about hiring. More than 60% of vacancies in large U.S. firms are now
filled by outside hires, compared with just 10% a generation ago.
• How to choose? Start with costs.
• Developing existing employees can save money, but it’s a long-term
bet
• Borrowing talent provides a just-in-time solution
7. 3. HOW CAN WE DO A BETTER JOB OF HIRING?
• Hiring may be the single hardest task in organizational life.
• The process has two distinct phases. The frst is recruiting and second
is selection.
• Managers may be delighted if they’re besieged by applicants, taking it
as a sign that their company is a desirable employer and that they’re
doing a good job recruiting
• candidates may overstate their qualifications, and because many
managers are poor at predicting who will be the best hire, especially
for a job that requires signifcant experience; unless they have special
training in the process, they may succumb to personal biases.
8. 4. HOW CAN WE DEVELOP INTERNAL TALENT?
• Leaders think they can’t afford to groom employees for bigger roles
because those employees might leave.
• But entire industries, including accounting and professional services,
invest heavily in development, experience high turnover, and yet
remain highly profitable.
• They can succeed with this model because classroom training is just a
small part of their development process, most of which takes place as
employees do real, billable work.
• The beauty of those programs is that employees attend classes after
hours.
9. 5. HOW CAN WE MANAGE EMPLOYEES’ CAREER
PATHS?
• The single best way to retain valued employees is to give them better
opportunities than they could find elsewhere.
• One way companies skirt the problem is by creating a transparent
internal market for talent. They post any vacancies, and interested
employees apply and make their case.
