Organisations throughout the world invest lots of resources, time and money in Talent
Management to retain High Potentials (HIPOTs). You will see these are highly
capable, intelligent, and quick learning resources that we're
handling. Would a hike in salary package, grade, or
designation place them motivated lastingly?
Imagine
a goldfish in a tank full of fighter
fish. A formula1 car on any heavy traffic road. Shoe
polish close
to fruit racks in the retail outlet. How repulsive are these
images? This is precisely how hipots will
feel if they've got to work in an environment that does
not suit their culture, aspirations, and capabilities. They
may feel suffocated and what follows next is the hipot going
in search of fresh air.
CAPABILITY
MISMATCH:
Take into consideration a situation where your hipot has to
report to a supervisor who seems to be low on
general intelligence. The manager would most probably take more time concluding a brainstorming session. The hipot may see
this extra time as waste and incapability of
the manager. The hipot would
possibly not find enough motivation to sit through the future meetings with
the manager or not look ahead to
learning from the manager.
CULTURE MISMATCH:
We all
know that adults would not like to be told. A hipot would hate being directed incessantly, and they love to be challenged cognitively. Typically they would prefer guidance only after trying out things on
their own. An environment where the organisation and the managers are less tolerant towards
learning through experiments and failures will likely not support nurturing a talent pool. ‘Telling
approach' is one indicator of an
organisation that lacks a high-performance culture.
ASPIRATION
MISMATCH:
Tenure-based
promotion is a popular enough a way to repel the
talent pool farther from organisation. What
is needed in such a situation is
to manage somehow and stay
put for the promotions to happen. A hipot might find being
employed in such an environment insulting. Hipots expect to grow based on performance,
effort and demonstrated capability.
Organisations
can't expect hipots to wait patiently for their turn of promotion. The irony is
that the organisations don't try to find their patience while recruiting them. The
talent management strategy must be in line with the intent to nurture and
retain the talent pool.
“At companies with
very effective talent management, respondents are six times more likely than
those with very ineffective talent management to report higher 'Total Returns
to Shareholders' than competitors.”
“Only 5 per cent
of respondents say their organizations' talent management has been very
effective at improving company performance”.
Source -
https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/organization/our-insights/winning-with-your-talent-management-strategy
ATTRACTING VS
BUYING TALENT:
Does your organisation
attracts talent or get it from the market? You will see these are two
different things. If by chance your organisation is attracting talent, you are sure to always have a talent surplus situation, no matter what the
market condition is. If you are buying talent from the market, you may consider the following
thoughts:
• Increased
wages are not going to keep the hipot motivated quite a while
• A Deputy
Assistant VP grade will
likely not mean much for a longer duration
• If there is
a mismatch between expectations and reality, the hipot may regress
in performance after joining your organisation
• Recruiting
hipots may cause interpersonal challenges together with increase in employee churn
Some pointers
that will help in making informed decisions about attracting, recruiting, and retaining
the talent pool:
• Define the DNA
of hipots for the organisation
• Define the
strategy to recruit hipots. You might have to make sure that they work with managers who can provide them with the right environment
• Conduct surveys
to check if your organisation's culture is
conducive for nurturing the talent pool. Should there be shortcomings, including organisational culture and practices,
address them through a robust learning architecture
• Make leaders
accountable for talent management and review them regularly
• Define a career
path for all roles within the organisation. The
employee should enter, get promoted, and exit the organisation at the right
time
• Make people
development a default competency for managers and leaders. Organisations should
give talent management competency enough weightage for making their promotions
decisions
• Provide equal
opportunity for all employees to learn and grow
• Make the
promotion criteria objective and transparent
• It is completely ok not to recruit hipots for your organisation, but this decision must
be based on talent pool bench-marking
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