Recruit and Retain

In today's economic climate of cutbacks and hiring freezes, employees feel underemployed and overextended. With individual employees picking up more of the load, organizations need to recruit, develop and retain talented workers. What follows are five examples of leading organizations.

1. Social networking:

Talent management begins with communication, and communication extends online. Some companies use networking sites to recruit potential employees, and use in their talent acquisition process. Organizations are using social networking to find, train, develop and retain employees.

2. Simulation:

Many organizations use simulation to provide real-world experience when managing and developing talent. Unisys and The Performance Development Group created an immersive, video-driven simulation where managers could practice behaviors by working through a typical 15-month performance cycle while managing two different, well-defined faux employees. Similarly, simulation also worked for a large pharmaceutical company that needed to train its sales force to directly affect real-life performance. They worked with PDG to create an immersive, video-driven simulation that allowed sales representatives to experience complicated compliance scenarios on physician calls in a low-risk environment. This video simulation provided a chance to practice on living, breathing, dynamic characters.

3. Hands-on experience:

To train and develop talent, Genpact, a global service provider in the business intelligence and performance management field, uses job rotation and hands-on experience in its Global Operations Leadership Development Program. In this program, managers rotate through three different jobs - crossing businesses, functions and regions - to obtain direct hands-on experience.

4. Blended learning:

To manage talent and prepare managers for the annual review process, International Finance Corp. followed a blended learning approach. Online training tools, targeted at both managers and staff members, included asynchronous, self-paced e-learning; mobile learning; synchronous Web conferences; and assessment tools. These multiple access points and learning styles reached more employees and helped managers better coach workers to develop their careers. According to IFC, "The multifaceted integration of learning and talent management helped IFC achieve its objectives of connecting talent champions by building global talent."

5. Synchronous online learning:

A company, which makes ingredients for the global food and beverage industry, its sales force needs to understand various ingredient technologies and customer needs. In particular, sales-people need to sell more than single-ingredient solutions; they need to provide integrated ingredient solutions. The training developed by them involved many parts, one being a Coaching for Sales Effectiveness course to help sales managers coach team members, one on one and in groups.

This course was started using online synchronous learning, via an interactive webcast, before being built into a management system. Beginning this way enabled managers to use it immediately, without waiting to integrate it into the system, which provided earlier feedback to further make perfect the course.

These examples show that, especially when combined with traditional methods, social networking and other online training methods can enhance an organization's talent management strategies.

Nature Never Lies

Recently I was reminded that basic themes seem to run through all aspects of life. Whether we are talking about managing people, playing sports, investing in the stock market or fighting a war, these principles prevail. If we want to understand the dynamics of organizational behavior, it is useful to review them.

Human nature never changes. Therefore, in a given setting - business, a game, the stock market or a battlefield - only the players, strategies, resources and technologies change. How these work out is a function of the human nature of the participants.

Internally, the reasoning and emotions of the participants drive the "game." Most often, particularly under stress, the basic elements of humanity - fear, greed, ignorance and ego - come to the forefront. The other side of human nature is balanced through values, hope, insight and creativity. In the end, reasoning seldom is unaffected by these other powerful forces.

For example, there is no correlation at any level between financial success and happiness. As Fred Herzberg pointed out in his motivation theory almost 50 years ago, money is like food: You can eat the best meal of your life, but within a few hours you are hungry again. People can achieve material goals and career ambitions, but that does not guarantee happiness. Unless they are retiring, they'll always be striving to fulfill and maintain personal goals related to money, status and power.

Unfortunately, personal goals do not always correlate with organizational goals. Conversely, when you find a person who is satisfied with their position for the rest of their career, you have found a follower, not an innovator or a leader. It may be time to retire them.

Goal achievement is more a function of will than intellect. If your people have the will to work through adversity for the good of the organization, you have an irresistible force on your side. Call it what you will - engagement or commitment, if you like - but intelligence, skill and knowledge are not enough.

The indomitable will to serve the goals of the organization is the greatest competitive advantage you can obtain. Therein lies the challenge: In a parallel case, we talk about leadership; but as Peter Drucker asked, "Leadership for what purpose?" The same can be said for engagement. How are you measuring engagement? Is it just a number on survey, or is it visibly connected to productivity?

All the great leaps forward throughout history have been the result on individual inspiration: One person who pulls together a support team of one or more believers leads to the great leaps in technology, medicine, sports, politics and business.

Despite what they say, management does not want these highly creative people; they want willing followers. If you find an unusually creative individual within your ranks, you have two choices.

One is to isolate him or her in a position where he or she can work out their inspiration without organizational interference. Then, you have to reward him or her and restart the process. The other is to hope that his or her ambition does not correlate with his or her creativity because then he or she will leave to follow his or her dream. Most organizations have not been able to keep creative people long because organizations require and reward followership.

Strategy and, eventually, success are founded on objective analysis of purpose and goals. Know who you want to be as an organization.

What do you want to be in the marketplace? What should your signature be: innovation, like Apple; high quality, like Tiffany & Co.; low cost, like Amazon.com; or world-class service like Singapore Airlines? This will dictate your market strategy. For example, if you are in retail, do you aspire to be like Walmart? This, in turn, dictates your hiring, salary, development and retention strategies.

Too often, I see companies hiring to fill jobs, not hiring for desired intangible capabilities. You can train to develop skills and knowledge, but what are the critical capabilities you truly depend on?

Think back to the above traits. For every responsibility or job, you want a specific set. You may want creativity in finance but not in accounting, right? Position by position, what do you absolutely need to be successful?

WHY LEARNING IS AN ACT OF COURAGE.

The best leaders love to learn. And the greatest organizations are learning enterprises – places where ideas are the currency of success. Yet, so many amongst us resist learning and embracing the new ideas that change brings with it. The deeper question is why?

What I’ve realized, as I travel across the world helping people Lead Without a Title, is that the very act of learning something new means you must also disrupt your thinking of yesterday. To accept or even just to entertain a new idea means you must leave the safety of your former way of perceiving the world and open up to something foreign. And that means you’d have to leave the protection of your comfort zone/Safe Harbor of The Known and sail out into the unknown – even for just a moment.

The unknown is a pretty scary place for most people. Ordinary people get threatened there. Victims get frightened there. And so the average person in business (and within life) avoids learning and exposing themselves to any idea or influence that might cause them to have to rethink the way they think and re-behave the way they have always behaved. But the fascinating paradox is that trying to avoid new ideas to stay safe is actually enormously dangerous – and infused with risk.

On the other hand, those who make the choice to Lead Without a Title have a lust to learn. They remain blindingly curious. They read books daily. They drink coffee with brilliant people. They have long conversations with role models whose ideas provoke/challenge/irritate them. Real leaders truly get that learning and ideation is the fuel of life. And that all it takes is a single idea to change the game at work (and rescript the story that is your life). Sure they too feel uncomfortable or even scared when faced with an idea that confronts their most closely cherished beliefs. But they understand that to resist the idea is to resist growth. As well as their next level of Mastery+Progress+Leadership. And so they move forward. Into an uncertain yet gorgeously exciting future.

- Robin Sharma,

Renowned Author

"The Monk Who Sold his Ferari" and other best sellers.