Just when I thought that the HR fad for “talent management” was over it reappears in survey after survey about the preoccupations of HR Directors. But the concept of “talent management” is like chewing gum parading as food. It gives self-proclaimed experts a lot to chew over – but has no real substance.
The term talent is truly an empty notion indicating little talent in those who claim to care about it. For it immediately raises questions like “talent for what?”, “talent from what perspective?”, “individual or collective talent?” and “is talent just another name for leadership?”.
I was once enlarging a team to provide a consultancy service and called on an occupational psychologist to carry out an analysis of the existing team to highlight its strengths and weaknesses. The purpose was to reveal the kind of character traits that were missing from the team and would give it strength. The outcome was as hoped for – certain key personality factors were identified as potential assets we should seek to identify in the new recruit. The interviews went ahead and all shortlisted candidates were asked to complete the personality factor test. Unfortunately the candidate scoring highest on the missing factors was also the least communicative during interviews and had the most doubtful career history. But I had “bought into” the particular team building technique and hired the individual concerned. The outcome was a disaster and it took only a few weeks for the morale and motivation of my colleagues to start to crumble. To make things worse our new workmate seemed to enjoy the havoc he created.
So maybe rather than focus on “talent management”, recruiters should simply devise more rapid ways to find out if a new hire “fits” into the organization. Apart from a few highly innovative roles or simple tasks that could always be outsourced most permanent jobs require collective effectiveness of outcome. Although the best evaluation for such effectiveness is feedback from colleagues we all know that there is generally a honeymoon period when people start work during which the impression they give about themselves is often quite false. The surest way to remove this is to subject the new hire to intense pressure. Do not give them time to “settle in”, but set them highly demanding targets and invite them to fail. When seeking feedback it is wisest not be overly democratic, but to ask the most skeptical and experienced members of the team to give you their views. Value above all else persistence and determination and look for common tell tale signs of poor work performance – like impatience, impulsiveness and clock watching.
The next time pressure is applied to maximize talent I suggest you fathom what senior colleagues mean precisely. Do not respond by setting up specialist roles to identify and cultivate something that you cannot specifically define. You may otherwise be cultivating the talents that grow most easily – what gardeners call weeds.