Talent - A Key Ingredient For Your Business

Fall 2008 Issue

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Talent, a Key Ingredient
for your Business – Now and
in the Future

	Introduction by Darcy Topper, Darren Grady, Partners, The Clarion Group

Talent Management is a hot topic. Almost weekly, magazines and blogs offer insights into how companies can ensure the best talent for their future. And companies are investing in robust talent development programs, innovative recruitment strategies, and well-developed data systems to track and match talent. We agree that you can’t grow your business without the right talent. The question is, how? We've seen organizations work with talent as an isolated factor. Invariably, they have limited success. In fact, the focus on “talent” can actually undermine the true organizational need by making talent a self-referencing objective and failing to deliver the capabilities required to achieve objectives. We believe the key is to take a broad perspective that we call “Organization Capability Management” – a purposeful approach linking the key processes of talent management with the business’s strategic, financial and organizational planning and management processes. This enables execution of current strategies as well as planning for future differentiation, innovation, and growth. It also shifts the organization away from believing that talent management is the responsibility of a single function – usually HR – and toward realizing that talent management is a business imperative shared among all functions. In this issue of The Clarion Call, we share what we've learned about integrating talent management with other business management processes. We examine the key elements of Organization Capability Management and show how they can be the ingredients for a truly integrated plan for your organization’s future success. As always, we welcome your feedback.

Talent, the one distinct competitive
advantage every organization
can develop

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The idea that talent is a strategic component of business is not new. Enterprises large and small know that the talent they have is critical to their success. We’ve seen company after company build talent management systems and processes to assure their Boards or the Investment Community that they’ve got what it takes to scale and grow into the future. However, many well-designed and well-intentioned talent systems have failed to deliver on the promises of “the right talent in the right places at the right time” because organizations have focused too narrowly on the process and structure of talent management. They’ve neglected to recognize that talent management is not an isolated process to be carried out by the HR function. It is not just about the rating and ranking of high performers or the definition of CEO succession or the robustness of the talent management software. It is all that – and – it is about identifying, enabling, and developing the talent for the organization through an orchestrated strategic business rhythm that ties directly to the strategy and financial planning processes. This is why we call this work Organization Capability Management.

Organization Capability Management blends defining strategy and creating financial plans for the business with defining talent and organizational capabilities that will be required to carry out that strategy to meet the financial goals. Organizations have unique talent needs that drive their success. Talent planning is as important as strategic, financial, and organizational planning; and the integration and alignment of these four processes creates a synergy of exceptional performance and sustained growth.

Integrating talent management processes with what is considered the core business planning work takes some adjustments; it takes some effort and discipline, but it’s not impossible. It requires a commitment from business leaders to assume a different role in ensuring their organizations have the talent they need. It requires the commitment to deliberately incorporate the critical business processes – strategy definition, financial planning, and talent/organizational management – creating a new recipe for leading the business. Finally, it requires a broadening of management skills and tools to create results that drive performance.

Let’s take a look at each of these areas.

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