While your company is interested in a great talent, not every great talent is interested in your company … C’est la vie! Obviously, dynamics of talent mobility are not obvious to everyone.
I have recently spent some time with executive management of medium-sized companies seeking opportunities to improve the performance of their businesses. They all have the same complaint, though they do not necessarily give it the same name. They all complaint about difficulty acquiring and inspiring talents to stay long enough to make a difference.
While your company is interested in a great talent, not every great talent is interested in your company … C’est la vie!
Do you know what all these companies have in common?
All of them suffered in the last few years from poor performance, and having realized that they should do something about it, they are currently in a way or another in an arbitrary or compulsory turnaround process. They have ambitious goals, but little idea about the means to pursue these goals. The biggest obstacle, little access to talents.
In few months some kind of a vicious cycle is formed and enforced by internal and external forces … As the company’s performance continues to fall, talents continue to leak to competitors, and as talents continue to leak to competitors, the company’s performance continues to fall.
Over the course of the last few years, the best and brightest talents have moved out and moved on. As the employer loses the appeal and sound reputation, talents become more expensive attract and retain, and in few months some kind of a vicious circle is formed and enforced by internal and external forces … As the company’s performance continues to fall, talents continue to leak to competitors, and as talents continue to leak to competitors, the company’s performance continues to fall. In economics, we call it brain drain … a phenomenon that is “unfairly” common to developing countries, and refers to migration of much-needed talents to more developed countries.
Breaking out of the brain drain vicious circle is complicated, as many of corporate turnaround activities, largely because one does not know where to start. A combination of great leadership and will are essential ingredients for success in such transformation missions.
HR Managers complain about lack of talent, but in reality the complaint should be about the lack of access to talents. They probably have an outdated talent management system and talent database, and if they have access to such database, they do not have the right tools and resources to run an effective recruitment process.
In recruitment, this implies refocusing talent acquisition on a balanced search for three essential components: ability, personality and knowledge.
When resources are stretched, my advice is always to revert to the simplest rules. In recruitment, this implies refocusing talent acquisition on a simple search for three essential components: ability, personality and knowledge.
While the ability and personality of the job applicant pose hard limits on our choices, knowledge poses a softer constraint, since knowledge is easily acquired on the job or through formal training. No wonder, many visionary entrepreneurs hire people because of their general fitness, not for their specialist knowledge. It is people what makes the biggest difference in company turnarounds.
