Harmonics

What Do Talent Really Want?

At Harmonics we are increasingly being asked to talk to Senior Leaders about Talent Management and why they need to prepare a Talent strategy. I wanted to share my insights on how we need to get real when thinking about Talent Management.

Is it all about the money?

Corporate Business Leaders are rewarded by how much money they make each quarter for their shareholders. It’s quite simply a numbers game to succeed. HBR this month profiled the Best Performing CEO’s in the world for 2017. Three metrics were used to identify the best:

1. Country adjusted total shareholder return
2. Industry adjusted total shareholder return
3. Change in market capitalisation

It is no surprise from the metrics used that, for a CEO, their track record in delivering financial return to investors is what matters. There is no mention in the metrics about talent attraction, development or attrition, yet we are consistently hearing that an inability to “get the right people” is slowing down business growth.

Short Termism

Top Global CEO’s now make more than 300 times the average worker, up from a 20-1 ratio in the 1960’s. While the salaries have been increasing, CEO tenure has been decreasing each year since 2000. Fortune 500 CEO’s survive 4.6 years on average. These CEO’s and their Leadership teams are under immense pressure to hit the ground running and deliver the numbers. We see the short termism playing out publicly in the Premiership as Football Managers get a short time to deliver results or they are gone. The HBR Best performing CEOS however lasted on average 16 years and had time to effect the change.

This pressure at the top has an impact on attracting and retaining top talent. This short term numbers game is visible for all to see within the organisation.

Everyone wants Top Talent

To deliver the metrics and business results, the heat is on to find the best talent and have them playing as a united and aligned team. So why is everyone finding it so hard to attract and retain top talent. Here are 4 observations from the work we do:

• Every Organisation wants to hire the “perfect fit”
• Top Talent want continuous “career growth” opportunities
• Younger talent have huge “social power”
• Don’t write off older talent too soon

Every Organisation wants to hire the “perfect fit”

We have personal experience to relate to this point. In our recruitment division, Harmonics Recruitment, we have noticed that the time it takes Hiring Managers to make hiring decisions is often too long. If the recruitment process slows down, it can send a message to those shortlisted and impact on the organisations ability to attract the best talent. Difficulty scheduling meetings in Senior Leaders diaries can slow down the hiring process but the real reason great candidates are lost is because employers keep holding out for the “perfect fit”. Everyone wants the “highly experienced with specific industry experience and a glowing track record” so they can hit the ground running. In a tight labour market, there needs to be more realism on what is available in the talent market.

We also observe Business leaders reacting to different crisis, spending days in back to back meetings and putting out fires. They don’t have time to coach and mentor new hires. Hence, they want the “perfect fit”.

However, to attract talent, leaders need to commit time to coaching them to bridge the industry or skills gap. Yes, it does take time, but when you hire for attitude and mind-set then the skills and knowledge acquired in the role offers the career growth talented people are looking for. What hiring managers need to realise is that their idea of a “perfect fit” is based on a CV that describes what a person has already done and often not what they want to do next. Those being headhunted will often ask our recruiters where the career growth opportunities lie in a role that looks similar to what they’ve being doing for the past 2 years. So when recruiting, it is important to remember that your perfect fit may not be the candidates idea of a perfect fit for their career future!

Top talent want continuous “career growth opportunities” – When speaking to a Senior Director last week, she described her experience with a past employer. She said “it was a time when there was just one amazing career growth project after another. I never thought of leaving. I had great mentors who created the paths for me to develop new skills. I learned more there than with any other employer”.

Organisations have become flatter and retention strategies driven by ‘promotion promises’ are simply unsustainable. The career up the functional silo is too narrow and does not build out the breadth required for future leadership roles. Career success is not only about promotion, top talent may want to stay and deepen their knowledge and skills in specialised roles critical to the future organisation. Offering hi-potentials a management position without ascertaining a ‘skills fit’ leads to a great career hitting an unexpected crash without any warning. Our career accelerator coaching programmes have been designed to guard against this happening. Great career progression in organisations needs to change to be become more about further developing your strengths which enhance future employability rather than just climbing the ladder to promotion.

Today, there is a dual ownership onus on both employer and employee in making career growth opportunities happen. Roles are constantly changing, new job titles are appearing and new skills are in demand. To use the football game analogy again, the game is constantly changing, it is about adapting and anticipating to these changes. We have helped organisations illustrate changing career paths to paint a clearer picture for employees where they can grow in an organisation that is rapidly changing. The traditional org chart has now become an organic chart that is quickly evolving as new skills are needed.

Younger talent have huge social power – Like-minded younger talent gravitate towards each other. They see what others are doing and want some of that too. They are that stage of life when they are curious and seeking new experiences. They also don’t trust organisations like their parents did because they have seen their parents being made redundant after giving many years loyal service.

Instead, the new loyalty is to look after numero uno. It is about gaining as many varied experiences, skills and knowledge on their CV as possible. The CV today is like a career passport where lots of organisations, roles and achievements are stamped on it. This new approach affords mobile talent entry to new employers and ensures they never go stale.

For organisations, it is being clear from the outset that talent will leave. It is not personal, it is just how the game is now played. But it is just important to learn the preferences of this nomad generation of mobile talent and help them to grow while they stay. They may come for a while and they may boomerang back again at some point on their career journey when they have learned new skills. We also see great opportunities for organisations to help younger talent become teachers of specific skills while they are here. This way they have left a legacy and the organisation has been enriched instead of feeling anger about talent moving on. Younger talent have huge social networks and their word is gospel to their friends in choosing where to work. If they have a bad employee experience, it goes viral on Glassdoor at speed. It is true, social is the new power.

Don’t write off older talent too soon – In our research, the average age when people are getting the tap on the shoulder from corporate employers to take a package appears to be 52. This milestone seems to indicate when someone has become too expensive in the corporate world. It’s leading to a lot of stress in the workplace for this age cohort who feel let down because they have offered such loyalty.

There is a new employer-employee contract required for those talented people who are being pushed out before their time is up. Those who fear they may be at risk need to develop a growth mind-set and demonstrate how they can learn new skills and pitch what they have to offer. This is what is required in the new world of work.

Your career is your business and it is up to employees to keep pitching for work like a start-up would to an investor. I have seen people in this age bracket be reactive and wait for the organisation to tell them what to do. The onus is on the employee to make the business case to their employer.

Employers, on the other hand, need to have development conversations with their over 50 talent. I see talented people over 50 being written off too young because frank and honest conversations failed to happen on both sides. In our opinion, those who are 50 plus need to opt-in to taking on further professional development. By opting out, they are demonstrating a fixed mindset and telling their employer they are closing the door to new internal opportunities. It may be the right time to leave, but the size of the package is only one consideration, how to become employable and marketable in the future is another and this requires opting-in to some form of development.

“Not everything that counts can be counted”

This quote by Albert Einstein was never more relevant in the search for talent. The best performing Global CEO’s list is indeed measured by financial metrics. The best performing talent more often than not do not trust organisations.  They instead trust what their friends tell them and what they read on Glassdoor. This is not so easily counted. Metrics find it harder to identify the manager that is blocking a talented person’s opportunity to make their next internal career move which is the real reason they leave. It is only in hindsight that we hear about the recruitment process that took too long because leaders could not make a decision about a candidate that wasn’t just the “perfect fit”. The busy leader who is still rewarded with their bonus even though they are stuck in back to back business meetings and haven’t taken the time to coach and have career conversations with their talented people who are being head hunted and feeling loved elsewhere. The busy organisation that fails to proactively create “career growth” opportunities for their hi-potential talent and then mourn when they leave.

Attracting, developing and retaining talent is not all about offering better money or office perks. It is, more often than not, about having the time for great career conversations to find out what talent really want both at interview and as they progress in your organisation. It is about taking the time to have lunch offsite and listen, truly listen to what is being said so you can help your talent to grow. Tony Crabbe wrote in his best-selling book Busy. “It’s the first time in history we can work when we want to so we do!”

The above strategies do not cost any money, they simply require attention. They won’t appear in any financial metrics for a Best Performing CEO but they will make a huge difference to your talent strategy. We just need to be more honest with ourselves and take the time to discover more about our great talent before they leave.

“If you need to conceal your true nature to get in the door, then you’ll probably have to conceal your true nature to keep that job” – Seth Godin – Lynchpin

With the recession behind us and the economy growing, the competition for top talent is intensifying. Interestingly, it’s not just the experienced or specialist employees that are in demand but the open-minded, fresh-thinking millennials are just as sought after as our workforce becomes increasingly transient.

They are the much talked about generation fuelling endless tomes of research, studies and reports. And while past reports of job-hopping millennials may have been exaggerated – some companies still struggle not just in hiring millennials but retaining them. They will make up 50% of the global workforce by 2020, so companies need to consider making changes to their organisational structures and management styles – now.

Engaging and Retaining Millennial Talent in the Modern Workplace

Overall, millennials value career and personal development over money and status. So, strategies beyond remuneration need to be developed. Here are our 5 recommendations for businesses who want to respond to the new world of work and engage millennial talent:

1. Flexible and trusted – Millennials have ambition and drive but this should not be seen that they want to work all the hours to be like the generation before them. Now they are seeking more work-life flexibility. They want to be trusted to work remotely, they want to dress casually, speak liberally and receive feedback to help them grow.
2. Career Growth – They need to see opportunities to grow, where they can join a team working on projects that have meaning and purpose. They may only be around for a few years so don’t speak tradition and legacy, instead redefine the career development conversation and give them time to speak about their career and personal interests.
3. Openness and transparency – Growing up with technology and social media, millennials expect a culture of transparency and for management to be upfront on why decisions are made. Keep them informed and satisfy their sense of purpose by helping them understand how their purpose links to company values. Millennials will be more engaged and committed if they are informed regularly on progress against the company’s strategy.
4. Mentorship both ways – Millennials appear to be more interested in finding mentors than their previous generations. Leaders and Managers can play a key role here (and not just their direct line managers) – helping millennials with their personal growth or demonstrating the characteristics of a strong leader. However, the real opportunity is in millennials offering ‘reverse mentorship’. If Managers are open to accept the mentorship, the reverse mentor-mentee relationships can add significant value for both parties to learn and utilise one another’s strengths.
5. Listened and recognised – Millennials expect a high-touch approach to management – listen to them and give them feedback. Since their early education, they believe their ideas are important and valuable, so listen to them or they won’t respect you. They really desire a great deal of  feedback – which goes outside the normal parameters of a performance management system. Managers must take the time to engage in formal and ad-hoc constructive feedback on a regular basis.

Perspectives from here and abroad

It’s all about Change

In October, I attended our OI Global Partners meeting in Turin, Italy where over 20 European, Australian and US Partners came to share best practice and themes from their respective countries. Harmonics is the exclusive Irish partner firm of OIGP, a global network of independently owned consultancy firms specialising in Organisation and People Change.

There were a number of themes that dominated our discussions that has implications for us all – whether as employers or employees:

Digital Disruption – Each partner firm reported digitisation was disrupting organisations business and workforce planning. Automation, robotics and AI are now rapidly changing the nature of work as we used to know it. D Amazon, Airbnb, Netflix are all examples of Digital platforms offering global market reach and capturing exponential market share at record speed. We are seeing the 4^th Industrial revolution take hold as digital start-up ventures are infiltrating traditional business models.  What will this mean for people at work? In a recent PWC Survey of over 10,000 global members, 60% think “few people will have stable, long term employment in the future”. This means we will all have to adapt to much change.

Adapting to Change – Our own recent OI Global Future of Work study indicated ‘adapting to change’ as the number 1 challenge facing HR Directors. There was consistency across partner firms that requests to design and develop change programmes was on the rise to enable Leaders and Managers to adapt to change. There is also an interesting development in organisations offering “should I stay or should I go?” career planning programmes. These interventions are to help those who need to decide if they want to stay and upskill to meet changing business needs or leave on a voluntary redundancy programme to pursue new external career options. This career alignment support is now forming a critical part of organisations change programmes.

Growing divide between haves and have nots – Each country shared low unemployment levels but also a growing inequality between the highly paid, highly skilled and the lowly paid, lowly skilled. The hollowing out of the middle class, middle age worker is taking hold and there are worrying signs that this will lead to even greater future inequality. Specialism in much sought after skillsets is highly valued by employers. Technology is moving so fast that the highly valued specialist skillsets are changing rapidly, so there is a perpetual need to unlearn, relearn and learn new skills. We are being approached by many of those in their 40’s and 50’s who are now being impacted by this change and are seeking career coaching to plot a new way forward. This is something that we will see more and more of as the huge disruption takes hold for those with previously well paid and skilled jobs. Organisations need to become more proactive in putting career planning and upskilling in place to support this change or fear losing previously talented people who are not prepared for this change.

International mobility – We are seeing a growing rise in coaching to support international career moves. This is predominantly for millennials who have been promoted to a global role and need to hit the ground running in a new international location. They are coming to terms with a promotion and embracing a new culture in one sweep. This can be overwhelming and career transition coaching is being seen as an imperative to succeed in a new country and in a new role

Future of Work Global Research Study – There has been excellent feedback from our clients to our 2^nd Global Future of Work research study. We are seeking to further deepen the research for the year ahead. This added value to our clients is helping them to understand the challenges and skills required to be successful in the highly competitive and changing world of work.

Market saturation of coaches – The number of people becoming qualified in coaching is growing year on year. While this is great for more and more people to have new coaching skills in the workplace, it is leading to oversupply in the coaching market. Many partner firms reported requests from newly qualified coaches to become join their books and become associate coaches. I have seen this first hand and receive multiple requests weekly from newly trained coaches to join the Harmonics team. From our perspective we need to offer our clients qualified coaches with at least 5 years coaching experience, commercial business experience and specialist knowledge in a core area that matches our client’s needs. Many enter the coaching profession because they are passionate about helping others but what each coach needs to learn most is how to commercialise and niche their offering to become attractive to clients and partner firms like OI. It was recognised by clients that our strength in OI is being recognised as the home to quality coaches globally.

Overall a great meeting and an opportunity for us to take time out with our partners to see how we will pivot our own businesses to stay ahead of the change curve. This quote below was never more relevant.

“The secret of change is to focus all of your energy not into fighting the old but on creating the new” – Socrates