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Topics - Badshah Mamun

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Imagine a situation where you have to sell jobs for your organization to individuals who have many lucrative job options in hand, what would you sell the job for or would you actually be able to attract the right talent towards a certain job! Every organization wants the best talent onboard, but how many of them actually succeed in the same? The question stares most of the organizations on their face today!

Businesses can no more afford to think only of existence, they need excellence for survival. When we look at what makes organizations great, is it the fixed assets, the plant and machinery, the technology? No, while all of these are important and contribute in their own way to an organizations success, there is more to it that makes great organizations great, it is the people!

The biggest Challenges and EVP


Attracting, hiring and retaining people are the biggest challenges for the talent management of the day. For this to happen it is equally important to develop value propositions for jobs to attract talent sufficiently. Employee value proposition means creating a balance of rewards and recognition in return to an employee’s performance at workplace. It is a people centered approach that is directed to existing employees and integrated manpower planning strategies because it comes from existing employees themselves. It must be original, unique, compelling and strategically directed to a talent pool.

The biggest challenge to talent management is ensuring a supply of talent sufficient to match the estimated demand, especially when the demand is very hard to predict and when the supply of talent is not constant. Remember - the talent management of 1970’s that failed severely because of the demand supply match. In such a scenario it is the best to build an employer brand of the organization which can be achieved by developing an employee value proposition. The latter is also referred to as employer brand proposition.

Why Employee Value Proposition


Many workers including Tandehill (2006) have recommended organizations to build unique brands of themselves in the eyes of its prospective employees. This essentially means developing a statement of ’why the total work experience at their organization is superior to that at other organizations. The value proposition should outline the unique employee policies, programs, rewards and benefits programs that prove an organizations commitment to people and management development. In nutshell it should define an employee’s ‘why should I join this organization?’

The employee value proposition needs to be communicated in all hiring efforts of the organization. It may be reflected on the company’s website, job advertisements and letters extending employment opportunities.

Importance of EVP


Benefits of EVP - It is a known fact now that there is more to employee satisfaction than just remuneration (salary and benefits). Employee value proposition has been proven crucial to attracting, hiring and retaining the best talent in the industry. This goes a long way in helping prioritize the HR policies, creates a strong brand in the eyes of people, and helps in workforce engagement.

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The current economic conditions demand a cut in the expenses. Unfortunately enough for talent management though organizations and leadership is all praise for it on papers, the same is neglected as seen as a cost center when it comes to implementation.

In wake of the economic recession human resource professionals are under huge pressure to cut costs. Logically this is best time to validate the importance of talent management. Hiring and compensating the best talent in the industry optimally and ensuring performance at the same time. The question that remains is ‘what exactly is the relevance in the current economic conditions’? Before trying to answer lets ponder on certain key issues.

    As per industry statistics only five percent of organizations possess a talent management strategy that is operational! In another ten percent the concept has just begun to develop.

    Aging workforce is another area of concern that has created vacuums in organizations leadership positions.

    Organizations also report shortage of talent business line managers.

All this has opened up avenues for HR professionals for vindicating their stand on talent management and once organizations understand that they need an integrated approach to talent management, the involvement of a top executive is important for driving success.

The top executive who now heads the talent management function is responsible for activities like succession planning, leadership development, career development, performance management, learning and development, recruitment etc. Having said this we again arrive upon the question of relevance.

Developing Leadership Pool:
Succession planning and leadership development are two issues that have felt a sense of urgency after the recent economic downturn. Organizations have been seeking leadership positions to rescue them out of crisis.

Performance Management:
After succession planning and leadership development, performance management comes next on the list. Without a thorough and standard way to measure performance it is not possible to promote right people to right positions and motivate them to perform for organizational growth and development.

Recruitment assumes significance:
Recruitment becomes strategic so to say. Recruitment practices determine organizational effectiveness. In a tight labor market it a daunting task to attract the brightest talent towards your organization and then getting them onboard. Internet has become an important source of external recruiting. Systems and standards have been laid down for the same. Here building an employer brand is important. Those who do, get right people onboard.

Skill based Manpower Planning:
Manpower planning is a strategic HR process these days. Instead of a mere headcount based hiring; manpower planning now extends to the locating critical skills, roles and responsibilities and then ascertaining current and future talent needs for those roles.

These are vital processes that optimize the performance of the human capital management. What is required is to ensure that they are consistent in order to ascertain they meet the business objectives.

Talent management is in its nascent stage, there are still more processes that will be added in due course of time as organizations opt for more initiatives in the direction.

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Talent Management / Recruitment and Retention
« on: April 25, 2012, 03:34:22 PM »
   

The problem of retention begins with recruitment! In most of the organizations the recruitment function operates independently of the retention department. HR people have so far been naïve to the direct relationship between the two and the resulting increase in employee turnover. It is therefore in the interest of organizations to understand how the hiring process impacts the employee turnover and devise strategies accordingly.

In recruitment Human resource department comes across a wide range of people who are different in terms of their psyche, their attitudes, beliefs and all other factors. It becomes difficult to judge what motivates whom. Incentives may motivate a certain person but may be equally unimportant to some other. Money it has been observed is the prime motivator in most of the cases but it motivates only to a certain extent and fails afterwards. How does talent management deal with all this? Can we have strategies in place that are almost universal in appeal or in other words can we design programs that motivate one and all? A universal solution may or may not be possible and may vary across organizations. But talent management has an answer i.e. look at the holistic picture - deal with whatever you have. We therefore have certain recruiting factors to take care of that impact retention. Here they are:

    Candidates Who are Money Focused


    It is very important to keep a track of people who are motivated by money. Often people tend to switch fast if they are not offered raises, bonuses, and stock options. No matter how great is the growth and development trajectory, if it is not being well complemented by a corresponding raise in salary the employee may leave soon! It is only during recruitment that such employees can be tracked easily. It is the interview feedback database that helps in making an assessment of what motivates whom. Further employee surveys may be conducted in order to receive their inputs on what they think is lacking in their professional lives. Here the questions should be asked implicitly.

    Past Experience or Average Tenure with Other Organizations

    Ones past experience can offer deep insights into the stability of the individual. An individual whose resume reflects frequent job changes may well be one who will soon leave your organization also once he gets onboard. On the other hand there are individuals who are in high demand because of their talents and who work on a project basis, their resumes will also reflect spontaneity. The decision lies with you.

    Induction and Orientation

    First impressions make lasting impacts. In one research conducted in Indian IT companies it was found out that fresh employees decided in their very first days that how long they were going to stay in that company! How is your induction and orientation program - fine, good, too good, exhilarating? It is high time to assess and review your programs. Try to create a kind of culture that looks challenging and rewarding.

    Role of Recruiters after Hiring

    Recruiters know well what motivates and what de-motivates or annoys the people they have hired. It is often a good practice to keep your recruiters in touch with the ones who have hired them. They add value and offer mentorship and guidance to the fresh employees. They may suggest way outs of obstacles that have come their way, both behavioral and otherwise.

Apart from this there are practices like rewarding managers for less turnover, introducing diversity into the way employees are trained (training and development). All this falls in the ambit of talent management and is common in many good global corporations.

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Talent Management / Return on Investment for Talent Management
« on: April 25, 2012, 03:32:52 PM »

World over organizations are concerned about the return on investment (ROI) of talent management. Those who are investing money into the same are searching for efficient means to calculate their ROI. This problem is not unique to talent management only; training and development for example suffers from the same drawback to a certain extent.

Fortunately there are software available and in development process for the same. These software’s help you in calculating your returns on investment for talent management. The software’s span the entire talent lifecycle and are built to automate and track the entire activities including the financial inputs and outputs at each stage. The software’s bring together all parts of the talent management system into a single collaborative environment. The environment may be either web based on otherwise, depending upon the vendor.

An alternate way of doing this would be making calculations manually, hectic but worth doing considering the benefits. ROI is the ratio of money gained or lost on money invested into a particular product, process or a project. Typically these calculations are undertaken over a three year period. Here are the steps to be followed.

The very thought of calculating cost for performance management system appears bizarre, especially for organizations that employee a good number of people. But there is a method to it, a poll. Choose a representative number of managers or employees and enquire about the average time they spend on preparing performance appraisals for a given year on one singe employee.

Now multiply each of these averages by the total of employees in your organization and the average salary for these managers and employees. For example if the managers in consideration spend an average of 4 hours on each employee appraisal and the average pay for the managers is $ 30 (let’s say) and your company has 200 employees. Then the total cost would come up as 4 × 200 × 200 i.e. $ 24000.

Similarly now calculate the cost for employees. Assuming if each employee spends 2 hours on the appraisal process for each employee and the average pay per hour is $ 15, than the total cost for appraisals for employees is 2 × 25 × 200 i.e. 10000.

In addition the staff growth per year has also to be accounted. The average time spent by the HR people administering and managing the process also needs to be taken into account. Finally other labor costs like copying, assembling, mailing and printing etc also need to be taken into account. All these costs added make up for the labor costs. Here in our case, if we do not account for the administration and other labor costs the total cost would be $ 34000.

Then the physical costs are accounted. These include the cost of paper, stationary, copier, printer etc. An increase of 2-3 % of these costs should also be taken into consideration. The labor and the physical costs combined make up for the total costs incurred. The costs which become the investment now, divided by the cost of purchase gives us the return on investment.

The return may give different results under different conditions of measurement. Though it is entirely not possible to calculate the return on investment on intangible assets, however an approximation always gives an organization a fair idea of their profitability.

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Talent Management / Talent Management for the New Generation
« on: April 25, 2012, 03:31:17 PM »


Most of the organizations do not feel much about managing their talent. Here is why they should -

    Typically, labor accounts for about 65 % of every business in any industry. The percentage is more for labor intensive businesses for example those in manufacturing.
    The performance difference between talented and lesser talented employees is huge.
    Employees and how they are managed is the most important source of most organizational competencies and strengths.

Talent management is not only important for hiring people as per the need, it is also important for determining when to hire. In the traditional model of hiring supply meant developing people internally for future. There was an upfront investment in candidates recovered through an enhanced performance over time. This was a good perspective; there were equal chances of making and losing money by investing in your people.

Hiring from outside or temporary employment on the other hand was seen as something that cannot fetch you substantial returns and or act as potential source of knowledge and competitive advantage.

These trends lost sheen over a period of time with the rise of the great corporate career. Consider this - In 1950’s — 1960’s an average fortune 500 executive had been with his/her company for average 24 years. Not anymore, the traditional and lifetime model was breaking up and giving way to a new model. Outside hiring increased along with the increased employee turnover.

The change was brought over by organizations failing to plan. Increased pressures from market for speed of delivery and variety of goods, the third wave of corporate restructuring and failure to keep up with new management practices brought chaos to planning.

In a survey conducted in 2003 by SHRM it was found out that 60% of the firms have no succession planning of any kind. Surprisingly more than 70 % had it in that late 1970’s! IPMA-HR survey of the workforce as a whole in the year 2004 found out 63 % have no workforce planning of any kind; the same was an integral component of virtually all companies in 1950’s. A new trend had taken shape, shortage - go outside and hire!

On the employee side, the trend of lifetime employment has diminished now. Talking in terms of the percentage of lifetime employees - in 1980’s 53 % of employees worked as life time employees, the same decreased to 34 % in 2009. The questions that arises is how do we manage the next generation employees and what exactly do people expect from jobs.

The new generation employees it seems do not believe in the old philosophy of ‘we will stick around till you need us’. They are more enterprising and will to take risks in their career; they accept failures easily and are prepared for them. People now prefer flat hierarchies, build careers around jobs and want a clear performance management system.

There are work-life balance concerns, issues of job flexibility all of which calls for renewing the social contract with the employees. The employees, their psyche, their beliefs and most important their attitudes are changing - talent management can’t afford to sit back. It needs evolution.

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Talent Management / The War for Talent in the Global Economy
« on: April 25, 2012, 03:30:39 PM »

Having good talented people in your organization was important yesterday, today it is critical! Organizations world over have realized the importance of having talented people. McKinsey was the first to coin this term ‘war for talent’ in the year 1997. They named this for their research for talent management practices and beliefs. This became a phenomenon soon.

Not many organizations barring a few like IBM, PepsiCo and McKinsey knew the importance of talent management until recent years. It is not a big surprise that nearly two thirds of senior leaders quit an organization within three years of their hiring. Add to it there is also the problem of an aging population in the west and unemployable graduates in the east. This opened up the eyes of major corporations globally. A substantial amount of pressure has developed on corporations that are global or multinational in presence, hiring and nurturing the right talent globally is an area of major concern.

Global leadership is now aware to the chaos and disruption this can bring within their clients/customers and with other stakeholders. Strategies and plans for sales, production, expansion, and diversification are of no use unless you have the right people to execute them.

The talent market is more than competitive presently than it was and could be in the next decades. In an economy that is knowledge driven the demand for highly skilled workers is on the rise incessantly. Though the demand may decline at times due to the changes economic cycle but in the longer run the rising trend will remain the same more or less. In a survey conducted by McKinsey in 2001, 72 % of the managers they interviewed were of the opinion that winning the war for talent is critical and only 3 % were confident that their actions would create a strong talent pool in the next 3 years.

Apart from the talent constraint, it was also found out that people at executive ranks (in the age group of 35 - 40) will also decrease by 14 % in the next 15 years. This can be countered for a few more years by replacing these positions with older baby boomers, but it is not long before these older baby boomers retire and management ranks turn lean.

It is also of interest to mention here that individual expectations of rewards (developmental, psychological and financial) have increased! These are challenges and the most disconcerting element is that not many organizations are prepared to face them.
The Solution

Organizations need to act, and act now! The following is the five point solution suggested by McKinsey

    Develop a talent mindset at all levels in the organization.

    Create a winning Employee Value Proposition.

    Recruit great talent continuously.

    Grow leaders

    Differentiate and affirm.

This means that a talent mindset is to be developed at levels in the organization preferably at the top. An employee value proposition is to be developed for employees just like the one that is created for its customers. Most important change the way you differentiate; make it on the basis of how much you invest in your top and low performers.

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Talent Management / Talent Marketplace
« on: April 25, 2012, 03:29:44 PM »

Organizations nowadays are becoming employee centric. Employees are asked to or assigned projects that pertain to their skills and abilities and what they are best at. To put it other words, jobs are designed around people now and not vice versa.

They is an ever increasing emphasis on developing training and development strategies in organizations. When such a strategy is developed and put in place, it is then called a talent marketplace. The purpose is to align people skills and extensive knowledge with the task at hand.

American Express and IBM are two very good examples of organizations that implement a talent marketplace strategy. The most productive employees are allowed to choose projects and assignments that are most suitable to their area of expertise.

Not many companies like the ones above mentioned are able to harness people skills in an effective way. Organizations in the name of talent management pay far more attention to searching for and recruiting people from outside. Little emphasis is laid on locating talent within. Even the work experience for such people is not enriching that helps them to feed and develop their expertise. This is in fact how most organization loose talent to rival organizations.

In the current business scenario it’s your intangible assets like people skills, people perceptions or reputation and relationships that count more than your tangible assets like the plant the machinery. More than anything else talent mobilization helps you unleash the power of people you have onboard. Providing them more opportunities to grow themselves and find work and skills that help them realize their potential counts far more than simply engaging them in repetitive jobs.

Talent deployment is another factor that needs to be taken care of well. Organizations have to be flexible in talent deployment across the length and breadth of their structure. Value creating initiatives need to be developed on a war footing in any organization if it wants to survive in the long run and therefore the need to developing talent.

In talent marketplace it is the internal talent mobilization that is the keyword. By mobilizing talent internally, organizations are offering freedom to their managers to use talent from across the length and breadth of organization for success. This also acts to increase the ownership of employees towards their work and get work done more effectively.

Hindrances to Talent Marketplace: Typically most organizations are structured such that managers find it difficult to locate a single individual from among a company’s talented workers for a single job.

The reason - companies are not prepared or flexible enough to accommodate anything that is new and seeks time. Again most of the companies spend lots of resources improving the quality of line staff. They are better off spending resources developing people for moving up the line management ladder. Formal job-rotation and career development policies are given precedence and the same organization gets stuck when a situation demands a cross job rotation.

The ‘push resources’ strategy of the conventional models may not survive long enough considering the inefficiencies involved. ‘Pull talent and knowledge’ on the other hand is gaining more weight in an era where uncertainty in business looms large.

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Talent Management / Talent Management and Poaching Talent
« on: April 25, 2012, 03:28:48 PM »

What could be the biggest source of competitive advantage to an organization in the current era of cut throat competition? If I asked this question a decade or two decade, the answer would have been something like - ‘it’s the technology’, ‘its global presence’, ‘its customer perception’ etc. All of them can be a potential source of competitive advantage to any organization even now. But the common answer today would be ‘the people’.

Yes, it’s the people that can be and that are the single biggest source of competitive advantage to organizations nowadays. Top executives globally are one in their view that the quality of people onboard decides your present and the future. Great mission and vision statements appear futile if the talent pool or skill inventory of an organization is not good and vice versa.

But since when have people become of strategic importance to organizations? They always were! But time demanded no reckoning of this fact. Organizations in the fast were progressing at standard rates and talent was developed at similar pace and consequentially there was no dearth.

But with the advent of globalization that has thrown open global market places, organizations and industries are growing at blistering pace. It is getting difficult to develop people at the same pace. The heat is being felt equally at the top as well as bottom level positions. There is shortage of skilled workers are the lower level and an equal dearth of people in leadership positions.

What’s more, organizations fail to understand how to retain the existent talent, compensation (financial and otherwise), rewards and recognition all have failed organizations in helping them retain people of skill and choice. An even more difficult aspect is to identify the right people for development for leadership positions.

Needless to mention here organizations want talent up and down the hierarchy and when they fail to retain the same, they poach. If I am an organization that believes in having talent onboard and I recognize talent in some organization, I have every right to poach the same, provided I can compensate him/her in terms of growth, learning and opportunity!

Poaching is not unethical on the part of any organization. In fact it showcases a flaw in the organizations retention strategy from where the person is being poached. It basically means that there is fundamentally something wrong in the way the organization compensates its employees. This is one of the biggest challenges to talent management. Consider the following facts:

    The average cost of hiring a new manager in place of another who has left the job is 1.5 to 3 times the salary!

    Each managerial position vacant can cost an organization up to 60000 on an average. It may shoot to six figures in some management positions.

    According to an estimate 1/3rd of business failures are due to poor hiring decision and inability to attract and retain quality people.

This is the cost of poaching to both the organizations, the one that is getting people onboard and the one that is losing people.

While poaching is not a new concept, what should be of more concern to HR is why do people leave and how to retain them. It’s none other than the talent management that has to come out with a solution.

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Talent Management / Talent Management and Succession Planning
« on: April 25, 2012, 03:27:45 PM »
   

In one our write ups we mentioned the problem of succession planning in organizations. The basis was the SHRM survey of 2003 that found out that 60% of organizations have no succession planning at all. We discuss the phenomenon in detail here. What is succession planning and when did it emerge as a problem? What is the way out? Questions like these will be discussed in the coming lines.

Succession planning is a systematic process of identifying and developing talent for leadership positions in the future. According to SHRM survey of 2003 it was found out that 60% of the firms that they interviewed had no succession planning in place and contrastingly about 70% of the major corporations globally had a proper succession planning in place in the late 1970’s. Similarly IPMA HR survey of 2004 found out that 63% of companies have no manpower planning at all which was commonplace in every organization till the late 1950’s. So the question that arises is when did succession planning emerge as a problem? Who is responsible - is it because of some demographic changes or because of the apathy on the part of management?

Marshall Goldsmith one of the world’s leading executive coaches recently wrote that many executives complained about succession planning being such a waste of time. Still many CEO’s complained about lack of bench strength in their organizations - lack of talent principally. Finally the role of demographics cannot be ignored! United States, for example has an aging population. India on the other hand has a population that is young by demographic standards. The combination of all these factors we may say has made a mess of succession planning in the past few decades.

What is the way out ?


‘Tell me and I will listen, show me and I will see and let me do it and I will learn’, how can we forget the age old adage! Plans specially pertaining to succession it seems do not work anymore, it is the development experiences that engage and motivate people at work. Perhaps renaming your succession planning to succession development may go a long way in reviving the succession planning process in your organization. The planning processes have lots of do’s and don’ts that make people think of it as another plan that is an end in itself and no a means to future position. Let them realize the focus is on development and not on the planning process.

The next step would be laying emphasis on outcomes rather than the process. This would underline in the eyes of employees what gets measured and what gets rewarded and elicit necessary behaviors and behavioral changes. Their ownership in the development process can increase as a result. Then there is a need to make the assessment process as simple as possible. Organizations have a tendency to make the assessment process complex unnecessarily. Complex assessment processes make assessment difficult for the average line manager. More complex assessment processes can be developed at the level of people development, while planning for succession, keep it simple.

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Organizations work towards the achievement of their mission and strategic objectives. This requires a thorough understanding of the resources required for achieving the same. Resources here imply financial and non financial both and they are equally important and interdependent.

Technically these resources have been divided into two, non contingent and differentiating capabilities. Whereas non contingent capabilities are basics that enable an organization to compete and exist in the marketplace, differentiating capabilities are those that differentiate an organization from that of the other and offer competitive advantage. Effective marketing management, for example can be one of non contingent capabilities. Similarly many HR processes aspire to develop non contingent capabilities but they often fail to align with the strategy and offer competitive advantage. Most of these processes end up developing people in similar areas and similar capacities as their rival firms but this fails to provide any competitive advantage.

For organizations to develop competitive advantage through HR processes it is very important to define strategic differentiating capabilities and then develop a process for identifying and developing the same. This empowers the HR people to create an impact on the organizational strategy and also provides a link between talent management and strategy.

For HR to prove that talent management can be of strategic importance to organizations, the critical relationship between the two must be proven. Talent management specially needs to be projected as a differentiating strategic capability that can offer real and substantial competitive advantage.

According to research conducted by various bodies it was found out that creation of differentiating strategic capabilities signifies the relationship between business strategy and human resources. Human resources, it was deduced are the primary sources of strategic advantage. The research study was primarily based on Resource based view (RBV) of an organization. This view has gained significant ground among HR practitioners as basis of models for formation and structure of resources.

Unlike other non contingent capabilities that can be developed easily and cannot contribute to a large extent towards the development of a sustainable competitive advantage, differentiating strategic capability such as strategic HR through talent management can. However for human resources to qualify as potential sources of competitive advantage they should fulfill the following criteria:

    Strategic Value:
The resource has to contribute substantially and add value in his/her area of expertise.

    Rare:
Unique in terms of skills, knowledge and abilities in order to qualify as rare.

    Appropriable:
The extent to which the resource is owned by the firm.

    Inimitable:
Such that the resource cannot be replaced even after the competitors having spotted the same.

    Cannot be Substituted:
This means that the resource cannot be substituted by the rival firms and that there is no match for the talent!

There are not many things in the business environment that can fulfill all the above criteria and offer unique competitive advantage except human resources and that is under the jurisdiction of talent management. There is also a need to understand the strategic intent of the organization before defining strategic capabilities.

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Performance management is an integral component of talent management that is aimed at ensuring that organizational goals are being met effectively and efficiently through individual and collective performance. It can thus encompass an individual employee, a department, a team, or even a process to build a service or a product.

Dr. Aubrey Daniels in late 1970’s used this term to describe a science for managing and enhancing both behavior and the results. It is this behavior and results that amounts to the performance of an employee. This is primarily achieved through attitudinal interventions. It was also defined as a strategic and integrated approach to increasing the effectiveness of organizations by improving the performance of the people who work in them and by developing capabilities of teams and individual contributors (Armstrong and Baron - 1998).

Performance management is most often used in professional organizations where the results and behavior of a certain course of actions has financial implications. Otherwise we can use it anywhere we wish to or enhancing people performance like sports, education, NGO’s, anywhere where there is an interaction between people.

Through performance management, organizations aim to align personal goals of employees with organizational goals and increase the overall efficiency, productivity and profitability for the larger benefit of the latter. There is no cap to the number of individuals on which it may be applied. It can be applied to one single individual or the entire department.

Typically the following steps are involved in performance management:

    Commitment analysis.
    Work analysis.
    Defining performance standards.

In commitment analysis a job mission statement is made for each job or process which is a job definition in terms of product, scope and purpose. Here the key objectives are outlined and performance standards are set against the same.

Work analysis follows next; this underlines the reporting structure and job description. Finally performance standards and expectations are set against each job or process keeping in view the efficiency and effectiveness both.

Employee performance management is of key benefit to organizations in helping them realize effectively the strategic and operational goals. In organizational behavior lexicon, performance problem is a gap between desired and actual results and performance management seeks to address just the same problem. There the effort is called as performance improvement. The guidelines that determine whether or job is being carried out effectively is based upon factors like whether the work is planned and clear expectations are set, work performance is monitored, staff is trained and developed continuously for a certain job etc.

The benefits of performance management are both financial and non financial in nature. Financial benefits include growth in sales, reduction in costs incurred, organizational alignment with the vision and mission, decrease in lead time.

In addition the workforce is motivated to a greater extent, employee engagement is enhanced, the incentive plans are optimized as per specific target or goal achievement and the importance professional development programs is better understood and made used of in learning and development. The management gains more control over its human capital, a transparency is ensured, work efforts are rewarded befittingly which boosts employee morale.

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Career Development / Career Development - Overview
« on: April 25, 2012, 01:58:21 PM »
         

People are the most important resource an organization can have. So, it becomes prime responsibility of the organizations to take care of their employees and give them an opportunity to grow especially to those who are career conscious and deliver performance. Career in 21st century is measured by continuous learning of the employees and identity changes in due course of time rather than changes in age and life stages. Career development of employees is not a mere responsibility of organizations, rather it is their obligation to address the ambitions of employees and create such job positions where they can accommodate their growing ambitions.

Employees are career conscious and they’ll stick to an organization where they feel that they have an opportunity to showcase their talent, grow to the maximum possible level and achieve their objectives. When we talk about growth, it can have different meanings to different people. Some may look at it as a fat package, some may want to climb up the ladder in the hierarchy and reach the topmost position while some want to acquire higher skills and competencies along with their growth as a human being. Some people may take it as an opportunity to avail some exclusive perks and benefits. Depending upon one’s own thinking, different people take different actions in order achieve their objectives.
   

Given the present situations, if employees want their organization to give them an opportunity to grow and achieve their ambitions, they need to be prepared for the future jobs. The main focus of organizations is on the employability of their people. Therefore, individuals should make sure that they have skills and competencies plus willingness to perform a specific job efficiently. Although the organizations can hire employees from outside but they require portable competencies in order to get the job done. For this, they will need to impart training to them and develop skills and competencies according to the job profile. But this is a troublesome process and takes hell lot of time to prepare the employees for a specific job. In order to avoid this situation to the maximum possible extent, organizations take control of the careers of their already existing employees and foster succession planning to fill the topmost positions.

Individuals need to develop new and better skills so that they are fit for promotion and reach to a higher level in the organization. Organizations likewise need to become proactive in designing and implementing career development programs for their employees. It is the best thing they can do to decrease employee turnover. Although it is employees responsibility to plan their career but in today’s turbulent and terrifically ambiguous world of work it is the employers’ responsibility to provide them with opportunities achieve their ambitions. They need to create that environment and culture for continuous learning and support their employees by motivating and rewarding them.

Career development is a continuous process where both employees as well as employers have to put efforts in order to create conducive environment so that they can achieve their objectives at the same time.

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Career Development / Importance of Career Development
« on: April 25, 2012, 01:57:30 PM »

Although the business environment has been endlessly experiencing negative changes such as economic downsizing and restructuring resulting in fewer hierarchical positions but at the same time the need for improving productivity while keeping a pace with continuously changing technology has also increased. Organizations, therefore, instead of hiring a new individual from the market prefer to promote their already existing employee to a specific position as he or she is already aware of the organizational culture and does not need to be trained. This requires a careful succession planning of employees and developing and preparing them continuously for filling topmost designations in future.

The process of organizational career development is important for both employees and employers. There may be several unintended and undesired changes as well as consequences that can change the entire scenario. In such a situation both employees and employers must be ready to keep with the changing environment and act accordingly. Employees continuously need to upgrade their skills and competencies to meet the current demands where as organizations must be ready with those employees who can handle the pressure efficiently and cease the risk of falling prey to the changed scenario. Therefore, understanding the importance of career development is very necessary for both the parties.
   

Business Environment Factors that can Bring Undesired Changes


    Economic Downsizing:
The biggest of all the factors that has badly affected the careers of millions of individuals is economic downsizing. The jobs are cut from the organizations and the fittest of all employees survive. If employees continuously learn new and better skills, chances are that economic conditions won’t hurt them that badly as compared to other individuals.

    De-layering:
De-layering means reclassification of jobs. This is an organizational change initiative where a company decides to reclassify the jobs more broadly. However, old reporting lines do exist in order to maintain managerial control but some jobs may be removed or cut down during the process. Again, those individuals have to leave the organization who are not competent enough to be shifted to other job with different nature.

    Cost Reduction Strategies of the Organization:
Cost-reduction strategies of the organizations are again very dangerous for those individuals who are not prepared to move on to the next level. If organizations have to cut down their operating costs, the employment of those individuals is at stake who are not employable or who have not performed up to the mark in past. Employees continuously need to upgrade themselves and show their talent in order to remain in the organizations till long.

    IT Innovations:
Continuous changes and upgradation in the technology is also one of the major factors that bring change. Some individuals can keep a pace with the changing technology and are always ready to learn and adopt new IT applications while some show immense resistance which is not acceptable to the organizations. Employees need to keep themselves updated and show willingness to accept changes as and when they occur and mould themselves accordingly.

The business changes affect both organizations and employees. The need is to understand them and find a way to cope with them effectively.

1649
Career Development / Designing Career Development Systems
« on: April 25, 2012, 01:56:31 PM »

Organizational career development process includes both individuals and institutions. Individuals plan their own careers whereas institutions or organizations manage the careers of the employees. Career planning by an individual includes several sub processes such as occupational choices, organizational choices, job assignment choices and career self-development. While the major sub processes of career management by organizations include recruitment and selection, human resource allocation, appraisal and evaluation and training and development. In order to have effective career development attempts by the organizations, designing automated career development systems plays a crucial role as it integrates a series of activities related to individual career planning and organizational career management involving employees, management and the organization.

An individual’s career is a series or sequence of work-related activities as well as his or her future aspirations. It is affected by several factors such as his or her behaviour, attitude, values, ambitions and desires and opportunities and threats and weaknesses and strengths plus the outer environment and economic conditions. It is a deliberate process followed by an individual depending upon his or her desires and aspirations over the span of one’s life.
   

Career management is an ongoing process that takes into account a particular job title or designation while preparing, implementing and monitoring succession planning depending upon the future requirements of an organization. Obviously, it also takes human factors in account but the entire process is directed and operated as per the needs and convenience of an organization. The best planning takes into account both organization’s and individual’s aspirations and creates a perfect mix where both the parties can be benefited.

Designing Career Development Systems


Designing career development systems according to specific needs and requirements of an organization can help HR specialists in bringing efficiency to the entire process of career management. Since the system tries to integrate all the activities of an employee, management as well as an organization, it has to be tailor-designed. There is nothing that fits all since the nature of the every business is different and aspirations of every employee in every industry are different. Most companies along with career management programs also involve career assessment process by the employee. If they have supportive environment such as a facilitator and properly automated system, they will properly assess their careers and fill genuine information about themselves.

Most organizations such as Xerox, IBM, Wal-Mart, Lincoln electric and Bell Atlantic have their own specific career development systems. Along with this, they provide their employees with supportive environment and a culture that supports the whole process of career development. This is the reason why these companies are considered as the best places to work. Since they manage the careers of their employees seriously and treat them as the most valuable assets of the organization, a very high percentage of university graduates prefer joining them even if they offer low compensation.

While designing career development system for an organization, the nature of their business, the industry and the business environment they are operating in should also be considered. Although it is an internal process of an organization but outer environment factors such as job market, current trends, economic conditions, etc affect the entire process.



1650
Career Development / Benefits of a Career Development System
« on: April 25, 2012, 01:55:44 PM »

Career development programs are most effective when they are integrated with the organization’s ongoing training and development strategies. For being able to do this, an organization must have a carefully designed career development system especially designed to meet its own unique needs and requirements. An automated and well-designed career management system not only benefits organizations but also help employees and managers or supervisors in establishing effective communication with each other. All the parties gain different benefits and combining which they can together set an organizational culture that supports such types of activities in an organization.

Benefits of a Career Development System to Organization


    Once organization has a fair idea about employee’s strengths and weaknesses, attitude and behaviour, values and future aspirations and skills and competencies, they are able to make better use of employee skills and put them at the right place.
    The organization can disseminate all important details and information at all organizational levels in order to ensure effective communication at all levels. It fosters and lays emphasis on better communication within the organization as a whole.

    It also helps organization retain valued employees by providing them what they want. Since the organization is able to collect all necessary information about a specific individual, it can make efforts to retain them.

    It establishes a reputation of the organization in the market. More and more working professionals see it as a people developer and get attracted towards it.

Benefits of a Career Development System to Employees


    The major benefit of career development system to employees is that they get helpful assistance and guidance with their career decisions. They get to know about their own aspirations, objectives and desires and understand how to shape their career.

    By using this system, they can set more realistic goals and objectives that are feasible to be accomplished over the span of one’s life.

    It fosters better communication between the employee and the manager as well as at all levels of the organization.
    The best part is that they can get feedback on their performance. This helps them improve their working style and compels them to upgrade their skills.

    The process leads to job enrichment and enhanced job satisfaction.

Benefits of a Career Development System to Managers/Supervisors


    A career development system helps managers and supervisors in improving and upgrading their skills in order to manage their own career. Even they get to where they are heading to and what their aspirations are.

    It fosters better communication between managers and employees.

    It helps them in retaining valued employees as they get to know about their skills and competencies and future aspirations as well.

    It helps in discussing productive performance appraisal of employees and planning their promotions as well as their career graph.

    It leads to greater understanding of the organization as a whole and cultivate a supportive and conducive culture in the organization.

    It helps managers in understanding the hidden aspects of employees and guides them to allocate employees the right job that matches to their skills and competencies.


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