HOW TO IDENTIFY TALENT

CHAPTER 4
ASM 401S
 INTRODUCTION
Talent is developed due to the following:

 Geographical choices of where to work

 Increase of job flexibility
 Change in job expectations
 Generational expectations
 Major shift in demographics
 INTRODUCTION (CONT…)

 Research has shown that an organisation’s top talent contributes disproportionate

value to the organisations success
 There is a direct link between the organisations calibre of talent and its ability to
drive its competitive advantage
 Top performers produce as much as ten times more than the average worker, while
they often require less than twice the pay
 The top performer differential is 2.5 times to 10 than that of an average performer
 TALENT IDENTIFICATION & DEVELOPMENT

 In order to survive and thrive, organisations need to focus on the way that they
identify and develop their talent.
 Talent identification informs talent development
 If the identification process has not been facilitated successfully, all talent
development plans will be off little or no value
 An organisation should be able to classify or categorise employees based on their
potential to succeed at higher levels or critical roles within the organisation
 4.2 THE TALENT IDENTIFICATION
PROCESS

• Most companies have their own talent identification process in place.

However, maturity & usefulness vary across different companies in that they
are not always applied consistently and not always communicated effectively
to employees.

Following the process depicted below, will help organizations to attain success:
• Determine talent criteria
• Ensure talent criteria is measureable
• Create tools to measure talent criteria
• Communicate criteria & ensure consistent application thereof
 4.3 DETERMINING TALENT CRITERIA

• Keeping in mind that talented employees are individuals with the ability to
contribute substantially to the current and future performance of the company,
best practice suggest that talent criteria should focus on the following:

• Alignment with short and long term strategy of the business

• Use of competencies to define the typical behavioural traits of talent within the
business and;
• Use of transparent set of indicators defining the organisation’s star talent qualities
 4.3.1 ALIGNMENT WITH THE BUSINESS
STRATEGY
• The characteristics that make up an employee a top performer differ per
organization and often per business unit or department

• Talent criteria refers to quality characteristics, skills, and abilities that

individuals need to exhibit in order to outperform their peers successfully.
• i.e.. Adaptability
• Resilience
• Innovation
• Creativity
 USE OF COMPETENCIES
• Competencies are employee characteristics that lead to behaviours that
are associated with high performance.
• These competencies are clustered into an integrated framework to form a
competency framework
• Competencies are usually identified in terms of observable behavioural
indicators, and are very useful in the identification of high potential
 4.4 WHAT ARE THE TYPICAL
CHARACTERISTICS OF STAR TALENT
• Even though “talent” or “potential” is often defined specifically for each organisation, high
potential employees often display traits within any organisation.

• Sense of self awareness

• Acquire Emotional intelligence
• Lives by example and value driven
• Ability to develop and communicate a vision as well as inspire others to follow
• Good interpersonal skills
• Good decision maker
• Strong drive towards results
• Possesses adaptability and agility
• Track record for accomplishing results
• Ability to take charge and make things happen
• Trusted to lead projects
• Consider the strategic perception of a situation
 4.5 MEASURING POTENTIAL
• Organisations cannot assume that top performers are the “top talent” for the future.

• High potential is very different from high performance.

• High performers may very well be at their top of their game now but it may be uncertain as to

how they will perform in the future given another challenge.

• Potential is about future performance not past performance. It is an individual’s ability to

quickly adapt to changing circumstances and their ability to learn and master a new job.
 4.5.2 THE USE OF ASSESSMENTS TO
MEASURE POTENTIAL
• While a good series of good performance appraisals should play a role in high
potential nominations, too often organisations rely on this primary source of
information when identifying talent.
Organisations should include:
 behavioural preferences
 Aptitude
 emotional intelligence
 Engagement
 career goals

Supplement the analysis of performance with reliable and validated measurements

tools such as:
Multi-rater assessments, psychometric tests and talent review meetings.
 4.5 .3 TALENT REVIEW MEETINGS

• Talent review meetings are structured to review employees, their performance and
their potential. During these meetings, decision makers utilise the defined talent
criteria to review, discuss and make decisions about talent status of employees and
what development steps are to be taken with each employee going forward.

• Due to an emotional connection that decision makers often have towards their
employees, it is wise to have these meetings facilitated by a neutral party who can
challenge the thinking of the decision makers and verbalise things that might
otherwise have gone unsaid.
 4.6 COMMUNICATING TALENT
IDENTIFICATION CRITERIA
Benefits of open communication

• Development becomes a shared responsibility of the involved parties not just HR

• Transparency can boost motivation in terms of the visible opportunities
• A sense of fairness can be enhanced in talent management
• Quality assurance processes are placed under great scrutiny by all involved
 4.6 COMMUNICATING TALENT
IDENTIFICATION CRITERIA
• Managers should be encouraged to have meaningful development and career
conversations with all their employees and should therefore communicate to
employees their growth potential without using unnecessary labels.

• Here are some reflections that could be considered;

• All employees should clearly understand the criteria of high potential status
• Criteria should be consistently communicated so that fairness is encouraged
• It is advisable that the message that high potential status does not guarantee
promotion and also is not permanent is reinforced regularly
• Any new requirements for high potentials should be timeously communicated to all
employees
 4.7 TALENT IDENTIFICATION TOOLS
• The nine-box grid or matrix was developed and used by General Electric in the late
1960’s to enable the organisation to assess the potential of employees in its business
and to prioritise their investment and overall talent strategy.
• A tool designed to measure the potential of employees
Potential

Performance
 4.7.2 THE DROTTER TALENT PIPELINE
• According to Stephen Drotter (2011), the operating definition of leadership is to make
performance happen.
• True leaders take accountability for the success of other people, and not just for
themselves.
• It is critical to test leaders on their ability to manage additional challenges while
sustaining their own performance and that of others.
• Drotter developed the leadership pipeline as a succession blueprint for moving
leaders through a well planned pipeline that intrinsically tests them in their current
levels and prepares them for success in levels above.
THE DROTTER TALENT PIPELINE
 4.8 INTEGRATION WITH OTHER
TALENT MANAGEMENT ACTIVITIES
• Why is it important to have a system of HR functions that are closely and clearly integrated and
supported by a well-designed technology platform? List below are some benefits:

Managers
• Access to information is direct, current and relevant
• Less time spent per manager per review period and
• Individual, team, departmental and organisational goals are closely aligned

Human Resources
• HR can proactively develop workforce skills to meet current and future needs
• Administration time is considerably reduced and
• Allows to focus on strategic priorities and harness executive attention
 4.8 INTEGRATION WITH OTHER
TALENT MANAGEMENT ACTIVITIES
• Employees
• A clear understanding of performance expectations and support needed to
achieve these
• Less time spent per employee per review period and
• Provision of opportunities to learn, grow and remain engaged
 4.9 CONCLUSION
• This chapter focuses on the tools, methodologies and activities that could be
used to enhance the process of identifying core talent within the
organisation.
• The key points to remember when identifying talent are to establish clear
talent criteria aligned to the business strategy, to implement these criteria in
a consistent way the business and communicate the criteria in a transparent
and effective way.