Leadership Development News Roundup: Talent Management Edition

Today’s job market is dynamic and full of opportunities for talented people. If your organization isn’t investing in its people strategy, working with its employees to help carve out career paths and making their professional development part of that path, it’s going to run into problems with talent management and retention down the road.

On Tuesday, I wrote about “Why Managers Must Have Career Development Discussions with All Their Employees.” In this week’s Leadership Development News Roundup, I have a collection of articles and blog posts with more information and advice on talent management to help you understand the why’s and how’s of employee development.

• Why Employee Development is Important. Business2Community: “People are more likely to leave companies that don’t provide them with good development opportunities and leadership. Even good managers are likely to struggle to retain key employees and manage team retention rates if these things are not looked after. When people are given the opportunity to advance, they become invested, your customers benefit from the increased productivity and your top talent sticks around.”

• Stop Hiring and Start Attracting Talent. Strategy+Business: “I try to increase the odds in the employees’ favor. One way to do that is to let them showcase their own work. This increases their profile in the company so that when the good projects and jobs become available, their names are more likely to be considered. Nothing makes me happier than someone who works for me getting a new role, even one in another group. I think it reflects well on a manager to have his or her people be chosen for advancement.  No one wants to do the same thing forever, and it’s unfair to hold someone back just because they are so good at their job that they’ll be hard to replace. It’s part of a manager’s job to build a succession plan for key staffers.”

• 3 Easy Ways to Invest in Your Employees and Boost Retention. The VAR Guy: “While there always is a certain amount of training on the job, proper training is essential. You can’t expect an employee to simply know how to do certain things, particularly if it is proprietary and unique to your organization. Training your employees is an investment in their future. It also builds loyalty and future skill sets, and will provide a return on your investment for years to come.”

• Toxic Talent Management Habits. Harvard Business Review: “To the extent that organizations are able to accurately evaluate their culture, energize their staff, minimize the influence of office politics, and properly assess leadership potential, they will be more likely to outperform their competitors. And the best way to achieve that is not by trusting their leaders’ gut feeling, but by following a rational, data-driven, and scientifically informed approach.”

• Developing Talent and Succession Planning. Business Today: “There are a number of processes and systems available for accelerating the development of leaders at all levels, such as formal training and development, on-the-job learning, special assignments, executive coaching, and job rotations etc. But when it comes to top leaders, organisations should not only develop individual leadership skills, but also enhance the effectiveness of its overall leadership capacity in order to transform the organisation and build the necessary culture. This means we should focus on human capital development, social capital development and cultural capital development.”

Contact us if you’d like to learn more about how we can help your organization attract and retain top talent.

Success Labs is a full-service, strategic organizational and leadership development company located in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. For more than 25 years, our expert team of consultants has worked with hundreds of companies to explore their business potential and improve their company and cultural performance. Contact us to get proactive about your people strategy.