A recent piece on the HBR Blog Site discussed a series that litmus tests to help in judging people and their real potential. Examples cited are meaningful listening, giving rather than taking energy and self-awareness. It is certainly possible to take the list of the ten criteria suggested and build it into a structured interview…
I’ve already identified this as the leading pain point of senior HR executives. This and several future entries will address this subject in more detail. As Baby Boomers are retiring, employee ranks are thinning, executive layers are disappearing and development budgets are shrinking, the road to executive ascent needs to be shortening. Yet can it?…
A recent Forbes blog discussed how women are reluctant to seek out leadership roles, avoiding these positions in favor of safer career paths. I have witnessed this behavior in a number of situations, in each of which a very qualified woman hesitated to move forward in the same way as men. Most interesting to me…
A recent HBR blog shows data reflecting the low scores that Board members give their companies for Talent Management which Board members, in turn, rate as critical to future success. This makes me wonder how these Board members would rate the Talent Management practices at the companies where they work, usually as senior executives. It’s…
Rarely does a day go by when I don’t encounter an important business executive making questionable decisions about scheduling priorities. Sometimes, it’s the executive’s administrative assistant who is the culprit; other times, it’s the executive himself or herself. Consider what is at stake. An executive’s most valuable personal business asset is time. Using time toward…
I’ve been gathering informal feedback from senior HR executives on their top five pain points related to developing leaders and growing talent. Here are the winners: 1.Accelerated Leadership Development – I’ve already mentioned this in a recent blog post, and it tops the list. As Baby Boomers are retiring, employee ranks are thinning, executive layers…
A recent blog, Leadership-Why Talent is Overrated, by Mike Myatt in Forbes — So, what role does motivation play in becoming a leader? Some assert that it’s the overwhelming characteristic of leadership. See for example: To them, to be motivated, passionate, determined to get it done, hard working and relentless is the essence of leadership.…
With increasing frequency, as Baby Boomers prepare to retire, senior Talent professionals are citing the absence of an effective approach to accelerated leadership development as their major pain point. As a case in point, recently I was having dinner with a prominent SVP HR and we spent most of the evening on this subject. He…
As part of reviewing a Company’s recruiting process, the senior talent executive broached the subject of reviewing and updating the organization’s competencies – specifically a list of roughly ten behaviors expected of all employees. She pointed out to me that the competencies were probably outdated and should be refreshed. I asked how the competencies are…
Recently, I was talking to one of my clients in the senior talent position at her company. As we were discussing the role of managers in talent management, the subject came up of teaching managers to have “engaging communications” with their employees. The focus was around what you would expect: delivering feedback, delivering performance results,…