For my blog readers – the following is a post inspired by questions received from HR leaders that I will be talking with tomorrow as I share with them my talent scorecard presentation. My pledge is that I will answer questions they have, and these were submitted as part of a survey I asked them to take. It is in the vein of what I normally talk about, but exceeds my personal 200-300 word limit that I try and stick to because I want our conversation to fit into your busy schedule. 🙂
Question: How do you create an employee development program specific to the needs of each employee?
I found out an interesting fact several months ago – 99.9% of organizations in the United States have less than 500 employees. These organizations employ about half of the people in our economy. This feeds into this question because the traditional answer to the question from training and development is to: 1) Develop job descriptions 2) Define competencies/measures for each role 3) Perform a gap analysis 4) Create a plan based on gaps 5) Revisit yearly with a performance evaluation. Most organizations do not have the time, HR expertise, and patience to do all of these things. Two things that are critical in developing people: 1) A trusting relationship between leader and follower 2) A conversation around what they need (both company and individual) that is captured in a plan 2.5) A follower ready to own the plan and a leader committed to supporting it. Here is a link to the development plan and other templates I provide that will drive the right conversations and capture key information in a written form that can be managed. fyi – it is that simple, but not necessarily easy. I can blog on that at another time if you would like – just ask. ANY size organization can put development plans in place for their people, and it is the key to helping people develop.
It states in Crucial Conversations that “one study of 500 stunningly productive organizations revealed that peak performance had absolutely nothing to do with forms, procedures, and policies that drive performance management.” From my experience, I agree. Please discuss how the process you are presenting makes a true difference in peak performance, including the aspects of the process which are most crucial to success.
The reference to Crucial Conversations is a series of two books published by and sold by a consulting group called Vital Smarts. My belief system on performance was actually born out of a conversation I had with one of their partners and a co-author from another book they published, Influencer. I spent a couple of days with David Maxfield listening to him teach and working with him on a rollout plan. Let me say the guy is brilliant, experienced, and their focus on helping organization/leaders become great at having difficult conversations is world class. But in one conversation I asked “Do you assume that organizations you are trying to help already have a culture in place where regular one on one discussions are already happening, because it seems that is the key place where it would be easiest to practice what you are teaching.” His answer was “Yes’. What I knew based on my conversations with leaders in this growing organization was the one on one habit was not firmly in place. As a result, the implementation of this key leadership skill was spotty at best. I agree that conflict management is a critical leadership skill to enable great performance, but I base performance/talent management on the relationship first, and then the other pieces/habits build off that. I also agree that it is not policy, procedures first – – but I also know from experience that in order to Build Rhythm there has to be some structure in place.
I love talking to groups and want to make the conversation longer than an hour long keynote. Feel free to comment or ask follow-up questions. I welcome them.