Great People Decisions - Fernandez Araoz

This was also a birthday present from a friend :) Couldn't have been more appropriate, given my current work related to personnel and the fact that I'm supervising with a small team of people.

Took me a few weeks to fill this in, cos I was interrupted by a number of other books in the process. This book is a gem. It resonates strongly with many of the things that I intuitively believe in but never had the opportunity to hear from a source that's more credible (than own self-affirmation!).

1. The higher you climb, the more impt hiring decisions become. First you hire great people, then you assign the right person to the right job.
2. The trend now is for HR to be increasingly decentralised. As such, there is greater responsibility for managers down the chain to take charge of hiring and managing talent.
3. When hiring, experience, IQ and EQ all matter. However, the combination of EQ and experience is the most powerful predictor of future performance. The lack of EQ alone is the factor which is strongly correlated with executive failure.
4. Essential competencies for managers / leaders include: (i) results orientation, (ii) team leadership - the ability to build high performance teams, (iii) strategic orientation, or big picture (iv) collaboration and influencing. Is starting to sound like the AIM model eh.
   
5. Potential comprises the following components: (i) ambition - the need for achievement, affiliation and power, (ii) ability to learn from experience and (iii) specific competencies relevant to the particular job.
6. Finally! Integrating the new hires and talent. One on one time cannot be substituted. As a manager, this is the one thing that cannot be delegated or solved with technology.
   

Bench Strength - Robert Barner

This is a must read for people hoping to learn strategies on how to manage talent in an organisation. The book explains how different strategies trade-off in terms of benefits, strengths and drawbacks, depending on the structure of your organisation.

Here are my three main takeaways:

1. A useful framework to analyse future leaders uses three dimensions- ability, engagement and aspiration. It gives a manager an idea how to unleash the potential in an underperforming leader. Based on a study, 10% of managers are missing ability (engaged dreamers) - these hv little success climbing the ladder. 43% are missing engagement, and these have hv 13% chance of success at the next managerial level. However, 47% of the employees who are missing aspiration hv 44% chance of success at the next level. Hence, target the employees who are underperforming due to aspiration first.
2. Capstone vs Foundation strategies for talent management. Capstone - use when resources are limited and there's little line of sight to talent - want to create competitive platform for leadership talent. Good in deploying the best people, but may lead to overlooking of solid performersFoundation - use when resources are ample, you know where your talent are, and cultural indoctrination is a key objective. Supports strong value / cultural messages, but dilutes the focus on the high performers. To effectively use the Capstone strategy, one needs to hv a process for tracking the hiring source for HIPO leaders.
3. Stream or pool strategy. Based on the assumption that most talents can fit into most places, the company maintains and steadily recruits into a pool of talent that it taps on to fill positions. A pool strategy offers flexible arrangement for both talent and organisation, as both can select from a range of optionsUseful for fluid organisational structures and where there is a broad base of talent to draw from. On the other hand, the stream strategy presumes a stable and organised hierarchy, and critical leadership positions that require pre-identification. Streaming allows for more intensive and effective use of talent resources. In an organisation, a hybrid can be used - i.e. pool for the lower rungs of the management ladder, and stream for the highest positions.
   

The Talent Advantage - Alan Weiss and Nancy MacKay

Another book I picked in my effort (perhaps an overly ambitious one) to understand the talent management space as quickly as possible.

This book is more relevant to a CEO audience than to a HR executive-wannabe. But there are still lessons to be learnt that can be applied to managers keen on recruiting and retaining talent in their own teams.

Some of the interesting insights:

1. People do follow tough bosses who exact high standards and deliver. People hungry for success want to work for successful people and learn from them.
2. Don't blindly promote people from within based on their technical expertise
3. All the divisional leaders / supervisors have to be engaged in the talent game. HR policies have to be executed well for talent to be attracted, groomed and retained.
4. Hold people accountable to generate results
5. Prepare a strong bench - have at least 2 people groomed and on track for the key leadership roles in one's organisation
6. To retain talent, one has to go beyond financial incentives, into giving people learning and growth opportunities, providing career certainties for the top talent, and giving top talent variety in their jobs
7. Need to keep an eye out for future talent trends and demands - cos we are grooming people for the future