Continuing the Workforce Partioning Discussion - Be Strategic with your workforce - From the Folks at Harvard Business Review

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Should all employees be equal?

This question tends to spark off lively debates in our strategy classes. I have had people respond to say all employees should be treated equally. Equity is important to everyone - people tend to commit better to a system that is seen as equitable. One that employees can trust to deal with them according to objective rules agreed with, and applied to everyone in the organization.

That would bring one to the question of - does differentiation mean inequity? More importantly, which should drive strategy? Considerations of employee perception or considerations of perceived value to the organization? If we agree that HR strategy and policies should be driven by value to the organization, what or who should determine that value?

A thorough examination of the issue generally (in my experience) leads to an agreement that indeed value - more precisely, value to the customer is and should be the primary driver for business (and HR management strategy). Once established, it isn't difficult to see the case for workforce partitioning. Differentiating talent management strategy for various segments of the workforce makes sense for several reasons:

·         Resource Constraints: The resources available to an organization are rarely limitless. This necessitates a 'smart' approach to determining how these resources are deployed.

·         Service Delivery: Whilst everyone in an organization is important and makes a contribution, clearly some roles are more 'critical' to customer delivery (and satisfaction) than others. This applies both from the structural perspective (hierarchy) and from the individual perspective (quality of performance).

·         Job Specifications: Job roles across the organization are varied; a heterogeneous approach is required– one size rarely fits all. For instance, some roles may require technical competencies, or have age related qualifiers.

Other possible qualifiers include experience, geographical location, attitudinal skills, job conditions (indoor/outdoor, shift work, level of physical activity required, level of decision making skills required, management skills, etc).

That the usual objective of business is identifying a need in the market and then assembling the resources required to meet that need profitably. Competitive advantage comes from identifying the things an organization needs to do better than others to win and keep customers in the market place.

 Typically, organizational capabilities required for consistent superior performance would be in more than one area, and at several levels. Therefore the skill sets and other talent attributes differ across roles. The main challenge for the organization would then be – how do we ensure that we have the right people, doing the right jobs at an optimal cost, in a way that competitors will find difficult to replicate?

 If competitive advantage is the main objective, how does HR add value? Strategic value here would be HR’s ability to creatively and effectively match the right skill sets and attitudes(people) to available positions in a way that maximizes the workforce, and through the creation of an enabling environment (culture and systems), derive utmost value from the organization’s investment in human capital.

Errors in this process could lead to significant losses in terms of staffing.  Under qualified people assigned to highly demanding jobs or overqualified people assigned to less-demanding jobs, and inadequate staffing levels. Where you have under qualified people assigned to jobs, the tendency is for errors and rework to be frequent, leading not only to losses in terms of time and cost, but more importantly to customer satisfaction.

Over qualification would directly impact on staff costs – the organization paying more than it should for underutilized talent as well as employee dissatisfaction. Mismatching could also lead to under or over staffing. Both of these scenarios impact negatively on the bottom line in terms of the organization being unable to meet customer requirements or doing so unprofitably.

In addition to possible losses in revenue, higher costs, customer dissatisfaction, lower profits, workforce mismatches also lead to talent attrition and general inefficiency. Another major possible impact area would be the organization’s ability to effectively attract talent in the market place considering that it is not operating in a vacuum.

You will often find that if an organization doesn’t have a performance management mechanism that identifies rewards and cultivates high performers, they either leave, or become de-motivated as there is no incentive to deliver above average.

Furthermore, there is the issue of succession planning, as well as determining recruitment strategy – what kind of skills, attitudes, experience do we need and where do we need it, training and development planning – what’s the best way to equip and grow our talent to meet the evolving needs of the business?. This also drives reward strategy – what should we pay for the quality of talent required, and how do our reward packages look relative to competitors?.

When closely examined, your workforce partitioning strategy is the basis for ensuring optimal resource allocation throughout the talent management process. A good understanding of this concept and various ways to effectively apply it are requisite for the HR professional and we should discuss the issue to find talent management strategies that work in our environment.

In the next 2 posts, I share expert approaches to workforce partitioning from different perspectives. Your comments and viewpoints will be appreciated.

Management training tips and guides

Quite a few managers get thrust into that role without formal preparation and sometimes, an unclear understanding of the dynamics of making the best of their team responsibilities. This situation is noticeable with new managers who have a challenge making the transition from being a highly regarded sole contributor to a team leader.

People struggle with change. That’s a fact of life. For a team member who is getting a new supervisor, the instinctive reaction is uncertainty and in some cases, anxiety and resistance. The manager needs a good handle on the people aspect of his role, clarity of purpose (he needs to understand what the business requires from his unit, and set clear goals in the short and long term for his team), and the right skill set to lead, motivate and communicate with his (or her) team for effective performance.

Many managers struggle with the challenge of enforcing performance standards and objectives whilst being approachable and considered a partner by members of the team. This challenge is not peculiar to new managers. Some experienced managers have struggled with this problem for years and are not as effective as they should be because of this gap in skills. And the problem isn't restricted to our market. 

Here's an excerpt I came across:  "According to the 2009 Skills Gap poll from ASTD (/American Society for Training and Development), organizations are experiencing gaps in these skills:

·         leadership and executive skills

·         basic workplace competencies that are the building blocks of successful performance in any job such as literacy and numeracy

·         professional or industry-specific skills

·         managerial and supervisory skills

·         communication and interpersonal skills

·         technical, IT, and systems skills

·         sales skills

·         Process and project management skills.

In addition, it is agreed these additional skills are needed for sustained high performance in the knowledge economy:

1.    Adaptability—the capacity to change in response to ever-shifting conditions in the economy and the marketplace, and to quickly master the new skills that such changes require

2.    Innovative thinking and action—the ability to think creatively and to generate new ideas and solutions to challenges at work

3.    Personal responsibility for learning—the willingness of individuals to take responsibility for continually improving their work-related capabilities throughout their careers. "

So how do we change this? In my opinion, there are several approaches to tackling the issue:

1.    Organizations have a responsibility to prepare members of their workforce for leadership. Whilst not everyone will become a manager, it is important for every member of the workforce to understand the concepts of leadership, followership and self management. They need to be encouraged to actively develop and exercise these skills not only in  preparation for a more senior role, but to improve productivity levels. Business these days requires a strong entrepreneurial mindset from all employees. This self driven behavior assures the ability to anticipate and meet customer needs whether or not "Big Brother' is watching!

2.    Managers and professionals need to take responsibility for developing their management and leadership skills with the understanding that this is their primary tactic to competently perform on the job and add value to themselves personally, career wise.

3.    There has to be a deeper understanding by organizational leadership, training and human resources managers of competency gaps across the workforce. Too often, there is a failure to leverage our training spend for the highest return because the basis for determining training needs and their solutions is flawed.

4.    The approach to addressing these and other skills gap needs to be guided by the understanding that classroom training can only be a part of the overall solution. Adults innovative handling for training to have any serious impact on changing behavior. Putting the individual in a management training class for few days is certainly not all that needs to be done if we want to deal with the issue conclusively. Adult learning best practices derived from years of research and observation from the field of psychology and learning are tailored around the following concepts:

i)      Training needs to engage all forms communication with the human mind (visual, aural and kinesthetic). In other words, people need to have to experience concepts in different formats for effective assimilation.

                                              

ii)     Learners need to be given the responsibility to process concepts for quicker understanding (the interactive approach). The learner tends to make more of an effort when he understands that the onus for finding the answers lies with him and other members of the class.

iii)    People tend to remember what they've practiced. People should be given the opportunity to learn and practice these skills across all parts of the business. Cross postings – opportunities for people to work outside their primary function for a set period can be a great tool to achieve this.

iv)   Repetition is key to internalization. A 'blended approach to learning and learning re-enforcement is critical. Skill development is best approached with the mindset that the classroom setting whilst great for sharing concept fundamentals, needs to be enhanced by the provision of training across channels (online, offline, and on the job). 

v)    Learning has to be directly relevant to the work situation and to the learner (and not learning for its own sake).

vi)   Measurement of training impact is important both from the individual and organizational perspectives. Pre and post training evaluations motivate learners to take training more seriously.

vii)  Choices in training courses, material and facilitation need to validated against the principles of active learning. Its important to ensure that the training is delivered according to global learning standards.

viii)  Training, and the subsequent behavioral outcomes need to be tied to performance. A learner who knows that his overall performance will be assessed on several levels including training participation and demonstrated behavior change has strong motivation to learn and apply skills acquired in the workplace