Why Having a Skills and Talent Strategy is Like Herding Cats (and How to Make It Work)
In the ever-evolving world of business, having a skills and talent strategy is like trying to herd cats. It sounds like a great idea in theory, but in practice, it can be a bit of a mess. One of the biggest challenges is aligning your business strategy with your skills strategy. If these two aren't in sync, you might find yourself with a set of highly skilled individuals who are all rowing in different directions. And let's not even get started on the different taxonomies for skills that various platforms use. It's like trying to speak multiple languages at once!
Imagine this: your business strategy is all about innovation and agility, but your skills strategy is focused on traditional, tried-and-true methods. It's like trying to drive a sports car with the handbrake on. You won't get very far, and you'll probably end up frustrated. The key is to ensure that your skills strategy is aligned with your business goals. This means understanding what skills are needed to achieve those goals and making sure your organization is equipped with them.
Now, let's talk about those pesky different taxonomies for skills. One platform might call it "project management," while another calls it "program coordination." It's like trying to compare apples to oranges. This lack of standardization can make it difficult to get a clear picture of your organization's capabilities and identify any gaps. It's essential to find a way to translate these different taxonomies into a common language that everyone can understand.
But fear not! Despite these challenges, there is hope. With the right alignment of strategy, culture, and ecosystem, you can turn this chaotic cat-herding exercise into a somewhat well-oiled machine. Start by ensuring that your business and skills strategies are aligned. This means having open and ongoing conversations between business leadership and HR to ensure everyone is on the same page. You do need to make sure you define what a “Skill” is to ensure everyone is on the same page!
However, aligning your strategy is only the first step. Moving from a latent to a predictive talent strategy requires additional effort and vision. In the latent stage, strategies often lack a full vision for talent. As a result, the skill gap continues to widen, and the organization relies heavily on external hiring. Despite recognizing the need for a talent vision, skills are still being collected manually, and adoption of skill visibility remains low within the organization.
When you're in the exploring stage, everyone agrees on a talent vision and governance, but skills are still being manually assessed, and adoption is driven by campaigns that can vary across different organizations. There's a buzz about using AI, but the right policies and procedures aren't in place yet to make it happen. This is a time for running experiments in isolation while the organization matures on different fronts to move to the next stage.
As you move into the active stage, communication about the value of skills and the benefits for learners gets better. This stage is all about explaining why skills matter and what's in it for people to share their skills. Learning programs become more targeted and tailored to meet individual needs.
In the proactive stage, continuous learning is driven by better skill alignment throughout the organization and stronger partnerships. The organization starts to see the perks of a more dynamic and integrated talent management approach. However, you still need good governance, engaged SMEs or business stakeholders, and campaigns to encourage people to update their skills. Having a digital credential strategy helps maintain the quality of skill identification.
Finally, achieving the predictive stage means reaching Talent Intelligence. At this level, the talent ecosystem seamlessly incorporates skills throughout the experience, leading to stronger value and impact for the organization. Innovation becomes a critical agenda to accelerate business goals, and the organization thrives on the foresight and predictive capabilities it now possesses. Even at this stage maintaining this stage is often difficult as platforms change in the ecosystem, business strategies shift as market demands change. Ok, don’t let me deflate the winds out of your sails, this is a great phase to be in but note we all aspire to go further eventually.
In conclusion, while having a skills and talent strategy can be challenging, it's not impossible. With the right alignments you can unlock tremendous value and impact for both your people and your organization. So, embrace the chaos, align your strategies, and watch your organization thrive!
Where are you on the journey to becoming a Talent Champion?
