Developing new talent management strategies for 2010

 

  I’ve been reading a couple of research reports on UK business and HR in 2010.

One is IRS Employment Review’s HR roles and responsibilities: the 2010 IRS survey (available at XpertHR – subscription required).  This survey of 253 HR practitioners in October 2009 identified two important issues and initiatives for HR over the coming year.

“HR is still busy dealing with restructuring and redundancies, and coping with the ensuing workforce and succession planning.

HR is also grappling with the aftermath of restructuring programmes that have resulted in job losses and the impact on remaining employees. Many HR practitioners referred to the need to boost employee engagement or morale, directly related to the impact of restructuring and redundancies.”

 

The other research is PwC’s annual CEO survey which finds that "changing the talent culture" will be one of UK businesses' main priorities this year.

"Delivering organic growth in a world more sensitised to risk will need careful leadership and management. Success in 2010 will in part be dependent on how companies motivate, manage and reward their talent pool.  Here in the UK there are some promising signs of CEOs tackling this issue.

• 42% of UK CEOs expect headcount numbers to increase in the next 12 months
• 52% of CEOs plan to make significant changes to their staff morale/employee engagement programmes
• 65% plan to increase investment in leadership and talent management
• 78% plan to changes their talent management strategies in the wake of the financial crisis.

The scale of anticipated change suggests that for whatever reason, existing HR practices did not support the businesses when the crisis hit. The past year has demonstrated that many reward models are broken, CEOs did not have sufficient flexibility to redeploy talent when the crisis hit and that different skills will be needed to compete in the new landscape."

 

Two things leap out to me here.

1. I’m not sure HR appreciates the scale of the challenge (or the opportunity).  CEOs want you to make a difference, if you’ve got the ambition and imagination to do this!
2. The change isn’t all about restructuring and engagement.  CEOs want to increase investment in talent management, but they want to manage talent differently too.

 

Stuck for ideas?  Give me a call.

 

Technorati Tags: CEO,HR,survey,talent,management,restructuring,engagement,ambition,imagination

 

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