If you ask talents whether jobs off

If you ask talents whether jobs offer a maximum engagement of their talents, then they will
deny it. Talents have the potential to be much more meaningful to their organisation. The
question is, how?
Mobilizing Minds (Bryan and Joyce, 2007) outlines some answers that primarily focus on the
way organisations organise talent management. Peter Cappelli (2008) and Ed Lawler (2008)
add several practical pointers: from talent pools, to talent markets and from electronic HR
systems that track competence development to learning networks between divisions and
departments.
True to my profession and the focus of this publication, I will limit myself to the possibilities
that talent programs can offer to maximise the engagement of talents.
Taken as a group, what potential do talents offer?
That question occurred to me after having reviewed several talent programs. I saw talents
come together for training and group meetings, but not for any significant collaborative
undertaking. I was able to win over the Career Development Division of ING Retail to the idea
of shaping leadership development through strategic group assignments, with the board as
a client and one of the directors as the delegated client. It was imperative that the
assignment was serious: where the proceeds – if they were of sufficient quality to the board
– would actually benefit the organisation. Too often the assignments for trainees are
fictitious, and not grafted on a real and fundamental organisational dilemma.
In the ING Retail Banking Leadership Programme we shaped leadership development
entirely through these strategic assignments. The learning experiences of the trainees
during the assignments triggered training, education, peer coaching and leadership
development. In other words, the strategic assignment triggered both informal and formal
learning moments (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2010).
Illustrative in this respect is ING’s experience with the first strategic assignment that the first
trainee group undertook. The board commissioned an assignment for them to achieve at
least e1m in savings in a specific part of the organisation. Six months later, a proposal was
presented that has since then realized e10m in savings. Learning can pay off!
Five key decisions to start harnessing the power of your talent pool are as follows (Groysberg
et al., 2010; Jones, 2008):
1. How many colleagues of equal or greater talent surround the talent?
B The direct report of the talent is also marked as talent.
B We hire talents in groups to establish a high potential peer group.
B The immediate colleagues of the talent are also marked as talent
B Other.
2. How is the information exchange between talents regulated?
B During our talent program, we organize networking events for our talents.
B Our talents have access to an intranet environment that facilitates information
sharing.
B Talents find each other easily – mobile phones, internet and e-mail addresses suffice
as enablers
B Other.