What are the best talent management strategies?
It is crucial to have great talent management strategies in place to facilitate a productive work environment. Here are some you can put in place...
Effective talent management is the key to organizational performance and a positive employee experience. According to a report released by McKinsey and Company, only 37% of respondents say their organization’s HR functions facilitate this. Proper talent management can help a company attract, retain, and nurture the best talents by maximizing their true potential in the work environment.
It is crucial to have great talent management strategies in place to facilitate a productive and positive work environment. To help you get started, here are some you can put in place:
1. Develop clear and honest job descriptions
Be transparent and honest with the talent you seek. The job description shouldn’t be pages long, but it should cover all crucial requirements. Stipulate job title, overall/day-to-day duties, necessary skills, work relationships (which team they’ll be a part of, and who their reporting manager will be), tools and equipment required, as well as salary and benefits.
One of the biggest complaints employees have after joining a company is that they aren’t getting to do the work set out in the job description. When you don’t spell out every detail of the job opening clearly, you create a recipe for future disaster. Your company’s requirements and the employee’s talents are not in alignment, which is why job dissatisfaction rises.
2. Utilize the interview process to determine cultural fit
This can be a hard thing to do. Explaining the culture of your company and determining if the candidate will fit into it is very subjective. You can try to determine the fit by screening their tone of voice, language, and passion. Ask them questions on personal values to see if they’ll be a good fit. This will allow you to judge how the candidate will interact with the rest of the team and if they can work collaboratively or not.
3. Prepare an effective onboarding deck for all employees in a new job role
Research by Glassdoor and the Brandon Hall Group found that great employee onboarding can help boost employee retention by 88%. Onboarding is not a one-week event and is also not just paperwork. Ensure that the employee gets face-time with their manager and that they meet all the new team members they’ll be working with.
For effective talent management, make onboarding an ongoing process by allowing new employees as much time as they need to fit into the new role. Trying a buddy system has been helpful for many organizations. A buddy can answer every single question an employee has whenever they have doubts. This can help them become socially active in the office. Buddies can also help employees understand their jobs better and can assist them in case they get stuck somewhere.
Last but not least, make sure you get feedback from the employee about how things have been going for them. Also ask their manager and peers how they have fitted in. A new employee (onboarding) or a recently promoted employee (crossboarding) shouldn’t find themselves clueless on the first day of their new role.
4. Give your employees regular feedback
An important part of talent management is providing feedback. This allows you to create a channel of trust and transparency between the company and the employee. Appreciate and recognize them for a job well done (using rewards and bonuses) and help them understand how they can do better when things start to go south!
Performance reviews are widely underestimated. A person needs to know how they have been working for the past three or four months so that they can understand what they are doing right and how they can improve on the things that are going wrong. The modern workplace is far from what it used to be years ago. You need to learn to be a coach for your employees, and feedback is vital not just for new employees but all employees.
5. Map out a career path for employees
Employees need to know where their career is going over the next few years. When they don’t see any growth, their productivity declines, and they begin looking for better opportunities elsewhere. Career advancement and promotions are never a 100% guarantee, but you need to be clear with the employee about their future.
Talent management is a full-time job. Make sure your employees know what comes next in their career and allow them to see a clear picture of their future.
