C
Comment | Catalyst
Where are all the best people, inside or outside?
A
s the world accelerates,
digitises and becomes
more dependent on
artificial intelligence,
the search for the best
talent becomes ever-more intense.
But the age-old problem of whether
talent is better home-grown and
developed in a bespoke way to meet the
company’s needs or recruited quickly
and disruptively to inject fresh thinking
just changed.
The problem has changed because
people now recognise that it can never
be solved. Why? Because it’s not actually
a problem, it’s a polarity. Polarities
exist where there are two apparently
contradictory positions that are actually
dependent on each other.
The internal development or
external hiring debate is not the
only polarity in business. You will be
familiar with discussions about whether
authority should be centralised or
delegated to a local geography; whether
the company needs to be more team
or more individual focused; the cost-
quality debate; the revenue-margin
conundrum. The list of polarities is
endless. Most companies perpetually
lurch from one pole to the other in a
‘polarity-two-step’ as leaders or minds
change. What is really required is to
unlock the best of both worlds and build
a system where the debate is around the
balance point between poles rather than
either/or. To unlock the best of both
worlds, we must identify the upsides
and downsides of both poles.
We must also change how we
see internal talent development,
distinguishing three types of
development: technical capability or job-
related skills, interpersonal capability
and leadership capability. The first
is a matter of technical training; the
second involves developing soft skills,
and the third requires leaders to mature
as human beings. All three should be
assessed separately.
The failure to differentiate and
properly measure these three radically
different capabilities is also the reason
why external hires fail. If we recognise
that an individual’s technical ability in
the objective world of ‘doing’ or ‘it’ must
be measured and developed separately
from their interpersonal abilities in the
world of ‘relating’ or ‘we’ – which, in
turn, must be measured and developed
separately from their leadership
capabilities in the world of ‘being’ or ‘I’
– we can balance the internal/external
talent polarity more effectively.
Developing the internal talent pool’s
‘I, we and it’ capability takes time. In
contrast, the issue with external
talent recruitment is not time but
measurement. Measuring capabilities
in these three different dimensions, —
I, we and it — requires a new approach
to talent assessment. Most companies
take a descriptive approach to assessing
talent. As fascinating as personality
profiling and strength-finding
assessments can be, they cannot predict
whether the new hire will succeed. What
is required is developmental assessment
that quantifies the sophistication of all
three capabilities.
So, understanding that this issue
is a polarity not a problem and that
it requires a new, multidimensional
development and assessment approach
will resolve the debate and deliver the
breakthrough organisations need to
succeed now and well into the future.
Dr Alan Watkins is CEO and founder
of Complete Coherence.
Alan Watkins
“Polarities exist where there are two apparently
contradictory positions that are actually
dependent on each other”
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