Talent Management in a Downturn Economy

By Michel Buffet & Joanna Rock

The turbulence and uncertainty that characterize today’s business and economic environment is forcing organizations and their leaders to manage two opposite forces: reducing costs in any way possible and making significant investment in resources (talent included) both to stay afloat and also to build for longer term viability and growth. One key implication for internal Talent Management professionals is a stronger imperative for working in close partnership with leadership on the following set of priorities:

Reassess
First, Talent Management professionals have to equip senior leadership with the data they need to manage priorities and make key decisions. To achieve this objective, they must:

• Lead the charge on identifying the critical competencies needed to not only survive the crisis, but also maintain healthy performance and prepare for future growth.
• Engage stakeholders in defining competencies, analyzing current and potential talent, and linking back to the core business activities.
• Work with their business partners to decide which activities and competencies need to remain in the organization or be shared between business units or geographies. This implies that Talent management inevitably connects to organizational design considerations and requires that Talent Management professionals collaborate effectively with their colleagues in OD and Strategic Planning departments.

Rebuild
The current economic crisis is in fact a unique opportunity for Talent Management professionals to show their unique value and to win - or to further establish – their place at the leadership table. Beyond working to define and evaluate talent, Talent Management professionals must play a role in the transformation and rebuilding of the organization. To achieve this transformation three key activities are necessary:

• Recruitment. Periods of economic turbulence create opportunities to pick up talent that may otherwise be out of reach in times of greater stability. For some organizations for example, it may be the right time to recruit specialists in finance and strategy coming from investment banking or consulting. These executives, hired from industries most impacted by the crisis, would enrich the strategic function of the company or upgrade talent across the board - particularly at the more senior leadership level.
• Transformation. Talent Management professionals must be active members on transformation teams so that their thinking is factored in when opportunities for mergers, acquisitions, alliances, outsourcing contracts are being discussed. Talent Management must be able to provide to leadership a clear Talent Map for each stage of the value chain.
• Engagement. We can’t stress enough the importance that effective internal and external communications play in times of crisis. Communications must simultaneously be honest and coherent. Talent Management professionals have an integrator role to play in bringing together their colleagues from Corporate Communication and from Learning and Development to ensure that solutions are proposed that guarantee good levels of information and engagement. Among these solutions, social networking tools are garnering greater attention as they can help decentralize information, encourage initiative and innovation, and transform the “social contract” between employees and their organization. Organizations are also well-advised to turn to innovative recognition solutions to keep employees positive about their role and their future in the organization. Last, we can’t ignore the importance of dealing with employees being let go in a fair and respectful fashion. Reputation is the most treasured possession individuals and organizations can enjoy and there is nothing like a botched wave of layoffs to leave an organization with an unsightly public image.

Re-Invent
While these times are quite challenging, there is a silver lining. The current downturn provides another opportunity for organizations and their leaders to look for deep paradigm shifts. Organizations have to reevaluate their vision and their relevance in the context of our “hotter, flatter, more crowded” world - as Thomas Friedman would describe it. The capacity to reinvent is paramount to the ability to survive:

• Talent Management Professionals must find their place at the table and propose coherent strategies, aligned not only with the organization’s change efforts but also with the critical forces shaping the environment - economic, demographic, and technological.
• Graduate programs geared to develop Talent Management professionals must encourage a diversity in experiences, propose a business savvy curriculum if they seriously intend on providing to their graduates desirable career opportunities.
• Talent Management professionals must continue to sharpen their knowledge and their functional experiences and embrace the idea that their career trajectory could take them beyond Talent Management or Human Resources towards operational and management roles.