Every week, I review blogs that cover talent development to find you the pick of the lot for the week. In this post, you’ll find pointers to pieces about talent intelligence, metrics, a defense of the performance review, and ten ways to make a performance review meaningful.
From HRM Today: Talent Intelligence
“Among the excellent essays in The Economist’s special report on Managing Information is one titled Data, data everywhere. And a Talent Management magazine article smartly implores us to Put Data to Work. But a Taleo Research survey found US HR and Line of Business executives are not receiving access to talent management data that ensures they have the right talent to meet their ever changing business challenges. In fact, LinkedIn and Facebook probably offer more information about a company’s talent assets than their HR technology systems have today.”
Wally’s Comment: What do you know about your talent management activities? What would you like to know? In this post, Alice Snell, suggests her firm’s research suggests that the gap is pretty wide and that HR could be the problem.
From HR Examiner: Thinking About Measurement
“The old saw goes “What gets measured gets managed.†That is the simplest way to describe the fundamental workings of management as a discipline. Here, at the dawn of truly strategic Human Capital function, we are often surprised at the degree to which people want to argue about measurement systems.”
Wally’s Comment: John Sumser comes at measurement from a different direction. He points out that there is no perfect system, but that good measurement can still help improve performance. And in disciplines like HR that really haven’t embraced measurement in a strategic way, the first companies to use metrics effectively will reap a big benefit.
From Compensation Cafe: In Defense of the (Insidious) Performance Review. I Think.
“So it’s time to kill the performance review. Again.”
Wally’s Comment: Compensation consultant Ann Bares takes aim at Sam Culbert and his “throw out the performance review” recommendations. Her language is polite, but the question she asks is important. Even if you concede that Professor Culbert is right in his description of the current state of performance evaluations, do his recommendations make sense?
My take is that you can’t fix performance appraisals unless you first create a system that does a better job of selecting, training and supporting supervisors. Then you’ll get a good job of coaching, routine supervisory conversations, and good documentation.
That may work in a smaller company. But in a large one there simply has to be more structure.
My simple bottom line is this. Sam Culbert is a professor in a university. Ann Bares is a professional who spends all day every day dealing with these issues. If I’m guessing where the right answer is, my money’s on Ms. Bares.
From Winning Workplaces: 10 Ways to Make Performance Reviews Meaningful
“Winning Workplaces’ own employee engagement research shows that, at least in small businesses (which is to say, most businesses), performance reviews are no10 t only an integral part of the people practices strategy, but they’re delivering results.”
Wally’s Comment: Speaking of smaller companies and performance reviews, here’s a post about how ten smaller companies are doing good things with performance appraisals.
