SPOTLIGHT
The New Rules of Talent Management
Agile isn’t just for tech anymore—it’s transforming how organizations hire, develop, and manage their people. This package provides a guide to the transition.
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HR Goes Agile
Companies’ core businesses and functions have largely replaced long-range planning models with methods that allow them to adapt and innovate more quickly. HR departments are starting to use agile talent practices to reflect and support what the rest of the organization is doing. In a sense, they are going “agile lite”—adopting the general principles but not all the protocols from the tech world.
In this article Wharton’s Peter Cappelli and NYU’s Anna Tavis discuss the profound changes companies are making in six critical areas. Annual performance appraisals are in many cases the first traditional practice to go. As employees work on shorter-term projects, often run by different leaders and organized around teams, companies are recognizing that workers need more-immediate feedback throughout the year so that they can “course-correct” mistakes, improve performance, and learn through iteration.
Coaching is another key item: getting managers to move from judging employees to helping them develop day to day. Teams, rather than individuals,
are the focus now that work is increasingly organized project by project, and this means that organizations must contend with multidirectional feedback, give decision rights to the front lines, and handle more-complicated team dynamics. Compensation is changing as well: Some companies are switching to spot bonuses, while others are dropping bonuses altogether and adjusting salaries much more frequently according to changes in performance and market rates. Recruiting has become faster and nimbler, and new learning and development practices help employees identify and access the skills and training they need to advance.
HR has not had to change in recent decades nearly as much as have the line operations it supports. But now the pressure is on, and organizations from
IBM to Regeneron Pharmaceuticals to the Bank of Montreal are paving the way.
HBR Reprint R1802B
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managing people
Better Brainstorming
Hal Gregersen | page 070
Great innovators have long known that the secret to unlocking a better answer is to ask a better question. Applying that insight to brainstorming exercises can vastly improve the search for new ideas—especially when a team is feeling stuck. Brainstorming for questions, rather than answers, helps you avoid group dynamics that often stifle voices, and it lets you reframe problems in ways that spur breakthrough thinking.
After testing this approach with hundreds of organizations, MIT’s Hal Gregersen has developed it into a methodology: Start by selecting a problem that matters. Invite a small group to help you consider it, and in just two minutes describe it at a high level so that you don’t constrain the group’s thinking. Make it clear that people can contribute only questions and that no preambles or justifications are allowed. Then, set the clock for four minutes, and generate as many questions as you can in that time, aiming to produce at least 15. Afterward, study the questions generated, looking for those that challenge your assumptions and provide new angles on your problem. If you commit to actively pursuing at least one of these, chances are, you’ll break open a new pathway to unexpected solutions.
HBR Reprint R1802C
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governance
How to be a good board chair
Stanislav Shekshnia | page 088
The majority of board chairs are former CEOs, who are used to calling the shots and being stars. So it’s no surprise that many start behaving as if they are alternative chief executives of their firms. That sows conflict and confusion at the top. In addition, as research by INSEAD’s Corporate Governance Centre shows, the two jobs are distinctly different—and so are the skills needed in them. The chair leads the board, not the company, and that means being a facilitator of effective group discussions, not a team commander.
After surveying 200 board chairs and interviewing 140 chairs, directors, shareholders, and CEOs, INSEAD has distilled the requirements for the chair’s role down to eight principles: (1) Be the guide on the side; show restraint and leave room for others. (2) Practice teaming—not team building. (3) Own the prep work; a big part of the job is preparing the board’s agenda and briefings. (4) Take committees seriously; most of the board’s work is done in them. (5) Remain impartial. (6) Measure the board’s effectiveness by its inputs, not its outputs. (7) Don’t be the CEO’s boss. (8) Be a representative with shareholders, not a player. While many executives need to shift gears and mindsets to follow these, successful chairs say the effort pays off.
HBR Reprint R1802G
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Risk Management
Why Compliance Programs Fail
Hui Chen and Eugene Soltes | page 100
Firms spend millions of dollars annually on whistle-blower hotlines, training, and other efforts to ensure adherence to laws, regulations, and company policies. Yet malfeasance remains entrenched in the corporate world. Why? Too many firms treat compliance as a box-checking exercise, making employees sit through training and attest that they understand the rules, but failing to assess the effectiveness of their compliance programs, or doing so with faulty metrics.
The authors explain how we reached this sorry state—and how we can remedy it. Firms should start by linking compliance initiatives more closely to specific objectives: preventing misconduct, detecting it, or aligning policies with laws and regulations. Then, using careful model design and some creativity, firms can develop better metrics to measure what’s working and what isn’t.
HBR Reprint R1802J