| | August 2021MANAGEHRMAGAZINE.COM8In MyOpinionRemind me...what's the core purpose of a talent and development function in your organization? If there is any hesitation, then let's be clear: We are in the performance business. To unpick that a little--we put the right people with right experience and capability in the right place, at the right time. And at the same time, we nurture an ethical, collaborative and agile culture which consistently delivers optimal performance results, through intolerance of anything else.Being accountable for performance outcomes in the real world, which we don't wholly control, is what our operational colleagues do every day, why should we be different?The COVID Catalyst: Where were we before the Pandemic? I hardly need answer this, as every one of us experienced it. The menu of topics, live, virtual or online, curated into module programs, sometimes a wish list for leaders to pick from, sometimes a tick box of competencies from "the framework".But they are largely without real world performance metrics or objectives. (learning outcomes don't count, they really don't!) I created my fair share of these programs over the decades, and organizations like the CIPD, ATD, and top business schools trained me through instructional design to do just that. Unfortunately, this isn't particularly effective.So what's the problem? Simply, we've been asking the wrong questions. When we look to identify learning needs, we create learning objectives and design learning solutions, to reach learning outcomes. That is a mistake and an entirely false flag of success. Takeaway #1 ­ No-one in your business cares about learning outcomes.Let it go. Stop pretending that this is any measurement of success in the real world. If you are teaching a Year 5 school class, certainly it does. But if you are supporting a business for sustainable success, it isn't. See Above: We are not in the learning business."No problem" you say? "We develop our people against a strongly researched leadership competency framework, with weighted core competencies for success." Takeaway #2 ­ Competency doesn't equal performance.Our organizations are full of people who "CAN" do it. Even if your competency mapping is weighted perfectly for your business model and diverse operating landscape (Which I suspect it isn't. It's understandably far too generic to be focused in large companies). THE COVID CATALYST: THE SUPPORT MECHANISM MODEL FOR LEADERSHIP PERFORMANCE AND DEVELOPMENT By Dr. Adrian Waite, META Head of Talent, Leadership and Organizational Effectiveness, Boehringer-IngelheimPre - PandemicPandemic ReactionDr. Adrian Waite
< Page 7 | Page 9 >