4 Keys to Keeping Talent Up to Date

The Current Situation
For those charged with keeping their organization’s talent up to date, the current situation is daunting.  Trying to maintain a talent base that is ready and able to take on rapidly changing challenges is a monumental task – and yet more important than ever to the success of your company.  Just ask Amazon who just committed $700 million to retrain one-third of its workforce in new skills by 2025.

Talent managers need to develop talent management strategies that figure out how to “reskill” and “upskill” employees shoved aside by automation and other advances.  One report claims that this group of workers accounts for almost 66% of current headcount. On average, two-thirds of today’s employees will experience a substantial shift in their job profiles over the next five years. And that doesn’t begin to count the numbers of new jobs needed to meet marketplace demand.

The Goal
For companies that rely on their people to succeed, business results depend getting the right people with the right capabilities in the right positions to consistently perform. You need to be able to attract, engage, retain, and develop a workforce that is up to what is required.

4 Keys to Keeping Talent Up to Date
As we see it, there are four keys to succeeding at talent management in today’s ever shifting job market:

1. You Need to Prioritize Talent
   Managing talent today is both important and complex. As a result, the time required by leaders to handle talent demands has greatly increased while the time to deploy talent where it’s needed has greatly decreased. Leaders need to get involved in the careers of their employees so they can provide development plans, shift resources, and recruit top talent.
2. You Need to Be Agile
   Change is a constant. The best leaders don’t run away from change but are ready to embrace change.  They need to adapt and quickly.  The slower you are to recognize a shift in talent requirements and to plan new ways to accommodate the change, the less able you are to stay ahead of your competition.
3. You Need to Rely More on Cross-Functional Teams
   Teams that work well together complement each other’s strengths. The group’s overall effectiveness is greater than the efforts of the individual parts.  When you’re looking to increase performance, use teams to enhance collaboration, communication, and performance.
4. You Need to Instill a Sense of Purpose
   Employees who understand the purpose of their jobs are more engaged and more willing to find better ways of doing things. Aligned employees are also more ready to take on new challenges like retraining for a job with a future so that they stay relevant and productive.

The Bottom Line
It is harder than ever to keep your talent prepared for changing job requirements.  Are you doing what you need to do to keep your people as your competitive advantage?

To learn more about keeping talent up to date, download The 3 Surprising Ingredients for Talent Management Success