Archive for Article

Above the Fray: What We Know About How WFH and Hybrid Affect Work

The pandemic created a fundamental shift in where people work, followed by incendiary disagreements about the tradeoffs of where people work. Those fires have been further fanned by popular media, business media, anti-business media, social media, TikTok, surveys and academic advocates. What’s been lacking is a fact-based discussion…

The Success Model: What Your Executives Want you to Know

It’s the first morning of your new job. You’re excited because you’ve been selected to have coffee with the CEO to ask questions about the company. She has a reputation as being straightforward and a bit impatient, so you’ve thoroughly prepared for this conversation. The barista hands you…

The Worst Doctor at Harvard Medical School

Each year’s Harvard Medical School graduating class includes one doctor who is ranked at the bottom of their class. To be clear, this individual was the absolute worst performer in their four years at this highly esteemed institution. Every other Harvard Medical School graduate that year had performed…

The Accountability Ladder

We celebrate the progress that companies have made in talent management over the last 15 years. CEOs and Boards now better understand the value of high quality talent. CHROs have built-out talent practices and the talent-building capabilities of their HR team. Yet despite that progress, even the most…

Why the Fake You will Outperform the Authentic You (and how to fake it)

At least once a month, I show a decidedly fake version of myself to very important people who have paid handsomely for my services. The fake me may show up in a client meeting, an executive education session or during an important speech. My clients don’t know that…

2024 Global Human Resources Census

The Top Line: Five Key Findings from our 2024 survey Our 2024 Global HR Census finds that a curious dichotomy describes those in the HR field.HR leaders show up as highly engaged.Many are willing to sacrifice to achieve their career goals. They care deeply about developing people and…

4 Secrets to Better Talent Reviews:
A People Manager’s Guide

If you believe that better quality talent delivers better results, then you should want as much great talent on your team as quickly as you can get it. A well-run talent review is the surest, shortest path to make that happen. Unfortunately, leaders don’t always get the benefits…

Is the Juice Worth the Squeeze?
Questions About Becoming a Skills-based Organization

Preface Dear Reader: I apologize for writing such a long report. What you’ll read in this report started with an article idea about skills-based environments. The idea was spurred by the increasing promotion of the concept by vendors and consultants and the early corporate initiatives I had heard…

Conundrums in Predicting an Employee’s “Potential”

At a recent dinner, a client steered the topic towards assessing the potential of talent. She asked me to share my insights on predicting the leadership potential of employees (defined as the ability to build and lead teams of increased scope and complexity to outperform the competition), to…

Two Talent Metrics Matter Most

There are two questions that we ask in our early conversations with clients. Their answers provide us with deep insights about their ability to add value through talent. They also instantly diagnose which talent practices need more attention. The two questions are: 1. Is your organization able to…