Talent Life Cycle

Talent Life Cycle is in many ways similar to a Product Life Cycle. Life Cycles help us to understand the entire end-to-end spectrum of a process from the cradle to the grave.

Necessity is the mother of all inventions and all innovations emanate from an idea that is born. I talked about it in my last post on “Globalization and birth of new talent”. The new kid on the block this time is this piece of organizational asset that I would address as “Brand You”. Tom Peters coined this term as far back as 1997 in an article titled “The Brand Called You”. He went on to author a book on the same subject “The Brand You50″.Talent Life Cycle is a management process to enhance the value of “Brand You”.

I have described Talent Life Cycle as a 3 stage process as shown above..

Talent Attraction

Brands are supposed to attract and have a value proposition that will become the compelling reason for others to follow. Great products have a great brand pull and personalization that goes with it. Similarly we have “Personal” “Brand” “Equity” as much as any other brand like Coca-Cola as Tom Peters puts it. Managing this asset should look at adding value to the “Brand You” that individuals come with. Role Modeling as a part of the brand building is a good starting point for organizations to build a value proposition for emerging talent.

Talent Development

Good products reinvent themselves and develop what the customers want. Product strategies work on version enhancements and add new value to themselves.”Brand You” also goes through the same cycle of version enhancements and development cycles to generate the next value in the life cycle. Good talent development practices roll out value boosters in the life cycle to showcase the equity that “Brand You” is building on. The impact is the same as the famous Hawthorne effect that showed a team of welders the importance of the weld in holding the space shuttle together in orbit.

Talent Engagement & Succession Planning

Products stabilize, integrate in the eco system and get recognized for the value they add.”Brand You” also integrates and transforms into the larger gamut of organizational branding which I call as”Brand Us”. At this stage the product is at its pinnacle of success.

Brands succeed when they are anchored in the environment they grow in and become synonymous with the practice itself. For e.g. the way Xerox as a brand became synonymous with photocopying. Organizations can build good to great talent management practices if they anchor the identity of “Brand You” in the work space.

Products transform to the next level of build and so does Talent. There is an EOL – “End of Life” phase for products. Talent Life Cycle also ends with a succession roadmap which helps to proactively transition an old version with a new one just as an exiting talent works toward ushering a new talent that is born and nourished to take over.

- Dheeraj