Balanced Score Card & Strategy Sessions at World HRD Congress 2015, Mumbai

The World HRD Congress has been an annual event that I have been attending for past 5 years.   Each year it seems to be getting bigger, better and brighter with several HR and Related Professions congregating in the city of Mumbai.  This year’s theme for the Congress is “Connecting Minds, Creating The Future.  The sessions would revolve around Strategic HRM, Balanced Score Card,  HR Technology, Measuring the Impact of HR Performance among others.  

This year I would be presenting experiences of my organization on Strategic HR Alignment and how the Balanced Scorecard is positioned in effective implementation of strategy.  Both the strategy and score card are two sides of the coin. One helps direction of the organization to be channelized appropriately given the context of the industry, the customer landscape and the talent availability and the other helps effectively implement the strategy. 

In simple terms BSC is a tool for strategy implementation and my session will focus on how HR has played a vital role in enabling this in a large diverse and multi geographical entity.

The congress will run from 15 to 17 Jan 2015 and you can find more details on the congress at their web site.  Click Here.

More insights on Score Card its role in strategy execution and the challenges and opportunities in later posts.

Sum of Parts or Not: Competencies in Context

You just lost the best person on your team- the champion who was most equipped with knowledge, skill and resultant capability to close a deal in one of the complicated business units at your organization.   So what way did that impact your competency as an organization.  Does individual competency affect the overall organizational competency.   Does one person carrying away vital capability make any difference to your organization.   

We often hear -  organization is bigger than individuals.  Yes that's true and it is also true that the whole is greater than the sum of parts when it comes to the organization and its employees capabilities.   However the caution for leaders is to understand that even when you deduct something  the same logic holds true.   When a specific capability (embodied in the individual) leaves the decrease is also greater than just one persons capability going away.  You can't have a one sided equation can you?

Here are three aspects that can clarify.

a) An exit of any nature is like something which rocks the boat.  Thought processes are triggered in  the discerning minds of colleagues and coworkers as to what made him / her leave,  should they follow and look for a better paying job... if he / she could get 30% more can't I get 40% more. This puts some pressure in the system that has a push effect.  There is a drag on the agility vis a vis that cumulative capability that the individual contributed to.

b) There is bound to be some kind of imbalance in the target goal or objective at hand.   It is like a relay - one person less to handle the baton - maybe you can replace the individual quickly , even before he's actually left , but what about the hours and hours of practice that went in before the final race.   This applies even to work situations.   So it has a slow down kind of impact or at least a temporary one till the capability evens out.

c) Replacement cost, effort and time to speed for building the same capability means someone has to take time out to train or coach another person.  Someone has a temporary diversion of focus towards something other than the goal at hand.  Reduced focus means reduced capability.  Can it be simpler.  

In future posts we'll explore more of the fascinating aspects of competency both individual as well as organizational level.   Other posts related to competency

Competencies: What?

What Capabilities? Change Management

Simple framework to Understand Competencies

Development Discussion: Timing Matters

Performance Management is a key process in the talent management repertoire of any organization.   If this key process is done well most of the other processes will fall in place and align beautifully.   One of the downstream processes that depends to a large extent on a robust performance management framework is the employee development process.  Some part of the learning needs comes from what was mirrored in the PMS outcomes; i.e. the areas for improvement and enhancement in the coming year based on the observed performance in context.

The problem most designers don't notice is that this key process is bound to fail if you couple the development discussion too tightly with the performance appraisal.   The best strategy would be to keep the two distinct and separated in time by what we can call as a "Cooling off Window"   The best would be to have the development discussion after a 3 to 4 month window downstream from the appraisal process itself.

That way you would avoid a lot of unwanted discussion around the gaps in the performance observed from feedback.  Normally you would notice that when it comes to the appraisal process most people get very defensive about areas of improvement and so it gets difficult to have any meaningful dialogue.  On one hand employee is defensive about improvement areas as it is tied down to appraisal scores and performance bands which ultimately determine compensation rise and other downside implications related to pay.  On the other the same points go into determining what areas could be improvement focus.

However this does not mean that you can short cut the performance appraisal and feedback. The rigor of the feedback mechanisms - timely, periodic (2 to 3 times in a window of 6 months) and context specific still holds good.

By keeping a cooling off window the two processes get done at different times.  The feedback at time of learning needs should also factor in context specific inputs given to the employees when working on their job and performing their roles.  This reinforces the inputs on improvement areas.    Combine this with multi-rater feedback where the employee is given feedback on areas to improve and areas of strength and this becomes a design synergy.   

So next time you find that people are not forthcoming and development needs identified were not relevant to the context of the employee double check if you had the cooling off window or did you try to combine the performance appraisal with the development discussion. 

Your Attitude Will Get You There....

One of Zig Ziglars famous lines goes like this…. “Your Attitude, not your aptitude determines your altitude”   How high you rise comes from how you approach things.  

Sample this…

There was a foundry foreman Jack who was supervising his workmen striking away at the sand moulding machine one morning.     A gentleman came and stood by and was observing.   The foreman said “Hi Steve,  It’s been long time I have not seen you”.  They both conversed about how they met twenty five years back at the foundry and how the technology was different then and how the foundry had only one workshop and now it had over 40 workshops across the state.

When the gentleman left one of the workmen came up to Jack and said.  “Jack, Wasn’t that our Chairman whom you just spoke to a while ago.   Is it true that both of you started work this foundry at the same time several years ago?”

“Of Course" Said the foreman,  "Both me a Steve signed up for work the same day 25 years back,  Today he’s the Chairman and I’m the foreman”. 

And he continued in the same breath…

“The only difference twenty five years back was that I came to work for the 1$ to the hour and he came to work for the foundry”

Yes, Cant’ be truer the point made by this simple narrative is that how you look at your work, your task, your role, your part in the play makes the difference in how you approach it.   You clearly see that Steve had an attitude to work very different from John.     So what Zig ZIglar said in his statement is best illustrated by the simple story.

Arise, Awake and Find Your Altitude!!! Happy New Year.

(The simple story is adapted from one used by Rob Thomas as an introductory message in a book Understanding Big Data)