The Strategic Employer

Why do some companies keep a ‘C” player in an “A’  player’s job?

We see two reasons why this happens.  Some of it has to do with the pain and anguish of letting an employee go and hiring another.  The bigger reason  is that  companies don’t  understand what the ‘A’ player looks like.

Everyone agrees that removing a manager or staff person is unpleasant.  It can be less painful to just deal with the inefficiency than it is to change the situation.  The problem simply becomes a condition of the work environment -  “that’s just the way it is”.It’s not the best solution, but it is more common than most people realize.

While less painful, it’s a real drain  on company profitability and competitive edge.  The sad part about this is that unless the company has a strategic vision for their ‘A’ level talent, they never fully understand  scope of this impact.  ‘C’ players are often kept around because no one really understands who should be in the job.  They don’t know what a successful ’A’ player would look like. 

This is especially true if they are still using a job description  as their guide.  A better approach would be to profile the job, develop a clear picture of an ‘A’ player, benchmark it against other successful people in the same or similar job, and hire based on these results.

If employers become strategic in this fashion they can correct inefficient staff and, more importantly, avoid the same hiring mistake in the future.

The only downside to completing a job analysis is that it will take time to complete it properly and, if objectivity is truly desired, there will be a fee to an outside firm.

The upside, however, far outweighs the downside. For instance, when a proper job analysis is completed you’ll find these benefits…
1) Near perfect candidate matches
2) Faster start for new hires
3) Reduced turnover
4) Reduced hiring costs
5) Significant improvement in the ROI of your talent dollars

Many organizations still use job descriptions and believe this is a substitute for a real job analysis. Strategic employers have moved on from the traditional job description and embrace the value of the job analysis tool.

Many of our corporate clients ask how they can get all the generations working together and maximizing their human capital potential.

One of the most effective and creative ways is  to create cross-generational teams .  There are two benefits to using this approach.  First, team members develop a greater appreciation for the power and perspective of the other generations.  Second, each generation will approach the problem from different aspects.  Their unique experiences will suggest possible solutions that might not be considered outside of a single generational perspective.

Managers will need to create these teams carefully.  There are certain ideal generational pairings that foster tremendous synergy.  Other parings will take more thought and guidance to be productive. For instance, you’ll want to pair Millennials with the Veteran generation.  The Millennials see the value in the knowledge of this older generation and the Veterans enjoy the mentoring aspect of the relationship.

Here is a very informative article from AMA.  We hear this often from people who contact us to look for new careers.  They have had it and don’t want to deal with a workplace that refuses to address this issue.

There are three ways, however, to keep top talent in your company and away from a recruiter’s desk:

1) Do a comprehensive role analysis of the jobs you ask top talent to perform.

2) Benchmark job success against the top performers.

3) Either retain or rehire the right people in these jobs based on #2 and #3 above.

Here’s the article:  http://www.amanet.org/training/articles/Coping-with-Ghost-Work.aspx?pcode=XCRP