Canadian HR Reporter

Canadian HR RepoRteR december 15, 2014 INsIGht 23 The toughest challenges facing human resources departments Talent management concerns include succession planning, leadership development Question: what do you consider to be some of the most challenging human resources issues faced by canadian em- ployers? Are there any potential solu- tions to those challenges? Answer: Some of the biggest HR challenges faced by employers in Canada today fall under the tal- ent management umbrella. ese relate to every facet of an organi- zation's talent management strat- egies and programs — specifically the acquisition, onboarding, en- gagement, development, promo- tion and retention of an organiza- tion's talent. When people hear the word "talent," they frequently think of individuals with certain unique or special innate skills or abili- ties such as artists, musicians and elite athletes. However, every- one possesses unique knowledge and abilities, and organizations are increasingly recognizing the competitive advantage of their own workforce (hence the man- tra "Our people are our greatest assets"). e problem is many organi- zations haven't been particularly good at managing talent — par- ticularly in the wake of the reces- sion that began with the global financial crisis in 2008. While employers could get away with a haphazard approach to talent management in the past, certain economic and demographic fac- tors are going to make it impera- tive for organizations to focus on the recruitment, engagement, development and promotion of talent. e importance of succession planning Part of this relates to an aging population and the fact that the large cohort of baby boomers is starting to retire in fairly large numbers. is will result in a tre- mendous amount of personal and organizational knowledge literally walking out the door. Organizations will, therefore, need to figure out how to docu- ment and retain as much of that knowledge as possible. Appropri- ate knowledge management solu- tions will be extremely important to document that knowledge, as will coaching and mentoring. But, above all, succession planning will be key to developing the leaders of tomorrow and passing leadership knowledge from one generation to the next. e problem is many experts believe there is insufficient depth of talent or "bench strength" of new and emerging leaders ready to step into senior management positions in the near future. at situation came about because many organizations neglected succession planning and talent management over the past few years because they were operating in a "lean and mean" mode in the wake of the recession, and relying on a supply of external talent to fill vacancies for senior leadership positions. However, in a tighter labour market where it is difficult to find talent, succession planning becomes imperative. In fact, suc- cession planning is necessary in any type of labour market because it makes more sense to groom and develop talent internally so that high-potential employees can be successful when they step into senior leadership positions. Promoting from within also signals to an organization's em- ployees that their efforts are likely to be rewarded. is helps to promote enhanced employee engagement and retention, which are also important talent manage- ment concepts. Leadership development and talent acquisition Leadership development pro- grams, coaching, mentoring and other development activities such as stretch assignments, second- ments and establishing cross- functional project teams can be helpful. It is also necessary for each high-potential employee or suc- cession candidate to have an indi- vidual development plan in place to document specific training and development activities that will help make her ready to step into a senior leadership role in the rela- tively near future. Talent management, of course, also applies to talent acquisition, and there are signs many orga- nizations have been having sig- nificant challenges finding and attracting the talent they need. is has led some employers to complain about skills shortages. While there are always going to be shortages of skilled workers in certain fields and geographic regions, several studies have questioned the existence of wide- spread skills shortages in the Ca- nadian labour market. Instead, some commentators have suggested that perceived skills shortages could be the fault of employers having unre- alistic expectations and insisting on hiring only so-called "purple squirrel" candidates, while oth- ers believe unduly restrictive pa- rameters in the applicant tracking system (ATS) may be part of the problem. Indeed, such systems tend to disqualify non-traditional or "out of the box" candidates who pos- sess required skills and competen- cies — in spite of the fact they may not have had the same job title in the past or worked for a direct competitor. Employers need to be willing to consider candidates with transferable skills – espe- cially since most people will have several careers in their lifetimes. Whatever the cause, there is no question organizations are spend- ing much less on training and de- velopment these days and have placed far too much emphasis on obtaining talent externally — as opposed to growing their own. While organizations obviously prefer to hire employees who can "hit the ground running," employ- ers need to return to hiring for po- tential and cultural fit and focus on developing skills and compe- tencies internally. Brian Kreissl is the product develop- ment manager for Carswell's human resources, OH&S, payroll and records retention products and solutions. He can be reached at brian.kreissl@ thomsonreuters.com or visit www. carswell.com for more information. Brian Kreissl toughest HR Question Significant consequences for those not tackling data governance Use of data councils a key way to drive better data management, finds study If you've ever been frustrated by the quality of data management and reporting in your organization, you're far from alone. More than one-half of respon- dents to a study by the Institute for Corporate Productivity (i4cp) indicated their organization had "no method of data governance whatsoever." The study defined data gov- ernance as anything related to the handling of data in an orga- nization, including policies and processes related to data man- agement, data quality, business process management and risk management. e use of a data council to support data governance was the only method of oversight that had a correlation to improved market performance, found the research. But even among organizations that reported having a formal data governance policy, only 24 per cent of those in the high-per- formance group indicated they used councils. e findings stem from i4cp re- search into human capital analyt- ics practices featuring responses from 252 organizations. e organizations in the high- performance group, however, were three times as likely to have data councils and twice as likely to have data governance offices than their lower-performance counterparts. e study defines a data coun- cil as "a temporary collection of individuals who have various roles within an organization that come together on occasion to make decisions regarding com- pany data." A council is distinguished from a data governance office, which is a permanent structure, and a "possibly unnecessary function in smaller companies," notes i4cp. It adds that while data coun- cils require some effort to set up, they provide "the dual benefits of generating standardized rules and definitions and creating a group of people who can effectively com- municate the reasons for those rules across the organization." Although it takes work to ef- fectively address data governance, the consequences of not tackling the issue can be significant. As i4cp observes: "Creating a data governance program is relatively straightforward and the consequences of not doing so are far-reaching. e hazard exists not only for possible security breaches but also for the flawed decisions that rise from data-less (or bad-data driven) decisions." While the low-performance organizations in the study fo- cused primarily on privacy, compliance and data security, the high-performance group focused on these considerations — and a whole lot more, indicates the i4cp research. In particular, the high-perfor- mance sample put a much higher focus on considerations such as: • policies, standards, and strategy • data warehousing and business intelligence • architecture and data integration • data quality • management alignment. e high-performance organi- zations "set a secure foundation" by normalizing procedures and policies and focusing on integra- tion and data quality, notes i4cp. That "solid framework" allows these organizations to "put faith in the data" and to use it to create aligned and collaborative man- agement decisions. e report lays out worthwhile recommendations that are salient to any organization grappling with data governance issues: • Implement a governance struc- ture for human capital data to ensure better decisions are being made from cleaner, more reliable data sets. •Use data governance to make better decisions, not just for pro- tection and compliance. • Create clear rules for employ- ee data access; employee data should be accessible only on a need-to-know basis. • Designate a specific role or team to be tasked with controlling and monitoring human capital data, as well as to guard against breaches of security. Ultimately, the quality of an organization's decisions is tied to the quality of the data used to sup- port those decisions. It's hard to get a clear picture of the current state — or to make meaningful projections about the future state — when you're working with data that is inaccurate, incomplete or difficult to aggregate. Data governance isn't an easy thing to get one's arms around. But a collaborative approach that emphasizes the strategic imperative of such an undertak- ing can pave the way for better data management — and better decision-making. Claudine Kapel is principal of Kapel and Associates, a human resources consulting firm specializing in com- pensation design, performance man- agement, and employee communica- tions. Claudine is also the co-author of e HR Manager's Guide to Total Rewards and Straight Talk on Man- aging Human Resources. For ordering information, visit www.carswell.com. Claudine Kapel Guest Commentary

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