Operational Excellence Depends on Cultivating Talent’s Strengths

As if the global economic situation isn’t enough to keep an executive up at night, concern abounds when you consider that only 20% of employees working at large organizations use their strengths on a daily basis. Since that poll was taken, downsizings, layoffs and restructuring have become every day occurrences. As a result, already compromised organizations now find themselves with fewer employees and the same, or even larger, amounts of business-critical work to be done – even as the majority of their employees’ capabilities remain untapped.

Globally, only 20% of employees working in large organizations we surveyed feel that their strengths come into play every day. Most bizarre of all, the longer an employee stays with an organization and the higher he climbs the traditional corporate ladder, the less likely he is to strongly agree that he is playing to his strengths. Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton, Ph.D. brought those startling results to light after The Gallup Organization polled 198,000 employees working in business units of 36 large corporations. The pair later expounded on the survey results in their breakthrough tome, “Now, Discover Your Strengths.”

Survey respondents who “strongly” agreed with the statement that they were working from their strengths produced improved results over those who did not work from their strengths, according to the poll. Consider these poll results:

• 50% of the employees’ business units experienced lower employee turnover;
• 38% were more likely to work in the organizations’ more productive business units; and
• 44% of their operations posted higher customer satisfaction scores.

How well can your company compete with a staff working at 20% of its true capacity? If your answer is “Not very well,” now is an optimal time to turn to a proven human resources approach that leverages each individual’s strengths to create high performance teams. In competitive global markets, mining the massive opportunity buried in the 80% of unused strength-based capacity can mean the difference between survival and market dominance.

Precision-Based Team Building

One approach to achieving more with fewer employees centers on precision-based team building – an innovative effort that creates strength-based working units. Precision teaming takes into account the strengths and weaknesses of each employee before creating the working unit.

This approach flies in the face of  “traditional” human resources utilization which often spends the majority of HR staff’s time addressing the weaknesses of so-called “problem employees.” In precision teaming, each potential team member’s strengths and weaknesses become part of the overall team’s capabilities. Taking the precision teaming approach empowers HR executives to compensate for one team member’s weakness by selecting another team member with strength in that same area.

Literally changing employees’ brains

Creating strength-based teams not only allows each team member to come to the assignment from a strong position, it leverages the total potential power of the collaborative collective. In fact, neurological research points out, refocusing employees’ attention via strength-based teaming can actually change the molecular structure of their brains.[1] Schwartz writes, “…directed, willed mental activity can clearly and systematically alter brain function.” He explained saying, “The exertion of willful effort generates a physical force that has the power to change how the brain works and even its physical structure.”

The strength-based approach to teaming pays dividends to employees and their employers now and in the future as the employees’ brain-resident priorities are literally re-prioritized.  “Therefore, to continue to rehearse counterproductive behaviors reinforces the physical structures in the brain that create the urge toward that behavior. A strengths approach encourages individuals to focus on the correct use of their innate abilities which subsequently reorders the brain to produce behaviors indicative of excellence,” Schwartz concluded.

Preparing to create teams

Implementing strength-based teaming relies heavily on three key HR-based activities – a stringent skills assessment which looks at individual potential through a “collective-oriented” lens, aligning skilled capacity with the company’s business goals and a compensation structure that incents lateral moves.

Creating high performance teams depends on an accurate and up-to-date inventory of each employee’s strengths and weaknesses. Several automated tools for skills assessment, including but not limited to StrengthsFinder® 2.0, Halogen eLearning Manager, Oracle’s PeopleSoft Enterprise Human Capital Management and a range of inhouse-developed systems, can streamline data collection and speed analysis. Attempting to create teams with strength data only is akin to trying to complete a puzzle while missing 50% of the pieces.

Before teams can be created, Human Resources experts need to review the organization’s business goals. Knowing the direction in which the company is headed, especially in respect to product, technology and market lifecycles, is vitally important to creating productive teams. For example, if a large number of employees currently work in product areas, industry markets or technologies that are about to be “sunsetted” or phased out, that information influences redeployment decisions. Also, emerging products, markets or technologies that will need a fully staffed organization to be best positioned for success must be considered as well. The human resource expert can use the skills inventory to determine how much of the staff currently allotted to the sun setting areas can be assigned to the emerging offerings, even identifying the types of training needed to make the transition.

Compensation restructuring, the third recommended activity, plays a critical role in helping ensure a successful transition of motivated staff. Employees targeted for redeployment must see the new assignment as a reward and an opportunity to showcase their strengths. To do that, the compensation scheme must incent lateral moves with the same career enthusiasm and pay package as clear “advances” up the corporate ladder. In fact, the compensation package associated with lateral moves that enable the company to be more competitive in the marketplace may even outstrip those of “advancing” positions.

Conclusion

Armed with the employees’ collective’s skills inventory and its own expert analysis, Human Resources executives can create high performance teams that leverage employees’ strengths and compensate for individual’s weaknesses – all while helping to advance the company’s business and improve its bottom line. Aligning compensation with the company’s business goals will reward employees’ flexibility and reduce turnover, likely building long-term loyalty to the company. Tapping into the unmined 80% of true capacity that today goes unused not only benefits the company, it creates employees who are engaged in their work and look forward to the next challenge.

Diane Tuccito is currently the Director of HR Solutions for Kinetix and has over twenty- five years of HR experience, 10 of which were at the HR Executive level.   In her current role, Diane is working with companies to solve their business issues with talent solutions.  Her focus is on three main areas: Organization Design, Talent Optimization and Total Rewards.

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[1] Schwartz, J., “The mind and the brain,” New York: Harper Collins, 2002.

Tags: HR, human resources, Operational Excellence, Retention, Strengths, team building