Posts Tagged ‘talent management’
John Elway for Manager of the Year? March 21 2012 7 responses
While fans of Tim Tebow will likely vehemently disagree, I’d have to put John Elway, executive vice president of football operations for the Denver Broncos, in the running for manager of the year. And not just NFL manager of the year; anybody’s manager of the year. Let me be the first to acknowledge that I enjoyed Tebowmania and Tebow Time as much as anyone. As I wrote here during football season, I thought Tebow and his coach Jon Fox did a masterful job of figuring out how to use his skillset to maximum advantage. For most of their run together, Elway came across as the wet blanket at the party. He was polite but sparing in his praise for Tebow because he couldn’t see a long-term plan for winning with the guy. Elway may have been right or wrong on that call. We won’t know how it plays out for the Broncos on that front because Elway went out and got himself Peyton Manning this week.
In moving Tebow aside for Manning, Elway did what a lot of managers have to do or at least should do. In his assessment, he had a good guy working for him that he didn’t think was going to work out over the long run. Especially with the pressure from Tebow fans in Denver and across the country, it would have been easy for Elway to keep Tim, let it ride and see what happened. After all, things could get better. (How many times have you heard that in performance management discussions?) Instead, Elway decided to make the move and go out and get the best quarterback available for his team.
Here are three lessons from Elway that I think managers should keep in mind for the next time they face a talent management dilemma:
3 Ways to Avoid Taking the Wrong Job — and What to Do About It When You Do January 11 2012 3 responses
You may have missed the story with all of the coverage on the New Hampshire primary, but White House chief of staff, Bill Daley, resigned this week after just about a year on the job. Daley is a high profile example of the oft cited statistic that anywhere between 25% and 40% of newly hired or promoted executives don’t last in their jobs for more than 18 months.
As it happens, a senior executive friend of mine recently let me know that she had left a new job less than three weeks after accepting it. Now, that’s fast! Intrigued by her news, I asked her if I could interview her for the Next Level Blog to learn more about what she thinks she missed during the hiring process, how she figured out so quickly that she had taken the wrong job and how she gracefully extracted herself from it.
Obviously, to protect her confidentiality I’m not going to get into all of the details of her situation, but there are some good lessons here for any manager or executive who’s considering taking a new job:
What Do People Want From Work? January 9 2012 11 responses
Other than the basic requirements – food, shelter, health care – on the hierarchy of needs, what do people really want from their jobs?
Last week I attended a presentation from Peter Cappelli, a Wharton professor and thought leader on talent management, where he addressed that question. Based on a study he cited, these are the top five things that a large group of people say they want from their work:
1. Friendly environment
2. Chance to use my skills
3. Chance to do something worthwhile
4. Feeling respected by coworkers
5. The opportunity to learn something new
Is there anything on the list that’s really that surprising? If you stop and think about it, you probably want those things from your own work.
Here’s the catch on the data that Cappelli shared. He presented it in the content of a talk on managing the older generation of workers and the data comes from a study that AARP conducted on what older workers want.
Is the list really that different that what workers of any age would want? My experience and observations tell me no. People want to work in an environment where they feel respected and appreciated, where they can learn and do their best work.
What does your experience tell you? What’s on your short list of the most important things that leaders can do to create a place where people want to work?
Scott Eblin is an executive coach, speaker and author of 
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