A Skills-Based Approach to Managing Your Talent Ecosystem

When senior executives think about their greatest challenges, finding the right talent is near the top of the list. A recent study showed that more than three-quarters of employers reported having trouble finding the skills they need in the current labor market.

This means that companies need to be more resourceful than ever with the talent they have. It also means leveraging external resources where necessary to secure the talent companies need to execute on their strategies.

Balancing the differing needs of contractors and employees, while getting the most from these talented individuals, presents a next-level challenge. In too many companies, a two-tiered system emerges. Line managers are hiring and managing contractors outside of the usual processes, while traditional HR remains responsible for full-time employees. This is bound to create inefficiencies, poor communication around roles and responsibilities, and other hurdles that cost time and money.

Responding to these urgent challenges, in a recent column in Forbes, I presented a holistic vision for managing talent. The model I presented briefly in that article was skills-based. Rather than emphasizing jobs and job descriptions, this more flexible approach focuses on acquiring the skillsmanagers require, whether the talent comes from inside or outside of your company.

Aholistic and unified vision for talent management should enable your company to integrate both external and internal resources in a single framework.This framework allows employees to have the variety, the new experiences, and the growth opportunities they desire, while line managers can quickly find and access the skills they need to staff and execute projects. By definition, it also avoids the pitfall of having a two-tiered system for contractors and employees.

I outlined three elements of a holistic, skills-based framework for talent management.

1.      Companies need a database that accurately reflects the skills they have internally, and the ones they can access, often through vetted pools of contractors. These databases frequently take the form of talent marketplace platforms that connect skills managers need with the available talent (internal and external to an organization).

2.      Companies also need to treat contractors as valued members of the team. Too often there’s tension between the contractors and the employees on a team. Employees may become jealous of the flexibility contractors have regarding their hours and place of work; contractors are often left out of communications they need to do their work. Part of the solution is for companies to onboard contractors in a manner similar to their full time employees. Your managers may need coaching on how to create a unified team where everyone understands their roles and responsibilities on the team – regardless of it they are a permanent employee or contractor.

3.      Finally, however you accomplish it, companies should find a way to create a single system of oversight for both employees and contractors not just at the team level, but at the larger corporate level as well. Don’t allow line managers to do an end run around HR, creating their own pool of contractors outside of the usual channels. To do so is to miss a big opportunity to leverage the complete system of talent you have across your enterprise. It’s the opposite of a strategic, holistic approach to HR.  

The key to this unified vision is to foster internal talent mobility, including the ability of employees to opt-in to projects that interest them without sacrificing their full-time roles. Internal talent mobility is the secret sauce that opens up high levels of employee engagement and retention,while enabling organizational agility.

Among other benefits, a unified vision for talent management helps companies respond to unexpected crises like the 2020-2021 pandemic because you have, through your internal skills database, access to all of the skills present in your organization, as well as an understanding of where to go to access the talent you cannot find internally.You can then assign people with the required skills to projects flexibly, on an as needed basis, to accelerate execution and encourage learning across your organization.

You can read a bit more about having a holistic vision for your talent strategy in this Forbes piece.