Managing Human Talent in Times of High Workforce Turnover

Organizations are tested in times of crisis. Especially when the economy is afflicted by inflation, product shortages, and high workforce turnover, management is challenged.  For some companies, human resource management is an administrative process that includes recruiting, selecting, training, and rewarding. But when we talk about people management, we also have their emotions and talent development, which seeks to attract, engage and retain qualified, motivated people with the necessary skills to perform the functions of the position to achieve high performance and a productive team. 

From my experience as a learning process facilitator, I observe that the human resources department is more task and activity-oriented than people-development-oriented. This approach to personnel is the old school approach that considers them as a resource to be used and, in some cases, exploited, that is to say, to make the most of their capacity.

Talent management goes further. It seeks to identify those people with high potential within the organization, motivate them and support their growth in the company.

McKinsey & company was the first to use the term talent management in 1997. They believe that organizations with effective management programs are more likely to outperform their competitors, increase organizational performance, relocate staff, and make their employees feel good.

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However, one study indicates that only five percent of employees believe that their organization’s talent management has effectively improved company performance.

So what can organizations do about this challenge? As a business coach, I believe the solution is to develop a culture focused on their people, their “internal customers,” their needs, and expectations, and to foster the values of respect, compassion, solidarity, and efficiency. This would help increase employee satisfaction and loyalty.

High employee turnover generally results from dissatisfaction due to lack of support, growth opportunities, and in some cases, mistreatment, which manifests in negative communication towards the staff.

Our consulting firm’s organizational diagnosis measures the following variables: corporate culture, leadership power, communication, measurement and control, service strategy, selection and training, technology, and automation.

The results on talent management will allow us to measure the gap between the current situation and the desired one to identify improvement opportunities through an action plan. All activities are mapped in a matrix based on priorities and their impact on the organization.

Management must be confident that it wants to improve to achieve the desired change. It must be fully committed and be a supporting force to back up the diagnosis results and the plan’s execution.