What are the 'standard features' that any talent management system should have?

I could post a laundry list of features from an RFP, but businesses / people want solutions not features. No two businesses have the same requirements. Take the time to set goals, prioritize a list of needs/wants, structure your solution around top priorities.

Joseph pointed to the main features or modules that can make up a TMS.

1. Talent Acquisition
2. Compensation & Retention / Analysis
3. Performance Tracking / Analysis
4. Human Capital Goal-Gap Analysis
5. Learning & Development
6. Succession Planning

In the real world, implementing change at these levels takes more than software. It requires a long-term commitment from the top to evaluate and revise their culture. Investments in training and retention have proven ROI, but may not be right for all businesses.

The best method may be to focus on Talent Acquisition. Selecting the best people using a sound and legal process will help build the internal Talent worthy of additional capital investment (training and development).

Aaron is correct; "The best method may be to focus on Talent Acquisition. Selecting the best people using a sound and legal process will help build the internal Talent worthy of additional capital investment (training and development)."

My only concern is that when we use the phrase "the best people" too many readers presume it means "the best applicants." The best people to hire are the best applicants about 20% of the time. If hiring managers want to increase their employee selection successes, they need to look at the top applicants who were not hired by measuring their talent. Talent is not found on resumes, transcripts or interview notes. Talent must be measured and it must be hired since it cannot be increased or imparted after the hire.

An effective talent measurement program will make significant positive impacts on items 1, 2, 3, 5 and 6, see Aaron's list above.

Executives need to...
1. Define talent
2. Decide how to measure talent
3. Uncover the talent demanded by each position
4. Hire competent job applicant who also have a talent for their jobs
5. Manage all employees well.

Items 1 to 4 (talent acquisition) are easy to do and are inexpensive compared to the cost of not doing it. Item 5 is the hardest item to accomplish since it requires executives, managers, and supervisors to improve their own behaviors.

Amazing, not one word about motivation, finding out what type of environment excites people and drives them to excel of their own volition.

Mark W. Ellis

Joseph, is talent another word for skills?

Aaron, very good points. Single focused 'point' solutions are available and can fit the needs of many organizations not needing a fully integrated TMS.

Bob, I did get carried away a bit with the word 'talent', so I revised some points below:

(3) Performance management to track & monitor performance of the talent (personnel) in the positions filled and make sure they grow in the assigned roles and desired growth positions
(4) Goals, aligned with performance, of the organization & the talent (skills) required
(5) Learning & Development to make sure previous skills attained and certifications are tracked as well as upward mobility paths.
(6) Succession Management is essential for tracking all talent (personnel) & especially key players to make sure you are staffed to back fill positions
All of these 'features' should be designed, integrated & aligned with your corporate objectives by providing 'actionable data' to help drive the talent management process.

Joseph I know what you mean about getting carried away. If talent means employees and/or skills, do we need all three words? In my business employee, skills and talent have distinct meanings that help explain job performance. Competence (KSAs) may be the King of job performance but talent is the King's Queen and together they rule job performance. For unskilled positions I'd rather hire for talent and train. For skilled positions I would still like to hire for talent but if there is no time or budget for training I'd hire for competence with an eye to not hiring skilled people who have a poor talent for the job--these are the future bad hires but they are not bad people.

Thanks for an interesting exchange.

Bob, as you can tell, I do not have the depth of experience or knowledge as others have, nor have I ever been a true practitioner, in the area of TMS.
Thanks for your comments, insight, and I love the exchange from experts in this forum.

Bob, great point.

The needs of the business should overlap with the competencies, experience, and personality of the employee or candidate like a venn diagram. Somewhere in the middle is a mix that can be compared to an ideal model established through job analysis and research (per job category).

Thanks Joseph.

Aaron, thanks.

"Somewhere in the middle is a mix that can be compared to an ideal model established through job analysis and research (per job category)."

I agree, and that is what we call job matching--successful employees are found at the intersection of Company Fit, Skills Match and Job Fit. Most hiring managers hire from the intersection of Company Fit and Skills Match thus they hire some employees (20%) with job fit but most without job fit (80%).

See "Article D" in "Section VII Articles" of the "Bliss Gately Tool, Business Costs and Impacts of Turnover Excel Workbook, Instructions and Owner’s Manual" at
"www.hermangroup.com/BlissGately_OwnerManual.pdf"

By the way some people say the "Bliss-Gately Tool" is the best method for calculating the cost of turnover.

Hello Mark, hiring for talent is all about hiring people who are motivated by the job.

Why hire anyone who is not motivated to do their job?

Perhaps I was not clear enough--competent employees who also have a good or better fit for their job are motivated by their job.

Motivation is a component of personality. Just like the other pieces mentioned, motivation should be a fit for the job. Motivation is dynamic unlike other personality traits. We have all seen new hires strong out of the gate, that ween as they gain seniority. Here is a generic sales personality profile:

A generic salesperson should be motivated by personal accomplishments (self-starter), more extroverted (social), and have good character (honest).

Good motivation absent the social and character in this example, you would not be a good fit. Even when personality fits, they need the unique competencies and qualifications required for that job in order to be an ideal fit. The trend of hiring persons with relevant industry specific experience is unquestionable.

Strong business cases can be made to start with jobs/categories with high-turnover, high-risk, high training cost, and small talent-pools. These positions offer the opportunity for fast, measurable savings (training, loss prevention) and long-term talent management (decreased turn-over, succession, performance).

May I add a few more words on Skills. I agree with the point Joseph added on skills: Learning & Development to make sure previous skills attained and certifications are tracked as well as upward mobility paths.

May I also suggest that a Skills Inventory may (depending on the nature of the business and job type) be of value to an organization. A skills inventory attempts to categorize who has what skills. This data is then aggregated and summarized based on the nature of the organization (branch, region, area, country, etc) and skill gaps can be determined.

Skill gaps can be used in 2 ways..either for hiring purposes (what skills are needed and where) or for planning training that is needed.

If you are interested in the idea of a skills inventory, I wrote a blog post on what it is and how you might set one up at http://bit.ly/9y8r3Q.

Hi Frank,
Great question with, as you can see, many answers!
It really depends on what you and your company determine the needs to be.

I agree with Aaron Lintz's post:

I could post a laundry list of features from an RFP, but businesses / people want solutions not features. No two businesses have the same requirements. Take the time to set goals, prioritize a list of needs/wants, structure your solution around top priorities.

Determine what's most important, and how (or if) it will integrate with other systems. Also, something else that's not been mentioned thus far -- during the discovery process, who have you had the best interactions with? Who has made you laugh as well as provide answers to your questions without avoiding them? As you know, this will be who you are working with in the future, and personally I'd like to work with those I interact with best.

Mark:

Motivation is more or less an intangible. It is a variable that intersects personality and life issues. With internal candidates there is a strong correlation to organizational culture and competency. It is more difficult to quantify when it comes to external hires. I would suggest that an analysis of motivation can be made based on measurable performance, coupled with 360 degree feedback from peers and direct reports.

The talent method we use compares qualified to be hired job applicants to long-term successful employees who are the Top Performers (TP). We also compare job applicants to the Bottom Performers (BP) and the Average Performers (AP). Our talent method shows if an applicant can learn and do the job as required, how they will do the job, and if they are interested in doing the job. Employers should hire qualified to be hired applicants who are like their TPs, not hire those like their BPs, and be careful if hiring APs is necessary.

A talent measurement method should be included.