One Page Talent Management, with a New Introduction: Eliminating Complexity, Adding Value

by Marc Effron, Miriam Ort

A radical approach to growing high-quality talent--fast

You know that winning in today's marketplace requires top-quality talent. You also know what it takes to build that talent--and you spend significant financial and human resources to make it happen. Yet somehow, your company's beautifully designed and well-benchmarked processes don't translate into the bottom-line talent depth you need. Why?

Talent management experts Marc Effron and Miriam Ort argue that companies unwittingly add layers of complexity to their talent-building models--without evaluating whether those components add any value to the overall process. Consequently, simple activities like setting employee performance goals become multipage, headache-inducing time wasters that turn managers off and fail to improve results.

Effron and Ort introduce a simple, powerful, scientifically proven approach to increase your ability to develop better leaders faster: One Page Talent Management (OPTM). Using the straightforward, easy-to-follow process described in this book, you will eliminate frustrating complexity, focus only on those components that add real value, and build transparency and accountability into every practice. Based on extensive research and experience in companies such as Avon Products, Bank of America, and Philips, One Page Talent Management shows you how to:

Quickly identify high-potential talent without complex assessments Increase the number of "ready now" successors for key roles Generate 360-degree feedback that accelerates change in the most critical behaviors Significantly reduce the time required for managers to implement talent-building processes

Do away with complexity and bureaucracy--and develop the high-quality talent you need, right now.

Genres: Business, Nonfiction, Leadership, Historical Romance, Buisness, Management

244 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2010

Reviews

[Mishari AlGhamdi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Brilliant idea. I loved how the authors criticized common-sense ideas.

[Brian Watkins · Rating 1 out of 5]

Very disappointing. At best, the concepts are an article. The arguments have many holes that pretty much make it useless. The overall concept is good, the details are weak at best.

[Margaret Dempsey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Multiple respected mentors and colleagues of mine have recommended OPTM to me for a few years, so I was eager to dig into it when my boss loaned me her copy. It did not disappoint. I’ve always harbored the feeling that my standards or expectations are unusually high, and while this book did not negate this theory, it confirmed why I have higher than average expectations. I am energized about my organization taking a deeper look at the theories presented in OPTM in order to apply them to our culture. It read more towards strategic HR professionals (which I am not), but was an easy and great read with practical advice and fact-based conclusions.

[Ryan Barretto · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent for HR professionals, at any level.

The authors have provided in depth information on how to build specific HR Systems for the organization that are simple to understand and easy to use. They have kindly provided templates to help you understand the various parameters within the process.

I particularly liked their approach towards 360 Assessment. I'm not too sure about the process they have for Performance Management, especially since ratings already cause a lot of angst among employees - based on my experience.

All in all, it was an educational read for me, and I really recommend this book.

[Jodi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great reminder of how talent management practices can easily become over complicated. Loved the design principles outlined throughout the book - especially the ruthless focus on complexity vs value add.

The chapters on talent reviews and performance management really stood out for me; esp with some of the science / advice going against well established norms ie the questionable gains of participatory goal setting btw manager and employee or the true value of self assessments when it comes to performance mgmt (hint: there’s very little).

[Jesse Tucker · Rating 4 out of 5]

The concept of this book is that most processes, reports, evaluations, etc. can be simplified to one page (or at least minimized) in order to increase comprehension, efficiency, and the likelihood of those within the organization - supervisors and managers - to find it helpful in managing their talent. Leaders should always weigh how complex something is against the value that it brings. Topics that I found helpful were SIMple goal setting, 360-degree feedback, the 9-box model (performance x potential), calibration meetings, engagement surveys, and selecting competencies.

[Jessie Lachacz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Genuinely a decent read, no more, no less. I think there were some valuable nuggets in there, and I enjoyed the focus on simplicity and adding value to every process. Sometimes I felt the book was trying to sell me on a perspective that was somewhat one-sided but ultimately, they did the research and provided a good summary of what they believe is effective. I definitely learned something and had a highlighter near by, so not a waste by any means from my perspective.

[Ana Giraldo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Comprehensive, simple and actionable.
Comprehensive because it links all the important processes of talent management.
Simple because it aims to remove complexity and all the layers/features that do not add value or demonstrate to deliver results.
Actionable because it tells you where and how to start and what to do next.

[Tres Jimenez · Rating 4 out of 5]

Useful approach for conducting efficient and simplified Talent Review conversations with your team. This is a modern approach to the classic 9-box talent reviews and it focuses on the quality of the conversation over the tool or documentation.

This book informed a 70K person company's updated talent review and succession plan process.

[Juliana · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you work at a corporation of any size, this book is a good introduction to the hows and whys of talent and performance management. I'm not an HR professional, but am a professional in the learning and training industry. I also work at a company that is is using a performance management system that was instituted for all the right reasons, but may in fact be a system that is dragging us down. I could sit around and complain about it, but I chose to educate myself about it. I have several books on this subject to read, and this is the first in the pile.

I liked this book for a couple of reasons. The authors do a great job of breaking talent management down and they make a call for simplifying it. I'm all for simplification. They also back everything they claim with the facts--real research. The authors make a call at the beginning of the book to start with the science (behavorial science) eliminate compliexity and add value. I like that. Ah, if only a few more HR pros would read and live this book.

I also learned the history of forced distribution and ranking--it was popularized by GE and Ford Motor Co. (Ford was actually sued over it). The authors claim that studies have shown it works and shows tangible results for a company. But it did make a question rise in my mind--why in the 21st century are many Fortune 500s using a 20th century performance process built for assembly lines? We don't work that way. How do you root out poor performers in a system that values creative problem-solving and not building widgets? There has to be a better way. The authors do advise that the benefits of such a program emerge in the first few years and that an organization should adjust the forced distribution over time. That is logical and makes sense. They also advise to not use labels or numerical ratings that are communicated to employees. I would really like to see more research on forced distribution.

Along the way I picked up some interesting little tidbits like:
*the more goals an individual has, the more poorly he performs on each (they suggest three)
*list goals in order of importance on perf management form
*frequent feedback builds leaders faster for course correction
*self-assessment does not work as poor performers are delusional about their performance
*everyone thinks they are a high performer--and writing a self-appraisal damages pride
*research showed that less improvement is seen when feedback becomes about the person and not a task
* and as an employee if someone gives you feedback, and then you follow up on it with them, they perceive you have improved whether or not you actually did
*like goals, too many competancies at a company are a bad thing

Overall, a good book to have in your library if you are a manager and are interested in employee development.

[Niels Lodewijk]

Smart, short and simple book on talent management (discusses performance management, 360feedback, engagement, talent review, succession planning and competencies). Book seems to be useful to (keep) focus(ed) on clean, simple talent management processes. By starting each chapter with a 'building from science' subchapter it shows some of the problems that I think can cause complex processes: Science does not agree on a lot of talent management subjects. I think it's great approach to base processes on theory that is agreed on and use some common sense to complete (and keeping it simple!). Instead of building processes that try to cover all different theories available and thus become unclear and complex without proven added value. Even though scope-creep is covered in almost every business book it's still useful to be reminded of it all the time, because aparently we become blind for it. Would be great to have an update on the book in ten years or so to see how much of the common sense in this book has found a scientific ratification. Book uses clear Anglosaxian companies as examples, so it might need some tuning for non-anglosaxian companies. To be used as a guide during talent management development.

[Renee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really liked the philosophy and approach, and liked & will use the chapter on Performance Management, but then most of the chapters after that did not convince me that these talent management practices are needed at all (based on their own philosophy to start with the science! there isn't convincing proof of the value of many of these things, especially competencies!), much less their recommendations on how to implement those practices! So the book overall was weirdly between 2 and 4 stars for me - some chapters 2 stars, some chapters 4 stars.

[Marc S. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant advice

Science-based, simple advice about how to grow better talent faster is what One Page Talent Management promises and delivers. Every chapter has tools and tips for how to set great goals, accelerate development and more.

[Veronica Franco · Rating 4 out of 5]

Easy read! Lots of good recommendations that are easy to implement.

[Carlos Britto · Rating 4 out of 5]

A nice framework for starting things simple although a little self centered and low on cases.