Strategic Assessments (3)
Master Sun: “The way means inducing people to have the same aim as the leadership, so that they will share death and share life, without fear of danger.”
Cao Cao: “This means guiding them by instruction and direction. Danger means distrust.”
Zhang Yu: “If the people are treated with benevolence, faithfulness, and justice, then they will be of one mind, and will be glad to serve.”
Adaptation: Talent Strategists understand that employment brands are built on the foundation of corporate culture (or the way of the leadership). If the leadership is unsettled and inconsistent, the results of recruiting campaigns may sometimes be successful but retaining the people will be challenging.
The legendary culture of Southwest Airlines is worth studying in this regard. The CEO works the customer service counters and therefore knows what her people face in their daily work for the company.
Her predecessor worked in a windowless office thereby communicating that his status and prestige were not to be measured by externals. The more relevant measure of his success was the degree to which his team gives him their hearts in return for his service to them.
While compensation in the company is not at the top of the industry the retention rates are high. This is a clear indication that the leadership has the way. The company has a magnet employment brand because Southwest Airlines is a great place to work.
The leader humbles herself before her subordinates while visibly working to make their lives secure, as a result they follow willingly and without coercion. They put their hearts into their work and create an outstanding customer experience. This is brought about because the leadership and the people are in harmony. They trust one another.
Application: Determine for yourself whether senior management walks the talk with regard to caring for the team. Be honest with yourself about your organization’s management style. Are there visible gaps between senior management’s avowed intentions and their performance with regard to culture and their employees? Do they say that human resources are our most important asset while approving long-term reductions in employee benefits to meet short-term profit targets?
Do they outwardly express commitment to empowering employees through training and development while secretly making plans to outsource jobs? Have they downsized the domestic workforce to curry favor with Wall Street and generate larger bonuses for the executive team?
If you want to become a true practitioner of the craft of Talent Strategy and conditions like these prevail in the organization you work for, you may not be able to put the way into practice.
Perhaps the most tragic illustration of this truth in recent memory is the collapse of Enron. Imagine yourself in the shoes of the Director of Staffing for that enterprise and you will gain some insight into the importance of grasping this idea. Outstanding execution against the recruiting goals established by senior management with the result being a heart-wrenching, earth-shaking collapse of the enterprise because the leadership did not have the way.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 7th, 2007 at 9:56 am and is filed under The Art of War for Talent. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Your Commentary and adaptations are well thought and shows a good reflection on the text as a tool for management.
Excellent Work!
Excellent posts, Don.
I loved it. Can you do “Shogun” by James Clavell next time? Maybe the long wing and the short wing falcon. I try to talk with my staff about this and only get blank stares. I believe there is so much we can learn about business from some of these titles. No one teaches the “rules of engagement” any longer and “saving face” isn’t understand by many.