My Talent Strategy Principles

Back in graduate school, I took a couple of courses on Org Theory.  In these courses we studied many things (Org Theory is an absurdly broad topic with far more theories than practices), but one of the items that was particularly interesting to me was an examination of what makes a good executive and how high-performing executives are able to make good decisions quickly, with imperfect information. There are many theories on this topic, but one in particular had a strong ring of truth to it and has always struck me as being the most sensible.

The idea is that over the course of their career, the high-performing executive develops a set of principles that guides their strategy and enables them to make very fast decisions.

Notice I do not use the term “successful”… we all know successful executives that are dolts and gained their position via the Peter Principle… I am talking about you US airline industry

These principles are typically formed early in a career and come from lessons learned, formal education experiences, and influential people (parents, first great boss, mentors, etc.). Once this foundation exists, decisions can be quickly tested against this set of principles. The slightly-nerdy part of me would call this a set of business rules for decision-making. The very-nerdy part of me would call this a series of conditional test algorithms comprising a heuristics model for decision-making. Let’s take the “business rules” path and avoid making my brain hurt.

With ever-increasing frequency, I get “how did you do that?” questions from my industry peers (and every now and then a Superintendent or CEO). Whether the question relates to performance management systems, ERP, high-service levels, or simply cost picture, my answer is almost always “I built a good team”. That answer usually prompts a series of requests for org charts and job descriptions. While these artifacts are standard fare in our roles and as long as we have HR departments we will need them, I don’t feel that they are particularly important (though I do believe that the process of creating them has its value). The question I think should be asked is…

How do you build a good team and how do you keep it all together?

Whenever I try to answer this question I start to rattle off single-sentence advice tidbits and quickly sound like a business school version of Everybody’s Free to Wear Sunscreen.  I have come to realize that I have my own set of principles, developed over the course of my career, and that I do not typically think of them in concrete terms.  As an exercise to help me both identify these principles and articulate them more effectively, I decided to give them substance by writing them down.

• Pay enough that salary is no longer part of the conversation
• Avoid large pay disparities
• Use bonuses to differentiate performance
• Leverage the power of spot bonuses
• Do not make the mistake of believing that you compete for technical talent with the K-12 sector.. you compete with EVERY sector.
• A high-end team is the cheaper option
• Foster a sense of elitism in your team
• Firing is far more important than hiring
• Bad attitudes are infectious, abate the wound
• Balance your team with external hires and internally developed talent
• Build a promotion path for the entry level positions
• Titles matter
• Training is sustenance, not luxury
• Support regrettable attrition

Many of you will disagree with at least some of these principles and you might even think some of them are crazy (Support Regrettable Attrition usually elicts an “Oh.. he’s soft in the brain” response).  I encourage you to call me out on anything you believe is wrong.  I am a work in progress and as such, so are these principles.

In future posts I will take each individual principle and give a deeper explanation… stay tuned.

The story continues…

1. My Talent Strategy Principles: The Original (You are already here)
2. My Talent Strategy Principles: Compensation