The document discusses six key steps for organizations to effectively manage talent and performance: 1) Define talent requirements based on business strategy and objectives, 2) Identify and attract talent both internally and externally, 3) Define performance expectations and role expectations, 4) Develop and nurture leadership capabilities through training, coaching and exposure to projects, 5) Recognize, reward and retain talent through compensation, promotion and other benefits, and 6) Align talent and supply chains to create an integrated performance management system. The document emphasizes that talent management is critical for business success and requires commitment from senior leadership.

1. Getting ahead through
Six Practices
Practice 6
Supply Chain Consultancy
Five key steps to aligning talent
and performance
Recently, McKinsey and Co., in conjunction They effectively integrate their people and
with Georgia Tech College of Management, supply chains in a systematic way to create a
published a report which indicated dynamic and robust performance management
that six supply chain related practices system which:
are fundamental to giving companies a  connects strategy to operational frontline
competitive edge. According to the findings, staff;
companies who excel in these six areas  focuses on the vital few levers and KPIs that
are dominant in terms of service, cost and enable staff to see their role within the end-
inventory. In this paper, Derek Thomason, to-end supply chain;
Martin Green and Martin Haynes look at  ensures staff have the right knowledge, skills
the sixth of these practices - the right talent, and ongoing education to operate at all
accountable for performance. levels;
 ensures succession planning is actively in
The success of an organisation is almost place to develop the managers and leaders
exclusively a product of the quality of the for tomorrow;
people it employs. New technology and  empowers and holds staff accountable for
innovative products may play their part, but performance.
what truly differentiates the ordinary from the
good, and the good from the great, is the way Talent management, however, is as much about
in which organisations recruit, train, coach and a business ethos as it is a process. To be of real
challenge their staff to continuously improve. value it needs to be an organisational priority,
So what, you may ask. Isn’t that what most and like the most effective supply chains, it
businesses try to do? In basic terms the answer needs to be managed end-to-end to yield the
must be yes. But really successful organisations best possible outcomes. Moreover, it must be
have a wider field of view. underpinned by a mindset and behaviours
that recognise and actively encourage talent
management as an integral part of the overall
business strategy.
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2. In practice, there is no universally accepted model or definition for talent management, but in
principal it engages employees at all levels and involves the identification, nurture and ongoing
development of individuals within an organisation. A five stage process to ensure an organisation
has the right people, in the right place at the right time might be:
 define talent requirements;
 identify and attract talent (including internal / external recruitment);
 define performance and role expectations;
 develop and nurture leadership capabilities;
 recognise, reward and retain.
It is easy to talk about talent management in the abstract. As a concept few would argue its
position as a business imperative and most will recognise the imbalance between the supply and
demand for real talent. However, the great businesses make that all important transfer from good
idea to practical, focused action.
The potential of talent management is clear, but it is all about execution. To work for the benefit
of all parties, it must support the organisation’s overall strategy and in turn exploit the insights and
advantages achieved to inform future strategy development.
An organisation needs to create a defined infrastructure to engage, reward and retain its talent.
The decision to pursue such an approach must be viewed as a long term investment in people
and be actively promoted and supported by the senior leadership team. Talented people will
recognise when commitment levels waiver and will not wait long for the next opportunity.
Step 1:
Define talent requirements
To ensure talent management adds real value to an organisation, it is important to establish the
range of challenges to be addressed to meet the business objectives and at what level in the
business the talent will be deployed.
Define Identifying the competencies required of the talent pool starts with a clear understanding of the
Requirements
business strategy, processes and desired outcomes. Senior executives must be able to articulate
Identify and
both the ‘current’ and ‘future’ states in order to determine the requirements of the organisation.
Attract They should also reflect the organisation’s overall philosophy and operating environment.
Talent Many human resources functions are extremely experienced in building competency-based job
Management profiles, informed by long established job descriptions and emerging trends in the employment
Recognise,
Define marketplace. These can be an excellent starting point, but there really are no hard and fast rules of
Performance
Reward and and Role what to include or exclude.
Retain Expectations
Develop & People invited to join talent management programmes should already exhibit both depth and
Nurture breadth of capability, combined with an ability to learn and deliver very quickly.
Leadership
Capabilities
Among the typical technical and behavioural competencies required for business management and
performance, those within the talent pool also need to reflect the following:
‘They should reflect the  the need to manage specialist functions and / or generalists;
organisations overall philosophy
 requirement to create future executives and senior managers;
and operating environment.’
 the time-frame - i.e. how long you expect the talent to remain in the post before moving to
another role in the organisation?
 measurement - how good is the business at managing the consequences of poor performance?
 capability and commitment to actively sponsor, mentor and coach the talent;
 the prospect of finding a likely match(es) against your desired talent profile;
 prioritisation of the various competencies and establishing minimum standards required.
Defining talent requirements makes sure that the business is clear about the skills and expertise
needed to deliver its strategic objectives.
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3. Step 2:
Identify and attract talent
Talent is not restricted to senior management or graduate recruits. Talent can be evident at all
levels in the organisation and across a range of skills. The organisation needs to ensure it defines
Define and identifies all these requirements.
Requirements
Given the profile and level of ambition normally assigned to talent management programmes, the
Identify and
Attract benchmark for qualification should be high. Individuals must already have demonstrated technical,
Talent behavioural and commercial aptitude well above that of their peers and be equipped to cope with
Management increasingly diverse and complex workloads.
Define
Recognise, Performance
Reward and and Role Some take the view that talent can be developed in any individual with the right frameworks and
Retain Expectations
Develop & deliberate practice.
Nurture
Leadership
Capabilities In practice competency assessment must be fully integrated within an organisation’s operational
processes. Unipart has its own well established management system, a fundamental component
of which is a competency based approach called ‘Gate to Great’. The methodology is not uniquely
‘Talent is not restricted to senior part of a narrowly focused talent management programme, but is a highly visible part of Unipart’s
management or graduate recruits.’
staff development activity across the business.
At every level, managers are required to deeply understand their business processes and identify
the key skills and knowledge required to ensure high quality, cost efficient delivery of business
targets. Each business area has a competency framework designed to ensure resilience within
operations and measurable development of staff capability. It is the measurable and visible nature
of this approach that drives staff engagement, accountability and retention. Every person in
the business has the opportunity to demonstrate and develop their talents in the light of their
specific role. To this extent, talent is self selecting and based on criteria related to their ability to
demonstrate talent at their level in the business.
Attracting talent to your organisation includes marketing and promoting your organisations’ vision,
values, performance in the market place and how you engage and reward your people. Articles
on your top performers and business successes will attract attention from other individuals
looking for a new challenge. When you are looking to attract talent think about what motivates
them and how your business meets those motivators. Will the talent get to play with the best/top
performers and have challenges that will stretch their capabilities and are the rewards appealing?
Step 3:
Define performance and role expectations
The use of competency based job roles and assessment is fairly common currency in most mature
organisations, but those that extract genuine value from this approach do so because it is a
Define
Requirements dynamic and active part of business life. Engagement in the process extends from the frontline to
the boardroom and is typically designed to be simple to use and absolutely aligned to the needs of
Identify and the business.
Attract
Talent Competency and competence are simply about capability and accountability to deliver your
Management
business goals, irrespective of role, tenure, hierarchical status, or experience. It is about ensuring
Define
Recognise, Performance you have the right person, with the right skills, in the right place, at the right time.
Reward and
Retain
and Role At a more operational level, talent management must also be supported by an effective
Expectations
Develop & management system that:
Nurture
Leadership  translates strategy into operational plans;
Capabilities  is underpinned by a set of key performance targets, and;
 includes a robust review framework which holds staff accountable for the delivery of business
performance.
‘Recruit and assess talent against
a multi-faceted and prioritised list
of needs.’ In any business there is a requirement to both recruit and assess talent against a multi-faceted
and prioritised list of needs. Most large organisations already have some form of competency
framework in place and there is also a wealth of literature available online. However, in practice
many frameworks fail to deliver the expected results as managers struggle to use and engage with
the models. This is because they are frequently viewed as ‘add-ons’ to core business processes and
are not fully integrated into daily management processes.
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4. The process of assessing performance and cascading KPIs is often hugely over complicated and
frequently creates significant waste and ‘noise’ across an organisation. It takes managers away
from the core responsibilities of engaging, leading and coaching their teams, to a place where they
drown in e-mails, ad-hoc reports and spend hours in largely wasted meetings.
The emergent themes are about decision making at the right level, supported by the appropriate
targets and indictors of performance. Wherever possible, keep things simple. The same is true
of KPIs or else this will ‘cloud’ talent who have been diverted by the need to meet complex and
often conflicting KPIs, rather than allowing them to focus on value adding activities.
‘Simple’ does not set any maximum limit on the number of KPIs, nor does it imply a basic or naïve
approach. The clue is in the title – KEY performance indicators. At some time in their careers most
managers will have tried to juggle a complex array of indicators, many of which are beyond their
gift, or which appear to hamper rather than enhance performance delivery. It often means the link
between performance, reward, recognition and remuneration (which makes complete sense) is so
convoluted, that managers hold up their arms in surrender, knowing they are trying to achieve the
impossible.
The benefit of defining roles and performance guarantees that the people are clear on their
responsibilities and the performance expected to deliver the business’ strategic objectives.
Step 4:
Develop and nurture leadership capabilities
Leadership and talent are inextricably linked and need to be developed within a culture that allows
Define
them to thrive.
Requirements
Whilst there is no best practice global template, developing a talent management strategy requires
Identify and both investment and senior sponsorship and should typically consider, but not be limited to, the
Attract
following:
Talent  provision of regular access to senior executives and high calibre mentors / coaches who will
Management
Define
both support and challenge an individual’s development;
Recognise, Performance  exposure to high profile projects and programmes of change;
Reward and and Role
Retain Expectations  clearly defined career development plans, charting how talent is expected to grow within the
Develop &
Nurture organisation;
Leadership  development of networking opportunities both within and beyond the organisation;
Capabilities
 opportunities to work across different geographies or business units;
 participation in new business development;
‘Talent needs to be developed  dedicated educational and training support;
within a culture that allows them  dedicated reward and recognition packages.
to thrive.’
Education and training is the foundation stone of talent management and development. It is not all
about academic qualifications although they are of course a very significant advantage in today’s
complex international economy.
There are many global organisations created by individuals with what might be considered poor
levels of academic achievement. But at the heart of that entrepreneurial spirit is an ability to
really understand what their customers want, combined with the capacity to deliver an attractive
product or service at the right time and price.
That ability to learn and adapt quickly is what differentiates the good from the world class and is
arguably at the core of truly successful talent management programmes. It is also a pre-requisite
for the entire organisation.
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5. The value of training and enhanced understanding is no better demonstrated than in MIT’s
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology) ‘beer game’. Conceived in the 1950s and evolved over
the intervening period, it is perhaps the best illustration of why supply chains fail through lack of
understanding, information and dialogue.
Participants are divided into teams, taking on the roles of various parts of the supply chain - for
example, local retailer, distributor or brewer. The game challenges the parties to respond to
changing demands for a single brand of beer. The simple requirements of the game are of course
managing the relationships between demand and supply, but the early rounds usually end in chaos
with the various teams moving quickly from a beer drought to a beer flood.
The underlying objectives seem obvious and the game provides a powerful reminder of the need
for detailed understanding of the end-to-end process, the use and visibility of key performance
indicators and appropriate communications between the stakeholder groups.
We have already referenced Unipart’s ‘Gate to Great’ methodology, which places significant
emphasis on the development of business skills and commercial acumen. That can take many forms
including our ‘See at ten, do at eleven’ approach, where individuals move immediately from the
classroom into a live working environment.
The range and volume of training is very much driven by each organisation’s objectives, complexity
and operating environment. By nurturing leadership and talent the business develops the required
capabilities, employee retention increases and a more engaged work force is created that delivers
real business benefits.
Step 5:
Recognise, reward and retain
Talent management is about bringing benefits to both the employee and the business. This ethos
Define of mutuality is a central aspect of the overall approach and must be underpinned by a clear set of
Requirements performance measures against which targets can be set and results assessed.
Identify and The task of senior executives is to create a framework that cascades business outcomes from the
Attract
boardroom to the frontline. This may appear obvious, however, the skill is in identifying who should
Talent
Management own what target, how it translates at each level of the hierarchy and how they are empowered
Define and supported to ensure successful delivery.
Recognise, Performance
Reward and and Role
Retain Expectations Whilst the same principles apply to talent management, it is likely that those potential ‘high
Develop &
Nurture flyers’ will be rewarded more highly and more quickly for delivery of exceptional performance.
Leadership The targets will, of course, be far more challenging, so it is incumbent on the sponsor and senior
Capabilities
executives to set clear and measurable targets for achievement. As with the competencies, these
may cover a broad spectrum of indicators, beyond the traditional revenue, cost and satisfaction
‘Talent management is about measures. Talent is typically groomed for leadership roles, so targets may include areas as diverse as
bringing benefits to both the academic achievement, global process transformation and new business starts.
employee and the business.’
The incentives, again, are likely to be higher within the talent management community. Financial
remuneration and promotion are the obvious contenders, but in all likelihood there are many
other equally important benefits associated with such programmes, for example:
 significant access to senior leaders both within the organisation;
 participation in key strategy planning and decision making meetings;
 membership of key industry bodies;
 free tertiary / specialist education and training;
 external secondments / support of global charities.
The list is very much at the behest of each organisation, but the objectives are clear: set
challenging targets, ensure the talent is held accountable for delivery and reward sufficiently that
both the individual and business achieve significant competitive advantage.
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6. Conclusions
McKinseys summarised their findings as follows:
‘Leading companies make supply chain talent development and acquisition an organisational
priority. Supply chain positions form part of the top management career track. Once the right
people are on board, companies hold talent fully accountable for their contribution to supply chain
performance.’
McKinseys emphasise the need to take a strategic view of acquiring and developing talent in the
supply chain and the need to hold that talent accountable for performance against a range of
targets.
At Unipart, we would agree wholeheartedly with this approach, but would add that the
management and development of talent needs to be built into the daily fabric of the business
at all levels. Hence our approach of ‘Performance Through Engagement’ and ‘Gate to Great’
programmes, which offer every individual the opportunity to develop, regardless of their position
in the business. The only caveat is that this has to be within a framework that ensures that their
individual contribution is aligned to the strategic aims and direction of the business. We discussed
this in the first of our papers on ‘Getting Ahead In Six Practices: Strategic Alignment’. In this way, it
is possible to ensure that the talent programme benefits both the individual and the business.
For more information contact:
Unipart Expert Practices
Unipart House, Garsington Road
Cowley, Oxford
OX4 2PG
Tel: +44 (0) 1865 384690
uep.enquiries@unipart.co.uk
or visit our website:
www.unipartlogistics.com/consulting
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