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Management Issues just ran a piece titled: "Don't trust HR to manage your talent." There's a lot of good stuff in this post which reports on a survey by Deloitte and leads with the following.

"When it comes to talent management, three quarters of firms obediently listen to HR and put all their time and effort into grooming their top performers. But if they are going to have any hope of coping with the twin challenges of an ageing workforce and a new generation of workers with different priorities, they are going to have to change tack - and fast."

There are three parts to this. All are worth your attention.

The first is that talent management is not HR's job. If you've got people working for you, it's your job. HR should give you ideas and support. They should be a professional resource, but talent management is every boss's job.

There shouldn't be a talent management "program," either. Talent management, identifying people with the ability and interest to develop and helping them do it, should be part of the basic way you do business. Think of it as a "program" and you think of it as temporary and as something less than a core function.

Second, if the only people you're concerned with developing are "high potential," you're asking for trouble. "High potential" almost always refers to people who want to climb the corporate mountain to the top, or somewhere near it. There are at least three other types of career paths, as defined by Dr. Ken Nowack at Envisia.

Specialist/Individual Contributors are interested primarily in one field or profession and developing their skills and opportunities there.

Generalists are more interested in development than in moving upward. They thrive on a variety of situations.

Entrepreneurs thrive on rapid changes over short periods of time. Inside larger organizations, they can kick-start projects and new initiatives.

Then there are the people who don't have a "career" in mind at all. They want to do meaningful work with people they like. They want to learn, but for many of them, work is where they go to earn the money to do other things that interest them.

Third, the future of talent management is going to look very different from the past. Instead of standard programs that everyone will adapt to, there will be flexible programs, with parts designed to fit specific individuals.

I think of this as a bit like the science of complexity. The reason we didn't think in terms of complex dynamical business and natural systems until recently was that we didn't have the computing power to understand them until recently.

Today, technology gives us the power to customize work and compensation and careers. Communication options let us experiment with ways to work together across distance and time.

Then there are social dynamics. The men and women of Generation X are moving into the power positions in our organizations. The men and women of Generation Y are entering the workforce in waves. Those generations are in the bargaining power position and they want flexibility and choice.

When we look back and decade or two from now, some of our talent management practices will look as strange as dial telephones that plug into the wall look to us today.

Wally's Working Supervisor's Support Kit is a collection of information and tools to help working supervisors do a better job. It's based on what Wally's learned in over twenty years of supervisory skills training. Click here to check it out.

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Wally Bock has helped people learn to be great bosses for more than a quarter century. His latest book, Performance Talk: The One-on-One Part of Leadership, makes learning key leadership principles almost effortless by teaching through a story and providing lists of resources for further growth.

Click here to find out more about Wally's coaching services.

For weekly tips and resources pointers, check our Wally Bock's Three Star Leadership Letter.

Click here to find out more about having Wally speak to your company or convention.