Clear Views Blog

As my daughter swam in the state long course swim championships this recently, I thought about how her swim coach needs to train and develop her swimming talent just like a manager who needs to train and develop the talent on his team. After each race during the competition, he talked to her about what she did well and what to focus on for the next race. He makes training fun sometimes and more challenging at other times to push her to higher goals; and listens to her when she reaches a plateau and is frustrated from her lack of progress.

The summer is when people take their vacation, lie on the beach and contemplate their life thinking about what makes them happy, the many stresses they put up with at work, and where they want to go next in their career. Often it’s during this time of the year that your employees are deciding if they’re going to start looking for another job.

What are your organization’s biggest challenges this year regarding talent? This and two other short questions are part of our new survey and we need your input! We are asking our readers to provide their opinion on topics of interest and challenges. Now that the year is half over, it’s the perfect time to identify what situations you are facing.

Every organization faces conflict among team members, breakdowns in communication and behaviors that create more dysfunction than function.  How your leaders handle these challenges becomes the standard which all employees follow. If the team leader is selfish and has a “me first” attitude, then employees will follow suit. If the leader is compassionate and good at listening, then, likewise, the others on his/her team echo that behavior.

As an HR leader you are constantly on the lookout for talented, knowledgeable and dedicated employees. But do you feel that your “high potential” cupboard is bare? When you have a job opening and want to promote someone from within, do you see that your company’s talent pipeline is empty?