Porter Novelli: Advancing Society Through the Art of Communication - Essay Sample

Introduction

Porter Novelli is a global purpose and award-winning consultancy firm that aims at creating a long-lasting behavior to change and drive business as well as positively impact the world. The company was developed from the idea that the art of communication can help in advancing society. In the year 2004, the firm undertook a visioning process as well as a fundamental strategic assessment that would act as a basis for operations in the next five years (Van den Brink et al., 2013). The process of strategic assessment was led by the chief executive officer (CEO) of the firm. The key areas of focus for the strategic process included a more client-centric structure, a new way of client account planning, as well as an enhanced emphasis on operational interdependence between the multinational offices among the international clients.

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The three approaches were what the management focused on to ensure that the firm gained a competitive advantage as well as increase its market share. The company would ensure client account planning by establishing a document that contains essential details about an existing or prospective customer, as well as information regarding decision making and the competing companies. Besides, one of the strategies that would be undertaken by the CEO included the aligning and upgrading of processes in human resource management for the purposes of implementing as well as communicating the new business strategies. The firm would achieve that by hiring a chief talent officer (CTO) who would play a pivotal role in the development of the strategy. However, according to the CTO, the main challenge of the strategy was the inability to create the highest level of employee engagement. The CTO focused on ensuring employee engagement by focusing on the four entitlements of an employee, which include expectations of the employees from the employer, ways of defining and measuring success, the reward for delivering and achieving the set targets, as well as elimination of barriers to high productivity by the management.

Comparison and Contrast Between Talent Assessment and Employee Performance

Talent assessment involves the procedures and processes that organizations use to identify which individuals will perform a particular job best as well as the one with the right cultural fit for a specific organization. Organizations perform job talent assessments to predict a candidate that has the potential of being a good employee as well as being productive and therefore leads to being retained in the organization (Van den Brink et al., 2013). Some of the aspects that are considered in a talent assessment include good personality aspects, proper time management, as well as being honest.

Performance management is a communication process where employees and managers work together to ensure organizational goals and objectives are achieved. It involves a continuous process that involves reviewing an employee's performance. Performance management involves various components and aspects such as expectation setting and planning, periodic rating, rewards and compensation, monitoring, development, and improvement. Performance management is a discipline that is used by organizations to determine and assess how employees are performing compared to the set goals and objectives by the management team. Performance management is done periodically, with most organizations conducting it on an annual basis (Farley, 2005). Employees are then provided with feedback on areas of strength as well on specific areas that the employee ought to improve on. On the contrary, talent management involves many disciplines that organizations can implement to enhance employees to drive revenue as well as reduce the operating costs. In addition, talent assessment involves aspects such as workforce planning, sourcing, and recruiting, as well as succession management.

Effectiveness of the Roles Played by Strategic Leaders in the Formation of Performance Management Strategy

Strategic leaders play an essential role in the daily operations of an organization. For instance, in the case study of Porter Novelli, the CEO and the CTO played a crucial role in the integration of the vision, innovation, and creativity for the long term success and organizational stability of Porter Novelli. The CTO played a significant role by connecting the employees as well as enhancing strong performance expectations for the employees. Besides, the strategic leaders make decisions that help in achieving the organization's goals as well as for the proper functioning of the organization.

Some of the good strategic leadership traits portrayed by the leaders of Porter Novelli include the ability to teamwork, decentralized command, extreme ownership, as well as the ability to prioritize and execute issues. For instance, the strategic leaders were responsible ensuring employee engagement and productivity as well as executing and communicating the vision to all employees and other stakeholders. Besides, the organization facilitated team-building exercises, which enhanced a sense of ownership as well as providing a platform for a detailed review of competitive and internal analysis as well as analysis of strategic alternatives. In addition, strategic leaders introduced a new approach where employees of the company would focus on client account planning for better management of customers as well as enhancing customer satisfaction.

Criteria for Evaluating the Effectiveness of Talent Management Strategy and How to Collect Data

Talent management refers to recruitment, hiring, retaining, as well as ensuring the development of the most talented employees in an organization. Talent management is important to an organization because it helps in identifying, recruiting, as well as holding on to individuals who ensure the success of an organization. Key aspects of talent management strategy include learning and motivating, strategic employee planning, as well as the career development of all employees.

The five criteria used to evaluate the effectiveness of human resource management include developing an evaluation form, identifying performance measures, setting appropriate guidelines for feedback, allowing employees to give balanced feedback. The talent strategy should be developed and evaluated in a consistent and objective manner for the purpose of protecting the interests of the employees. The organization should then identify performance measures upon which they will base the talents of the various staff members. Besides, the management team should set guidelines for feedback where employees provide feedback on some of the best talents. Other criteria used to evaluation of talent management include quality of work by employees, the level of creativity, responsiveness of employees to the feedback provided, amount of consistent improvement noted, levels of execution, peers and customer feedback, as well as ability to take ownership of actions done in the organization. Data could be collected by conducting face to face interviews and open-ended surveys among employees, direct observation as well as using focus groups to evaluate key competencies and talents among employees within a firm.

Components of an Effective Talent Management Strategy

Some of the current components of the talent management strategy include creating staff engagement and professional development. Other components of talent management strategies used by Porter Novelli include client account planning and management training. However, I do not find the components to be effective and therefore would recommend that the management should include other aspects such as career development, strategic employee planning, compensation, succession planning, as well as training, learning, and motivating (Van den Brink et al., 2013).

For instance, the human resource department should focus on a talent acquisition process that focuses on hiring the best staff members with competent skills. Besides, a good and effective talent management strategy should focus on learning, training, and motivating employees. For instance, the management should concentrate on training staff to provide them with opportunities to be productive. Besides, the organization should reward staff members who are exceptional and results-oriented. Providing employees with a proper remuneration motivates them to aspire to produce more.

Talent management plays an essential role in the business strategy because it helps in managing one of the important assets of a company and other stakeholders. Therefore, embracing these components of an effective management strategy will help Porter Novelli to retain exceptional employees as well as maintain and motivate a superior workforce. In addition, the firm should focus on talent management tools such as workforce planning, executive coaching, recognition programs, diversity, and inclusion, as well as strategic planning and goal alignment.

Functional Expertise of the strategy

Functional Expertise refers to the various skills possessed by individuals that focus on their professional contribution to an organization (Farley, 2005). Some of the functional expertise skills that an individual may possess include science skills, sales skills, as well as machine maintenance skills. Other functional expertise skills possessed by individuals may include those that relate to a specific task that may be defined by an organization from a department level.

The functional component of the organization's talent management strategy includes teamwork spirit, productivity, as well as innovation, and creativity, which enable the company to achieve its goals. Focusing on skills and functional Expertise of employees has enabled the organization to identify highly motivated and competent staff to drive the objectives and goals of the organization.

Conclusion

Talent assessment involves the procedures and processes that organizations use to identify which individuals will perform a particular job best as well as the one with the right cultural fit for a specific organization. Organizations perform job talent assessments to predict a candidate that has the potential of being a good employee as well as being productive and therefore lead to being retained in the organization. The key areas of focus for the strategic process at Porter Novelli included a more client-centric structure, a new way of client account planning, as well as an enhanced emphasis on operational interdependence between the multinational offices among the international clients. Talent management strategy should be developed and evaluated in a consistent and objective manner for the purpose of protecting the interests of the employees.

References

Farley, C. (2005). HR's role in talent management and driving business results. Employment Relations Today, 32(1), 55-61. https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=Talent+management+and+performance+management&btnG=#d=gs_cit&u=%2Fscholar%3Fq%3Dinfo%3A8KSD1A-4Uo4J%3Ascholar.google.com%2F%26output%3Dcite%26scirp%3D3%26hl%3

DenVan den Brink, M., Fruytier, B., & Thunnissen, M. (2013). Talent management in academia: performance systems and HRM policies. Human Resource Management Journal, 23(2), 180-195. Retrieved from https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=Talent+management+and+performance+management&btnG=#d=gs_cit&u=%2Fscholar%3Fq%3Dinfo%3AI8ojKjLVxWQJ%3Ascholar.google.com%2F%26output%3Dcite%26scirp%3D0%26hl%3Den