11 important takeaways from this video:

00:00:24 Training is about short-term knowledge acquisition. Employees need knowledge about project management, for example, so they take a course on it.

Talent development, on the other hand, is more long-term.

00:01:24 High potentials are the promising employees whom they have identified as having the most potential to move up in the organization quickly Once companies have identified their high potential employees, the next step for the compay is to develop these people over the long-term into those high-level positions.

This form of development involves significant, large scale programs and investments.

00:04:20 A newly-graduated  person usually gets a first job which only requires you manage yourself: you, your job, your responsibilities, etc.

If you are promoted to manager, you’re no longer responsible for yourself and your own operational tasks as you were before, you are now responsible for coordinating and managing a team and the team’s operational tasks and performance against objectives and deadlines.

If you are promoted once again, you are now responsible for managing managers who must manage their own teams. You are now sandwihed between lower- and upper-management, as well as other related departments. You neither make the strategic decisions nor make the product/service.

If you are promoted once again, you are now managing organizations: you are responsible for the future, survival, and culture of the company. Business strategy and market positioning, re-branding the company image, merger and acquisition, etc.

00:11:40 The above transition in the company is important because companies cannot simply wait until they have vacancies in upper-management to recruit; rather they must pro-actively prepare people so that they are ready to move up at a moments notice.

00:12:29 If you want to succeed in your career and move up quickly in an organization, it’s imperative to know how the promotion and talent development process works.

00:13:30 What would the company do if a a key position (The Director of Finance, the CEO, etc.. ) in the company were to suddenly become vacant: the person dies, falls ill, is head-hunted by a competitor and leaves the company… What can the company do now to prepare for such a worst-case scenario? A competency model is a list of competencies Human Resources  believe a candidate must have to succeed in a job.

[EDITOR’S NOTE: For more information on Human Resources Management and headhunting, refer to the lecture Human Resources Management: How Brands Attract & Select The Best Candidates by the same speaker.]

Competency is the possession of experience, knowledge, genetic predisposition, and personality to effectly problem-solve. Knowing and doing are two different things.

One is not necessarily better than another, just better or worse suited. A shy or pessimistic personality would not be as suited to a position in sales as an out-going and optimistic personality would be.

[EDITOR’S NOTE: for more information on training employees to be competent, refer to the lecture Human Resources Management: Training Employees To Stay Competitive.]

Performance managment via performance reviews involves an annual meeting between a manager and the employee measuring the employee’s performance and future objectives.

Talent review involves top managers deciding together who their high-potential employees are; their top 5 or so percent of employees the company should invest in and ready them for key positions.

From there, potential assessments are conducted to further refine and categorize their top 5% of high-potential employees are further narrowed down and assigned training courses and programs (on- and off-the-job) relevant to their key position.

00:31:10 The question becomes: “Is this form of assessment reasonable?” At first look creating a list of competencies for key positions, evaluating high potential employees’ competencies, and then training them for that position makes sense, particularly:

Stretch roles are challenging positions and projects designed to test the employee and prepare them for future key positions.

00:36:30 You can’t always ask customers what they want. Sometimes you have to define what customers want.

00:38:30 Some people succeed because they have one sort of competency; some people succeed because they do not have that same sort of competnecy. People are different and there isn’t always one solution to a problem that can be solved by one set of competencies.

00:45:10 Performance management looks at successes and shortcomings the employee’s past and present, and how shortcomings can be addressed in the future. It isn’t about ‘what should be improved,’ it is more about ‘What should YOU improve.’

00:58:00 But what if…