If you find value in content like this, sign up for my Talent Edge Weekly newsletter.
Talent reviews and performance management are important talent practices that enable organizational performance. However, a common pitfall is treating these practices as scheduled process events, often confined to a specific time of year, rather than ongoing opportunities for proactive reflection and action. To promote this shift, I recently shared one of my cheat sheets with seven high-impact questions leaders can use to accelerate talent decisions at any moment, focused on areas such as upgrading talent in a critical role, identifying top retention risk, surfacing hidden talent, addressing ongoing subpar performance, creating stretch development, and unlocking workforce capacity. That resource helps leaders move from insight to action, where many talent efforts stall. To build on that cheat sheet, I’m sharing a complementary view to help identify which of those seven question areas present the greatest opportunity to act now. This view introduces sample indicators that signal where focus is most needed. For example, for Talent Upgrade in a Critical Role, the original question asks whether a critical role is filled by the best possible person, and what the next step should be taken. The added indicators include: A) There are known internal candidates who would likely outperform the incumbent, and B) If the role were vacant tomorrow, we would likely select a different and stronger candidate. These indicators help pinpoint where opportunities exist, and even one signal can highlight a talent decision that needs to be made.
