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Succession Planning

Published December 2008

To Tell or Not to Tell: Grooming High Potentials

 

  Lindsay Edmonds Wickman

"To tell or not to tell, that is the question;
Whether 'tis better to be forthright
And tell high potentials of their status,
Or to be silent and let them know nothing."

Just as Hamlet faced a critical decision, this parody on his soliloquy illustrates that talent managers do, too. The state of the economy has made organizations more introspective as they look for ways to develop and retain top talent. Informing — or not informing — high potentials of their status can impact whether they stay or go. Unfortunately, there is no easy answer to this controversial question: Tell or don't tell?

"This notion of transparency continues to be a complicated issue," said Lynne Morton, co-founder and chief operating officer of TalentScope, a provider of talent management solutions. "It is important to tell people they have been identified as high potentials. However, it requires a corporate culture that supports and manages the expectations of people.

"A lot of [companies] have said to me, 'It's opening up Pandora's Box; we don't want to do it.' The reason is because they're afraid of their inability to manage the expectation[s]," she explained.

If it's not done right, telling can be harmful to an organization's health. But if talent managers can manage the expectations that come along with telling, the end result is not only better retention of top talent, it also sends a clear message to the workforce about which qualities make good leaders.

"When you're looking to identify and develop high-potential employees, you're [letting those] individual[s] know how important they are to the organization, how you recognize their unique abilities [and how] you want them stay and grow with the company," said Patrick Sweeney, executive vice president of Caliper, an international management consulting firm that developed the Caliper Profile, a personality assessment tool.

"It also allows the rest of the individuals in the organization to see not just the individual you value but the qualities you value. It really brings to life the values of the organization and what you stand for when you identify and recognize people."

Should Every Organization Tell?

Telling is not the right decision for every organization, as doing so depends on corporate culture.

Even though Ken Driscoll, the director of the talent management group at Navistar Inc., an international truck and engine corporation, believes high potentials should be told, his organization does not embrace the practice, and some employees have quit without knowing they were identified as high potential.

Because there are differences of opinion across the four business units, the leaders of each unit make their own decisions about whether to tell or not, which Driscoll said can lead to problems.

"As people transfer from one business unit to another, it can create confusion," he explained. "But for us, to mandate that in our organization or say we're going to adopt that [wouldn't] be wise either. Leadership has to believe that's the right approach."