Porter Novelli's performance management strategy and talent development approach

Porter Novelli Southern Company Case Study Due Week 8 worth 150 points From Goldsmith & Carter textbook, select Porter Novelli (Chapter 12) Southern Company (Chapter 13) case study assignment.

Porter Novelli Case Study

Porter Novelli has established itself within the market as a provider of public relations services to non-profit organizations. Gradually, the company has created points of difference through the integration of technology and innovation. It now serves companies in over 60 countries and in various sectors, such as business, healthcare, education and so on.

Porter Novelli is worth analyzing due to the efficiency of its internal managerial decisions, which have supported its global ascension. In such a setting then, emphasis is placed on four distinctive aspects:

The effectiveness of the roles played by the strategic leaders in the formation of the performance management strategy

The development of an evaluation plan for the effectiveness of the talent management strategy and the statement of the means in which the data would be gathered

Critique and alternatives to the talent management strategy

The functional expertise components of the strategy and its ability to optimize the organizational ability to identify qualified individuals.

2. The roles of leaders

As Porter Novelli worked towards an improvement in its competitive position, it placed an increased emphasis on the management of their human resources and this materialized in the construction of a new plan for the performance management strategy.

The role played by the strategic leaders in this endeavor was fairly important in the meaning that the leaders were in charge of aligning the envisioned goals of the company with the individual goals of the employees (Snell and Bohlander, 2012). In other words, they placed an increased emphasis on the motivation and training of the staff members in an effort to align their commitments and performances with the requirements necessary to attain the pre-established company objectives.

This role of the strategic managers reveals an importance in the creation of a direction, but it was also necessary for the firm to integrate the performance management strategy in an effective and efficient manner. At this level, the strategic leaders placed an increased emphasis on data collection, employee performance evaluation and objectives establishment. They proved generally efficient and effective in aligning these three dimensions to develop and implement the Leadership Pipeline (Goldsmith and Carter, 2009).

4. Critique and alternatives

The talent management strategy developed for Porter Novelli is generally positive and stands increased chances of success. Nevertheless, an important critique brought to it is represented by the fact that the strategy is rather generic, and does not provide specific input on how the goals would be attained (Neely, 2007). For instance, the plan suggests that it would redefine the essence of work and would develop a new talent management focus, "starting from the demand side rather than from the supply side to build the core architecture for talent management" (Goldsmith and Carter, 2009).

Being that it is rather generic, the new recommendation is that of making the plan more punctual. Specifically, it is necessary to devise a clear plan for implementation. Such a plan could be as revealed below:

a) Identification of performance and talent needs

b) Implementation of training programs in accordance with the identified needs

c) Evaluation of the outcomes of the training needs and redesign of new training programs based on the results of the evaluation.

5. Functional expertise component

The proposed strategy is based on the functional expertise component of research, which in turn supports the optimization of the organization's ability to identify talented employees. Specifically, the focus of the strategic approach is that of conducting thorough research in order to first identify the needs of employee training. At this level, emphasis would be placed on the identification of the skills and knowledge necessary to adequately perform the tasks of a given position. Then, these skills and knowledge would be compared with the skills and knowledge as possessed by the assessed individual.

This approach allows the company to identify the exact needs of how to best manage the talent and which employees require training. Additionally, it also reveals the extent of the training necessary to each employee. In turn, the company would devise and implement targeted training sessions, which support company optimization through the ability to maximize the efficiency of the resource usage.

6. Conclusions

All in all, Porter Novelli is an international leader of the PR industry, with an established and consolidated position within the market. In order to further improve its competitive strength, the company is required to implement a wide strategic program of increasing customer satisfaction and market penetration. Still, in order to attain this objective, it is necessary for the company to strengthen its internal environment.

This effort is centered on the development and implementation of a new talent management program, namely the Leadership Pipeline. This program is based on the redesign of the job and the stimulation of employee performances, yet it is unclear as to how these objectives would be attained. In order to address this limitation, a more targeted approach should be taken.

References:

Cheese, P., Thomas, R.J., Craig, E., 2007, The talent powered organization: strategies for globalization, talent management and high performance, Kogan Page Publishers

Goldsmith, M., Carter, L., 2009, Best practices in talent management: how the world's leading corporations manage, develop and retain top talent, John Wiley and Sons

Neely, A.D., 2007, Business performance measurement: unifying theories and integrating practice, 2nd edition, Cambridge University Press

Snell, S.A., Bohlander, G.W., Managing human resources, 16th edition, Cengage Learning