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Originally Published in Fair Value

Last Autumn, I gave an interview and later wrote about the importance of developing talent in organizations. My claim was that by creating opportunities for people to grow, we reap the reward of their unique and valuable contributions to our overall goal. That much, I said, is mainstream progressive thinking-so, much so that my substantive point was that sticking to the path isn’t always as easy as it seems. Certainly, I’d not expected the core view to be challenged.

Investing in Internal Talent Isn’t Enough

However, some weeks ago, a former colleague put it to me that investing in talent wasn’t enough; what’s more, she pointed out there were numerous examples where I’d personally hired senior leaders in a way that had potentially leapfrogged others in the organization. Surely, she suggested, there were times when building from within was too slow or too haphazard for the needs of a particular situation. And, of course, like all fair challenges, she was right—at least in part.

A commitment to growing and giving space to talent remains fundamental to the health of most companies. It’s especially appropriate in working towards long-term goals when the workforce is relatively stable and, importantly, when there’s sufficient scale and opportunity to allow for regular career progression. Absent some or all of these conditions and the strategy is clearly less productive. But even in the most vibrant and forward-thinking of organizations, there will still be occasions when an injection from outside can be both necessary and beneficial.

Bring In Outside Talent Is Needed

The impetus from fresh perspectives, particularly during periods of change, should not be underestimated. Nor too should the objectivity that external recruits can bring, helping to counterbalance the established cultures and processes which constrain all of our abilities to see things differently. And sometimes, particularly in markets that are changing rapidly, there’s a critical need for skills and insights that simply can’t be developed in-house. Recruitment for these purposes comes at a cost, but if done wisely I believe there’s no inherent conflict with a wider commitment to internal talent and succession plan.

Similarly, there are times when organizations require a short-term injection of skills that would be uneconomic or suboptimal to develop internally. Technology projects, for example, often need experts in coding and system architecture, just as transformation programs will benefit from change management specialists. Even those companies with a depth of internal skills to draw on are likely to have specialist partners to help with areas such as branding, legal matters, or senior recruitment.

Blending Internal and External Talent is Key

This blended approach to internal and external talent is the reality, if not the stated strategy, of most sizable companies. It’s sometimes referred to as the “build-buy-borrow” approach, and the skill is to get the balance right over time while meeting the needs of each situation. Too much emphasis on external recruitment, for example, will lead to demotivation and insufficient embedded knowledge; similarly, outsourcing works best when delivered through trusted partners who understand not only the immediate goals but also the culture and values of the organization, and often its history too.

Temporary, or Interim, Appointments Aren’t Usually Helpful

As an aside, one of the differences I’ve observed over recent years is the extent to which temporary appointments are significantly more common in the UK than in the US. Indeed, in the UK, it’s now not unusual to come across interim specialists whose career is founded on a mix of troubleshooting, project management, and “minding the shop” before the arrival of a permanent appointment. At their best, these specialists can be skilled at driving through the quick and sometimes difficult decisions that a crisis or void demands-but soon as we turn to look at the longer term, the attractions of interim appointments strike me as limited. As a former colleague once put it to me: interims are a very sharp tool to be used for precision and with appropriate care.

Returning to the original theme, while I’ve counter-argued that a blended approach to recruitment is compatible with a commitment to talent, there’s much truth in the suggestion that investment alone is not enough. Even a casual interest in the history of sports will show that the building of great teams is never just about money. Similarly, pouring cash into training and development programs without the appropriate culture and opportunity to support the aspirations this fosters will lead only to roadblocks and frustration; at worst, you’ll end up training colleagues on behalf of your competitors, which is where they’re likely to head.

Two weeks ago, the UK’s Sunday Times published the latest results of its annual “Best Companies to Work For” survey. The poll is a long-established benchmark of employee engagement as measured by colleague opinions to score highly; it’s not enough to have good policies on paper; they must truly resonate with employees across a range of workplace measures. As the “Best Companies” website neatly summarizes, at these leading companies, “… employees encounter inspirational leaders, charitable and environmental initiatives built into work life, a focus on staff wellbeing, fair financial rewards, skills- boosting training and career progression, excellent managers, and teammates who inspire both admiration and fun to lay boys That’s quite a list-and in scanning the results, it struck me that the majority of the businesses which ranked highly were necessarily not simply the feel they have sustained by necessarily the household names we might expect. This suggests it’s not simply the aura of a brand or even scale which makes colleagues feel they have the opportunity; rather, their satisfaction is primarily sustained by an ambition to succeed together, underpinned by values that respect them as individuals.

In-House Skills Isn’t Everything

So, what of the concerns raised by my former colleague? It’s certainly true that there have been occasions when I’ve hired external talent, and in most (though not all) cases, I’d do so again. And I agree that a sole focus on in-house skills, no matter how well-resourced, is unlikely to be sufficient. Indeed, given the uncertainties of commerce and the pace at which change occurs, I doubt any of the leading companies in the Sunday Times survey follow a single-track strategy. But for all that, a blended approach is a more accurate description of what most businesses will follow; without an underlying commitment to progress through people, their options are likely to be more limited and less sustainable.

In many ways, I was pleased to receive the challenge. I enjoyed the discussion, and in truth, our positions were inches apart. Importantly, it was offered in a constructive spirit as an opportunity to explore and learn together. And I’d argue that’s exactly the approach we most need to nurture: a desire to find the best way forward, founded on a commitment to each and all of our abilities, offering scope for personal growth while welcoming newcomers and the skills and perspectives they bring.

Video Transcription

Intro

Jos, we wanted to talk today about driving transformation through corporate culture it’s a phrase we hear a lot about corporate culture. What does it actually mean to you?

What is Corporate Culture?

Corporate culture, in my mind, is the what is corporate culture combination of a set of core behaviors and values that unify a group. Unifies if you want a group of people, whether it’s a corporation, whether it’s an association of people or what have you, and so on.

Corporate Context

Corporate culture is the set of core behaviors and core values that unify, in our particular case, the citizens if you want to connect a group, it’s hard to encourage in a bigger environment.

Environment

The company but there are a lot of factors in the environment that also determines, obviously, how hard it is to implement cultural change, and the legacy of the business is one of them. You may have a small company that has a certain legacy that stems from a much larger PLC background or may have had a much larger market gap. It is complex for instance, Connect Group is a good example, I would say there are other elements, such as the average tenure of

the workforce if you have a younger workforce, it’s easier to implement cultural change, and if you have all the work for us if you work in a very competitive environment where you have

to show agility because of the competitive framework. Where you have to be creative and you have to come up with new ideas or new products that are an easier environment because it’s much less change of first than other environments. So, there are a lot of sort of dynamic aspects that surround if you want an organization that determines how quickly you can implement change, but as a rule, it’s easier, obviously, in smaller organizations than our large organizations.

Tips

Experience in evolving corporate cultures what would your tips be house should we go about I think it’s about repeat repeat repeat I think it’s about starting every meeting after you do your

safety message with the core behaviors that typify the citizen of connect group and not

just in the sense of ‘hey, these are our six or behaviors or core values,’ no utilize specific examples of how adhering to those core behaviors has helped the organization or the individual and in terms of achieving certain personal goals or certain professional goals. That’s the way to start I think every meeting in addition to that we.

Message

have to carry the message the leadership team has to carry the message when we do

our town halls; we have to talk about culture time and time again I always say if you don’t get tired of hearing yourself talking about the core behavior, you should haven’t spoken about

them enough, it’s almost a politician’s life if you want in terms of talking about that specific topic. But it’s extremely important, and one of the things that I would say are the larger the task is the transformational task that’s in front of you, the larger the importance becomes of the corporate culture and the larger the importance of having everybody aligns in terms of behaviors become right so, I would.

Conclusion

Say corporate culture is also a very important tool and in accelerating large transformational tasks, and we shouldn’t of course, engage in an exercise of self-deception cultural change takes

time but most certainly you accelerate the process by talking about it and by giving specific examples and by making it a living conversation rather than you know some words on a poster somewhere it’s written on the wall, yes thank you very much for sharing

your views, thank you.

Just occasionally, we come across something – a person, a performance, a project – that metaphorically hits us in the solar plexus. An encounter so stunning that it takes time to process; for all that, we intuit its significance, even if we don’t quite know why. The experience can be unsettling, and yet it’s compelling, too, reminding us that there’s more to life than the familiar paths and patterns we so easily follow.

By their very nature, we can’t know when these encounters will occur. This is why it’s so important to be open to new – and even challenging – possibilities. The idea that we’ll find fresh insight and invention every day is a sort of contradiction in terms. And while that might be comfortable for some, it’s not the route to growth – be it in business, in life, or simply in ourselves.   

In my case, the latest instance happened at the movies.

Banshees of Inisherin and Life’s Purpose

A few weeks ago, I went to see the magnificent (indeed, I’d go so far as to call it a masterpiece) Banshees of Inisherin. Directed by Martin McDonagh, the film has won a plethora of awards and is about as far from a Spielberg blockbuster as you could imagine. Yet, so impactful did I find it that I’ve replayed it in my mind ever since: its beauty, its layering, the dark comedy that compliments an unfolding as brutal as it is mesmeric. 

But the purpose of my writing here is not to critique the movie. You can find that elsewhere, and many of you may already have seen it. For those who haven’t, the narrative centers on the unraveling of a friendship in the background of the Irish Civil War. It explores themes of life’s purpose, despair, honesty, and humanity – and in truth, that’s a shortened list, for I could just as easily have chosen retribution, fate, or even mythology. And if all that sounds complex, then I guess it is.

Quality Comes at a Price 

But then, that’s the way with quality; it’s never fake or superficial, which means it invariably comes at a price. The cost isn’t necessarily financial; it might be cerebral or emotional, requiring tough choices or letting go of that which we yearn to hold onto. As I write, I’m aware these too are themes of the film…. But aren’t they also themes of life and love and (dare I say it) even leadership, in its broadest sense? 

Quality is Linked to Care

Robert Pirsig, who wrote Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, argued that quality was inextricable from care; that almost anything we do is better experienced – or managed – if we have a deeply felt concern for the issue at hand. And while I can’t prove that theory, I can sense its intuitive wisdom. Perhaps the genius of the Banshees of Inisherin is that as I watched — at times open-mouthed — I felt the agony of the characters and was so desperately sad at the inevitability of their fates – even that of the poor wee donkey!

There’s No Going Back

The ending, like this piece, is open to interpretation. But one message is clear: we can’t undo the past, just as I can’t un-watch the film. The truth is, some choices are so significant — and some events so seminal —that there’s no going back. That’s not a reason not to make them, though, because, unsettling though they are, they are also the ones that make life worth the candle.