In at this time’s fast-paced and aggressive enterprise panorama, figuring out and creating high-potential expertise is essential to making sure organizational success. However what makes somebody a high-potential worker, usually often called a “HiPo”?
How can organizations construct frameworks to acknowledge and nurture such future leaders, particularly in areas like Asia-Pacific, the place cultural nuances and enterprise dynamics fluctuate considerably?
To realize deeper perception into these questions, HRM Asia spoke with Nicole Dickie, Senior Advisor, Worldwide Distributors, for Hogan Assessments. Dickie emphasised the significance of persona in shaping management potential. As Robert Hogan, psychologist and founding father of Hogan Assessments, famously says, “Who you’re is the way you lead.”
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HiPo staff are sometimes considered as a company’s future leaders, however defining what makes somebody a HiPo might be difficult. Many organizations fall into the entice of focusing solely on an worker’s present efficiency or visibility inside the group. Hogan’s strategy goes deeper, assessing potential via the lens of persona.
In line with Dickie, Hogan’s mannequin focuses on three features of management potential:
- Dependability and competence (Management Foundations): “HiPo people should grasp the basic features of being a superb worker and reliable chief,” says Dickie. This implies constantly following processes, delivering on commitments, fostering a constructive work surroundings and being likable.
- Perceived affect (Management Emergence): The second side, usually extra acquainted to most organizations, displays a person’s capability to be seen as a frontrunner inside the office. “Conventional HiPo identification usually hinges on a person’s organizational visibility and political acumen,” she says. Whereas that is vital—being observed by management and provoking others—it’s not the one measure of potential.
- Crew and expertise growth (Management Effectiveness): The third and maybe most vital side is the power to construct and lead high-performing groups. Dickie notes that this consists of attracting and creating expertise, securing obligatory sources, and attaining strategic enterprise goals.
“These important features of persona set a HiPo aside, distinguishing them via their employability, perceived affect and management potential, and capability to guide groups in the direction of profitable outcomes,” she says. “By specializing in these traits, organizations can higher determine and nurture their succession pipeline with high-quality future leaders.”
And as organizations broaden throughout completely different areas, particularly within the quickly evolving Asia-Pacific market, they face distinctive challenges. Cultural variations, financial situations, and enterprise methods all affect how high-potential staff are recognized and developed.
Advantages of utilizing persona information in HiPo identification
“There is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all answer for expertise administration practices, together with the identification and growth of HiPos,” Dickie says. “The good thing about utilizing persona information for supporting HiPo applications, nonetheless, is that that is relevant to all organizations. Incorporating persona into HiPo applications gives goal information that may eradicate or at the very least mitigate the affect of organizational politics and chief preferences, providing beneficial insights that meaningfully differentiate staff.”
For organizations with out an present HiPo mannequin, Hogan’s framework can function a basis. However Dickie emphasizes flexibility, explaining, “Even when a company already has their very own HiPo mannequin, they will simply incorporate persona traits insights to match their very own definitions of excessive potential and to fulfill the precise wants of a HiPo program internally or of their market or nation.”
This customization is especially beneficial in Asia-Pacific, the place organizations want to stay agile and repeatedly realign expertise methods with altering market dynamics.
Hogan encourages organizations to undertake the Japanese “kaizen” enterprise philosophy of steady enchancment to make sure their HiPo applications evolve alongside enterprise goals.
HiPo applications as key to succession planning
Succession planning and HiPo identification go hand in hand. In line with Dickie, HiPo identification applications are a part of the inspiration of a company’s succession technique and ought to be intently related with the general expertise technique. “Succession planning, similar to all strategic initiatives,” she says, “have to be data-driven to be efficient and assist staff’ quick position growth and future position growth.”
An instance of this strategy might be seen in a metropolis authorities’s growth of a brand new position: chief warmth officer. As local weather change more and more impacts enterprise operations and public security, this authorities wanted a frontrunner who might oversee revolutionary warmth discount initiatives. Utilizing Hogan’s assessments, the hiring managers recognized two administrators whose personalities aligned with the innovation, course of administration and conscientiousness required for this future management place.
“The deal with strategic self-awareness, resulting in behavioral change and maturity, is related to each quick and long-term roles,” says Dickie. This course of not solely boosts staff of their present roles but in addition helps develop the leaders of tomorrow.
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Moreover, organizations usually surprise in regards to the optimum time horizon for HiPo growth. Though this will fluctuate relying on the enterprise technique, Dickie suggests a two- to five-year window for efficient growth. “This gives time and alternative for expertise to develop their strategic self-awareness, change behaviors and achieve maturity, in addition to to accumulate key experiences and to construct crucial abilities wanted for his or her potential subsequent step,” she says.
Take into account her instance from an insurance coverage group in Asia-Pacific. By leveraging Hogan’s HiPo expertise report, the agency recognized promising department managers and applied a two-year growth program combining quarterly coaching with sensible expertise.
“Since beginning this system, a number of HiPos have been promoted,” Dickie says, “and the group has seen important development in organizational bench energy.”
Josephine Tan wrote this story for HRM Asia. Discover extra from this writer at HRMAsia.com
