Cultivating talent in an organization can be very challenging but as a small to medium-sized business, you've got a few advantages that your larger more institutional cohorts do not:

greater visibility and greater agility.

And this can make all the difference. Giving individualized or team-level attention and investment keeps employees more engaged and feeling valued.

Here are a few questions to warm-up a discussion on talent.

1. Does your organization have a talent development plan? This should match current employees with knowledge or skill development with immediate to medium term project needs. If you have an existing employee with a skill set that is going to match awesomely with an even bigger strategic change you see coming, hold on to that person. In fact, let them know you're considering them for future challenges. It's very unfortunate to see an employee leave before the strategic change is underway or worse, not even recognize they have a skill or talent that could have bridged this future gap.

2. How much time and resource is available for training and talent development? Some organizations offer training daily; some weekly. If the frequency stretches beyond this, sometimes training can be viewed more as an administrative hassle rather than a means to "sharpen the saw."

3. How resourceful can you get? Talent development need not be expensive or formal. For starters, one can create incentives. Awards for perfect attendance, higher scoring, and/or innovation of training used on the job. Make talent development a little fun. If you have a training budget, evaluate existing programs. Don't forget to use the talent in your organization for talent development. One of my customers, a thriving engineering firm, is gifted with a highly knowledgable technical leader. From time to time, this leader will hold lunch & learns, providing technical insights and fundamentals on current problems or projects.

It's simple.

It's brilliant.

And it gets all of the talented minds in the same room to gain insights into current challenges.

Motivating Talent development x Training Consistency = Bigger successes

Need a spark to get your talent development moving in the right direction? Let's connect

jchen@amphib-digital.com