Democratizing Talent Development: The Future of Work is Now

7th August 2020

Anne Fulton, CEO and Founder of Fuel50, recently joined Jason Averbook on the “NOW of Work” podcast for a fascinating conversation around the new talent dynamic and democratizing talent development for the future of work.

Talent development is nuanced, with career engagers, motivators, individual values, and skill gaps of each employee determining potential career opportunities. So how can it be scaled for an entire workforce?

You democratize it.

Today’s talent marketplaces are really aiming to connect people to the opportunities within organizations, not just jobs but mentors, learning experiences, and stretch assignments and all of those things that we need to grow our careers and maximize our talent in an organization.

A New Talent Dynamic

There is a new power play that exists today that was not necessarily there three or four months ago. We have a new talent dynamic as we have new labour market supply dynamics happening.

There is a collective responsibility, a social responsibility, that we in organizations have today to our people. Organizations must be above reproach when it comes to their talent decisions.

This new talent dynamic is raising the bar about the way that we think around our responsibilities for talent. Our talent decisions need to be ethical, humane, inclusive, robust, and defensible.

Talent intelligence and talent decision making right now is critical. Make sure you have the critical talent where you need it and a talent supply to support that. That talent intelligence is gold dust for an organization.

Talent intelligence and talent decision making right now is critical. Make sure you have the critical talent where you need it and a talent supply to support that. That talent intelligence is gold dust for an organization.

Democratizing Talent Development

Talent management systems used to be top-down, compliant-driven, and dictated by HR. What the Fuel50 platform achieves, and what we think is the future of talent enablement and talent optimization, is employees that are completely enabled to drive the utilization of their talents. Put that into the talent marketplace and that’s going to drive talent optimization across the organization so that you do have the right skill and capability where you need it, when you need it, and in an agile way.

Essentially, we like to put the ownership of career or talent development back into the hands of the one person who should own their own future – the employee.

We still think that the leader or the manager has a role to play, and we also believe in pushing information to them (at the touch of a button), so that they can see the career engagers, motivators, values, interests, and skill gaps of each of their employees. In fact, pushing that information into the hands of line managers, not just HR, is one of our core goals.

That being said, we really want to power up HR and business partners and chief people officers to be able to have the data that they need to take to their stakeholders around the capability gaps and succession risks and reskilling momentum across the business. Information is power. We want to provide people with great information so that they can make great decisions, no matter what level they’re at across the organization.

Information is power. We want to provide people with great information so that they can make great decisions, no matter what level they’re at across the organization.

The Future of Work: Reskilling, Agility and Resilience

One of the things that we were anticipating as we came into 2020, and it is no less an imperative than it was, is rapid reskilling of the workforce.

Agility and resilience in the workforce are in hot demand right now. People are pivoting, being repurposed, and redeployed into different parts of the business so having a workforce that is agile and skill-ready enough to be redeployed into other areas of the business is something of incredible economic value.

Reskilling, growth and increasing marketability and value to the organization – those things are super important. Careers are not linear anymore. They are not necessarily vertical. They really are about that agility, playing in place, pivoting, and finding where the stretch is for you. It is a different mindset.

There is also more of a gig mentality coming into jobs. That kind of mentality is likely to be more common going forward, whereas committing to and investing in a career – e.g. joining one of the big four firms and being on a roadmap or a train track in terms of the future – that is a thing of the past. We are predicting that job titles will not exist, but instead it will all be about the project that you are contributing to.

Agility and resilience in the workforce are in hot demand right now. People are pivoting, being repurposed, and redeployed into different parts of the business so having a workforce that is agile and skill-ready enough to be redeployed into other areas of the business is something of incredible economic value.

The Future of Work: Transparency and Inclusivity

In the past, projects have often not been resourced transparently. At Fuel50, we want inclusivity into those project decisions so that everyone has a chance to put their hand up and the business leaders or the line managers have an opportunity to see who the best fit for that project might be. We are all global now. We are all working remotely so anyone can put their hand up but who is the best talent? Is there some hidden talent across your business that might be a wonderful resource?

The feedback loop that takes place after a project, for the skills and contributions that that person has made, becomes a kind of virtuous gain cycle. It is a success spiral for the employee and for the business – a learning loop. Therefore, there is more workforce agility as there are more people ready, skilled, and able to support with what might be a rapidly changing business demand.

At a time when talent optimization and internal mobility are more critical than ever for business agility and even business continuity, bringing rigor and science to decisions about talent just makes good business sense.

Enjoy listening to the podcast!