Talent Management

My 34th Birthday party at our house - family, friends, food and fun

In HR, the latest buzz word is Talent Management.  I normally abhor buzz words, trends, and the "next best thing."  But today I had the opportunity to sit with our plant management team to talk about people.  An amazing thing happened, we talked about people in a constructive way, in a way that will help them grow and develop - and be ready for the next challenges of our business.  We focused on the human resources aspect of the business, which is an HR person's dream.  I am fortunate to have the opportunity to facilitate these discussions, and I must admit, my bossy personality has finally paid off.  My parents probably didn't see a benefit to this obnoxious personality trait, but I keep people on task and on time.  I felt like we were productive in creating a game plan to fill the upcoming retirement vacancies, and to provide meaningful opportunities for our most talented people.  This goes further than the most talented people, though, we talked about all levels of the organization, how to keep people engaged and minimize the retention risk.  

The day wore me out, though.  Facilitating managers two to three levels above me, and 20-30 years older than me is challenging, at best.  I've been in my role for 4 years and feel comfortable doing this, but I know in the back of their minds, I'm still just a 'kid' - and one without an engineering background, which is to my detriment (to them).  This kind of attitude will likely drive me away from manufacturing in the long-term, but I can't speculate that now.  I work for a great company that believes in developing and challenging people.  However, my status as a women and the fact that I didn't take a manager position offered to me (which would have uprooted my family at a time we couldn't take that risk) makes me feel like I'm being left behind.  I've expressed this concern, only to have it swept under the rug.  Yet I still feel like my decision set me back a couple of years in my career.  It's something I have to live with now.  My decision to earn my Ph.D. was my own remedy to this woe.  This terminal degree will take 4-5 years, but it's worth every moment I spend, because I will be able to write my own destiny, instead of wallowing in the "woe is me."  I think for women, we have to have this ability to control our own futures, which is why more and more women leave corporate America to start their own businesses.