Best Practices in Talent Management: How the World's Leading Corporations Manage, Develop, and Retain Top Talent (Pfeiffer Essential Resources for Training and HR Professionals) [Hardcover]

Marshall Goldsmith (Author), Louis Carter (Author), The Best Practice Institute (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0470499613 | ISBN-13: 978-0470499610 | Publication Date: December 30, 2009 | Edition: 1

Praise for Best Practices in Talent Management

"This book includes the most up-to-date thinking, tools, models, instruments and case studies necessary to identify, lead, and manage talent within your organization and with a focus on results. It provides it all—from thought leadership to real-world practice."

Patrick Carmichael

head of talent management, refining, marketing, and international operations, Saudi Aramco

"This is a superb compendium of stories that give the reader a peek behind the curtains of top notch organizations who have wrestled with current issues of talent management. Their lessons learned are vital for leaders and practitioners who want a very valuable heads up."

Beverly Kaye

Founder/CEO: Career Systems International and Co-Author, Love 'Em or Lose 'Em

"This is a must read for organization leaders and HR practitioners who cope with the today's most critical business challenge—talent management. This book provides a vast amount of thought provoking ideals, tools, and models, for building and implementing talent management strategies. I highly recommend it!"

Dale Halm

Organization Development Program Manager, Arizona Public Service ?

"If you are responsible for planning and implementing an effective talent and succession management strategy in your organization, this book provides the case study examples you are looking for."

Doris Sims

Author, Building Tomorrow's Talent

"A must read for all managers who wish to implement a best practice talent management program within their organization"

Fariborz Ghadar

William A. Schreyer Professor of Global Management, Policies and Planning Senior Advisor and Distinguished Senior Scholar Center for Strategic and International Affairs Founding Director Center for Global Business Studies

Editorial Reviews

From the Inside Flap

Best Practices in Talent Management offers a hands-on resource, which contains the most current and important information on how to attract, retain, and motivate top talent within any organization.

Designed to meet the needs of today's organizations, this handbook is filled with practical advice on how to implement employee and customer-centered programs that emphasize consensus building; self, group, organizational, and one-on-one awareness and effective communication; clear connections to overall business objectives; and quantifiable business results.

With lessons from companies that are widely recognized as among the best in organization change and leadership development, the book is offers invaluable lessons for succeeding during challenging times. As best practice organizational champions, these companies share many similar attributes including openness to learning and collaboration, humility, innovation and creativity, integrity, a high regard for people's needs and perspectives, and a passion for change. And all these outstanding organizations have invested in human capital—the most important asset inside of organizations today.

Best Practices in Talent Management offers lessons from the world's best organizations in various industries and sizes, and shows how to identify the key elements of leading successful, results-driven talent management; access the tools, models, instruments, and strategies for leading talent management; apply practical "how-to" approaches to diagnosing, assessing, designing, implementing, coaching, following-up on, and evaluating talent management; and measure critical success factors and critical failure factors of a program.

No matter what the size or mission of your organization, Best Practices in Talent Management will be your guide for diagnosing, assessing, designing, implementing, coaching, and evaluating a winning team of talent.

About the Author

Marshall Goldsmith, Ph.D., is one of a select few advisors who have been asked to work with over 120 major CEOs and their management teams. A prolific author, his book What Got You Here Won't Get You There was ranked as the #1 best-selling business book by the The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. For ten years, he served as a member of the Board of the Peter Drucker Foundation.

Louis Carter is the Founder and CEO of the Best Practice Institute, and a world-renown leadership and organization change advisor. He is the author of over nine books on best practices including Change Champion's Fieldguide and Best Practices in Leadership Development and Change.

Best Practice Institute (BPI) is an association of executives and leaders who share and pioneer best methods of organizational change. Best Practice Institute produces online learning sessions, webinars, Benchmark Research Groups, publications, and certification programs. (www.bpiworld.com)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Pfeiffer; 1 edition (December 30, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470499613
• ISBN-13: 978-0470499610
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.1 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #159,770 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ultimately, the effectiveness of best practices depends on those who execute them, January 4, 2012

By 

Robert Morris (Dallas, Texas) - See all my reviews
(TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Best Practices in Talent Management: How the World's Leading Corporations Manage, Develop, and Retain Top Talent (Pfeiffer Essential Resources for Training and HR Professionals) (Hardcover)

As co-editors Marshall Goldsmith and Louis Carter explain, the material in this book focuses on 14 dynamic enterprises (i.e. Avon Products, Bank of America, Corning, CES, Ecolab, GE, IRS, Kaiser Permanente/Colorado Region, McDonald's, Microsoft, Murray & Roberts, Porter Novelli, Southern Company, and Whirlpool) that were selected by the Best Practice Institute because they have succeeded in implementing talent enhancement programs - "although, to be fair, to call them `programs' is not entirely accurate, as they are in reality vital strategic components integrated into the companies' core operating values." Indeed, had they not been so integrated, neither they nor their companies could become, much less remain, vital and dynamic. There is a separate chapter devoted to each of the 14, written by one or more of the contributors who were invited to participate. It is important to keep in mind that in an age when several companies "built to last" haven't and others once great are no longer even good, at least a few of the 14 in this book may no long be exemplars of anything, except perhaps of how quickly an organization can become weakened in one way or another.

I appreciate the material provided in the Conclusion introduced by this explanation: "In order t0 present a fuller and more complete picture of the best practices in talent management, in March 2009 the Best Practice Institute [of which Cater is founder and CEO] released results from a groundbreaking survey of some of America's most dynamic companies." An overview is provided in the Conclusion. Then in the Epilogue, William J. Rothwell suggests several "key take-away points" from each of the 14 mini-case studies. From Ecolab, for example, "This case is outstanding for illustrating how a talent program can be built on, and leverage, the organization's culture and values. These values include, according to the case, (1) spirit; (2) pride; (3) determination; (4) commitment; (5) passion; and (6) integrity. The talent program was based on internal interviews of company executives." Obviously, brief take-away points merely serve as triggers to recall insights that are developed in much greater depth, in context.

Presumably Goldsmith and Carter are responsible for the reader-friendly format that most of the contributors adopt (with only minor modification) and graphic devices such as Figures that consolidate a wealth of information about an especially important subject such as Avon's "Talent Investment Matrix" (Page 6), Corning's "Program Snapshot - Week One" (50), Ecolab's "Success Indicators for Business Drivers at Each Pipeline Level" (90), "IRS Leadership Core Responsibilities" (119), McDonald's "Performance Drivers" (162), and Microsoft's "Key Stakeholder Roles for HiPo Coaching program" (196). Because they are best practices, these and others examined in the book should serve as exempla that suggest possibilities rather than as templates to be adopted without revision or modification. That is to say, doing what is right and doing it right pose entirely different challenges.

Those who share my high regard for the material in this volume are urged to check out George Anders' recently published book, The Rare Find: Spotting Exceptional Talent Before Everyone Else, as well as Dean Spitzer's Transforming Performance Measurement: Rethinking the Way We Measure and Drive Organizational Success, and Enterprise Architecture As Strategy: Creating a Foundation for Business Execution co-authored by Jeanne W. Ross, Peter Weill, and, David C. Robertson.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Incredible collection of talent management techniques and best practices, October 20, 2011

By 

Josh Henderson - See all my reviews

This review is from: Best Practices in Talent Management: How the World's Leading Corporations Manage, Develop, and Retain Top Talent (Pfeiffer Essential Resources for Training and HR Professionals) (Hardcover)

This book is an incredible resource for anyone dedicated to attracting, retaining and motivating top talent within their business. Each chapter serves as its own white paper of best practices regarding talent management within some of America's most powerful and intriguing organizations. Each case study supplies a surprisingly granular review of the best practices utilized by experts and organizations throughout a variety of industries. On top of it all, each chapter is written by the practitioners who not only utilize these methods but many times developed and implemented them as well. I found the format to be well thought out, the professionals incorporated to be superlative, and the content to be outstanding. If you are looking for an eclectic industry review of the best practices regarding talent management then look no further.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great read, May 16, 2011

By 

DBQ leader - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Best Practices in Talent Management: How the World's Leading Corporations Manage, Develop, and Retain Top Talent (Pfeiffer Essential Resources for Training and HR Professionals) (Hardcover)

This book is a great read and very informational. Lots of information on the Resource development plans of different companies.