Defining the Talent Focused Organization and Insight from Yahoo's Marissa Mayer

In recent discussions with global HR leaders about their career aspirations, statements like: “I want to work for a Talent focused CEO” or “I will only consider a Talent focused organization” have come up more often than usual lately in all regions. “But what exactly does this mean?” is a question we posed to members of our HR and Talent Management leader network over the past couple of weeks.

No doubt there is much wisdom written on the topic — too much to analyze or attempt to regurgitate here. On a practical level, one definition we heard that makes a lot of sense is the notion that: ‘a talent focused company is one which strives to have an engaged, motivated and aligned workforce. This would be driven by the top leadership of the company and this commitment would be long-term and sustainable. The tools to drive the talent agenda would be considered to be a critical area for investment.’ In short, a ‘Talent Focused Organization’ could be defined as: ‘a company which has a long-term leadership driven commitment to exceptional levels of employee engagement.’

However, as we know, this is easier said than done and there is no commonly understood approach to exactly how employee engagement should be most effectively defined or achieved.

In a recent Forbes article (June 2012), employee engagement was defined as: the emotional commitment the employee has to the organization and its goals. Forbes went on to say: “This emotional commitment means engaged employees actually care about their work and their company. They don’t work just for a paycheck, or just for the next promotion, but work on behalf of the organization’s goals.”

Two key points were:

• Employee engagement does not mean employee happiness. Someone might be happy at work, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they are working hard or productively on behalf of the organization.
  
• Employee engagement doesn’t mean employee satisfaction. Many companies have “employee satisfaction” surveys and executives talk about “employee satisfaction”, but the bar is set too low. A satisfied employee might show up for her daily 9-to-5 without complaint. But satisfied isn’t enough.
  

Yahoo’s Marissa Mayer’s recent decision to ban working from home has created widespread public discussion and debate. This decision strikes at the heart of the notion of workforce/employee engagement in quite a dramatic way due in part to the fact that this move runs counter to recent trends where remote working is becoming much more commonplace within multinational corporations. Conventional wisdom suggests that the ‘modern’ workplace is a flexible one, where workers are not always expected to be present in office locations. For every outcry that ‘this edict is taking the workplace back to the stone ages’, there is an opposing and equally passionate view. Some headlines on this topic include:

• “Marissa Mayer Should Focus on Employee Engagement”
  
• “Sir Richard Branson disagrees with Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer: ‘One day offices will be a thing of the past.’”
  
• “Dear Marissa Mayer, You’re Ruining It For The Rest of Us”
  
• “Mayor Bloomberg Agrees With Marissa Mayer, Says Telecommuting is Dumb”

With regard to the first headline above, it can be argued that Ms. Mayer is indeed focusing on employee engagement when she states the need for employees to collaborate, stand shoulder-to-shoulder and help to build ‘one Yahoo’. Whether one agrees with Ms. Mayer or not, it’s clear that she is also making a statement that employee engagement isn’t just for HR to deal with (true) and that employee engagement needs to be a strategic business initiative (arguably true).

Given the polarizing effect of the working from home ban, it is probable that it will be rough sailing with high levels of employee turnover at Yahoo in the coming weeks and months. Thereafter — this move could prove to have a positive effect. It’s likely a pretty safe bet that those who stay at Yahoo over the medium-long term will be highly engaged believers in the cause. Whether Ms. Mayer can turn the business around — and whether this initiative can ‘kick start’ some positive change remains to be seen.

Employee engagement is all about commitment and loyalty of the individual to the company. It means contributing to the work using discretionary effort — going ‘above and beyond’. It’s all about caring about the results. One can argue with Ms. Mayer’s methods, however, it’s hard to argue that she isn’t putting more emphasis on creating a Talent focused organization with an engaged workforce than many other far more experienced and tenured CEOs.