HRHeadStart #76: Product Management to Attract/Retain Talent; Psychological Safety

The Talent Agenda

Building on last week’s ideas on applying Product Management frameworks to HR, we can also apply this thinking to attracting and retaining talent. After all, employment is a product and an exchange of value. A company hires employees to get work done and the employee hires the company to get certain things in exchange for their skills, time and energy.

To sell the “employment” product, there are a few fundamental questions to think through:

1. Target Market: Who are you selling to? Which segments of the talent marketplace are you targeting? What are their characteristics and needs?

2. Product Development: What is your employment product and how does it help the target customers solve their needs? What are the product features and benefits?

3. Value Proposition Delivery: How does the product make your target customer’s life and career better? How will you communicate and deliver the value proposition?

Check out this post to explore this idea in detail.

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Working Better

We often talk about the need for organizations, teams and individuals to be responsive to the changing business environment, yet we often find ourselves working in low-trust cultures.

Data from Gallup indicates that this is improving, but still quite low. Such environments create low levels of psychological safety and people don't feel comfortable voicing ideas and concerns to others. This slows down learning, which is a crucial ingredient for success.

But instead of solely putting it back on the managers, here are some ways to take the initiative and bring up difficult conversations with your manager. The essence is to find ways to bring your manager into your world and involve them in the problem-solving process rather than have them act as a bystander.

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Tiny Thought

One of the best ways to earn trust is by giving it.