Victory Through Organization: Why the War for Talent is Failing Your Company and What You Can Do About It – Dave Ulrich, David Kryscynski, Wayne Brockbank, Mike Ulrich
HR is not about HR, but about delivering real value to the business
The competitive advantage is what you do with the talent once you have it.
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When people are given challenging responsibilities, autonomy to control their outputs, participation in decision making, and visible and valuable recognition, it meets virtually all of the criteria for effective rewards.
The Less Obvious Roles of HR Professionals
Nurturing a staff culture that will be most beneficial to the organization’s customers, and managing effective employee development and recognition are part of what it takes to develop thriving companies
However, along with these organizational competencies, HR professionals as individuals need to devote attention to their less obvious, but extremely valuable, roles. 
HR Competencies Needed Today Part 1
- Strategic positioner: position a business to win in its market
- Credible activist: build relationships of trust by having a proactive point of view
- Paradox navigator: manage tensions inherent in making change happen
- Culture and change champion: make change happen and weave change initiatives into culture change
- Human capital curator: manage the flow of talent by developing people and leaders, driving individual performance, and building technical talent.
HR Competencies Needed Today Part 2
- Total rewards steward: manage employee well-being through financial and non-financial rewards.
- Technology and media integrator: use technology and social media to drive high-performing organizations.
- Analytics designer and interpreter: use analytics to improve decision-making.
- Compliance manager: manage the processes related to compliance by following regulatory guidelines.
Become a Paradox Navigator
The role of Paradox Navigator is most closely tied to business performance. Yet this is an area where many HR professionals were lacking expertise.
Paradox navigators need to effectively manage tensions between:
- Global and local demands
- Need for change and stability
- Gathering information and making decisions
- Internal and external hiring
- Individual needs and collective needs
- Employees vs. customers and investors
- Top-down and bottom-up.
The Paradoxes
Transcend Paradox: Clarify the poles
- Define best outcomes – how both sides relate to success criteria
- See others’ points of view—how do others experience the paradox?
- Find common ground—where do we agree and disagree?
Transcend Paradox: Cognitive Complexity
Dealing with cognitive complexity is the top skill that helps to transcend paradox. Cognitive complexity involves seeing different sides of an issue, respecting other people’s points of view, learning new ideas (20-25% every 2 years), and seeing patterns in events.
High potential individuals are interested in on-the-job assignments that are challenging and valuable … because they want to create a track record of documented results.
Improving Employee Performance
Using employee involvement to improve staff performance takes an organizational approach to the pervasive problem of low engagement. The goal is to move from cynicism to commitment, isolation to community, and for employees to have a sense of purpose and social responsibility in their work.
Connecting Employees and Customers
One of the most interesting ways companies are involving employees is by connecting them with customers for feedback.
This could mean having employees listen to customer service calls, engaging more employees in market research and social media, having customers visit the company’s office, having customers participate in employee training, and even locating employees to work out of a customer’s facility.
