Group Companies Need Talent Management

Have you ever wondered why when we have Finance consolidation, HR consolidation is never heard of, and yes I am not talking about the typical HR Accounting stuff.

I think it augurs well for large companies which work across businesses and diversified interests to have a consolidated view to their talent.
I have in my experience dealt with a large number of group companies who have an excellent policy framework to manage the large scale that they cater to ( In India , Group companies manage a few ten thousand to hundred thousand employees), however whats lacking is a single framework to benchmark all the group companies on a common parameter and use that framework to identify top talent across group.

And before i move ahead let me define group companies - Group Companies are responsible for handling and driving the HR policies and strategy for an entire group which may contain different companies (as different legal entities)across diversified businesses.


Thats the challenge and thats something group companies should look to address.

So whats the solution? I would like to call it Talent Consolidation !!!
Group organizations need a single window where they can access key data on their employees.
In today's automated environment the individual companies may have a single / multiple HR systems. What this means is if there is a report requred by the Group CHRO, he would either have someone consolidate this from multiple system (remember, if these are different systems they might be capturing different aspect on employee) thus leading to bigger problems in consolidating data or get this as an individual company view. In either case, it gives only a partial view !!

Lets also see, Why its important for Group Compnaies to focus on Talent Management

1. Talent Management helps create Brand image - Many organizations have successfully used their talent for creating a brand image.
2. Talent Prediction and Analysis enables organization to get a correct picture on talent.
3. Whats most important for me ? Is it succession planning ? Attrition Management or Performance management ? These are talent drivers and they need to be identified correctly
4. A consolidation at a group level can also be the anchor for individual companies.
5. Groupwide talent management can be a factor in retention management.

However does it all happen if group companies do not have access to the data they need. So its important for group companies to not just look at the process part but also built in the enablement by investing in a robust system to help them manage their needs cohesively.
When would Group companies wake up and make this investment ? Only time would tell.