Creating a Unique Talent Strategy: A Collection of Case Studies

Businesses now recognize the pivotal role that talent plays in the success of their organizations. They need talent strategies and programs that go beyond the ordinary – to achieve solutions that are fact-based and enable greater business performance. To learn more about how Mercer’s depth and breadth of talent management solutions and global resources can benefit your organization, please contact your local Mercer office or visit us at www.mercer.com/humancapital.

Contents

Creating a talent strategy to drive engagement in China

Developing a talent strategy to engage and up-skill staff

Developing a highly skilled workforce during rapid growth

Implementing lean manufacturing processes for a services-based organization

Designing a talent strategy through a three-day summit

Creating a "best fit" talent strategy to close skills gap

About us

About Mercer

About Mercer’s talent management services and solutions

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Creating a talent strategy to drive engagement in China

A global pharmaceutical company had committed to a growth and expansion strategy for emerging markets – China being central to this strategy. While business plans had been rigorously developed and agreed by the board, the organization believed its talent management practices were less robust. To ensure the organization would be successful in China, it knew its talent strategy had to be better aligned to ensure it had a pipeline to meet its goals both now and in the future.

ChallengeAn additional challenge was that this organization operated five unique operating companies (OpCos) each with its own HR programs and practices, creating more complexity around agreeing a way forward. Given this operating model, the organization determined that a talent strategy would need to be developed through a collaborative cross-operating company approach.

Given these challenges, the organization engaged Mercer to design and facilitate a cross-OpCo talent summit in order to:

n Better align current talent management practices with future business goals

n Gain leadership engagement and commitment relative to talent management both across China and within OpCos

n Establish processes to develop talent and establish strong and diverse bench strength

Action and outcomeWorking closely with a cross-OpCo design team, Mercer outlined a three-phased approach to not only create a journey of engagement for stakeholders but also deliver a robust, board-ready talent strategy within three months.

Phase one: Accelerated diagnostics on current state and desired talent requirementsTo ensure an understanding of the type of talent required to support future growth while still engaging existing talent today, Mercer collected insights from three perspectives: leaders, employees and human resources (HR). In-depth interviews were conducted with key OpCo leaders, HR and other stakeholders to determine the current state of affairs as well as future talent requirements. Focus groups with a cross-section of employees were also held to explore the current employment offer as well as the desired experience by looking at the total rewards value proposition (pay, benefits and careers).

The result of phase one revealed:

n Business direction and requirements for China, engaging leaders in defining their needs

n Key talent challenges facing the operating companies

n Desired future state and talent requirements

n The perceived effectiveness of existing talent management programs to support desired outcomes and what was missing

n A set of business-critical priorities and themes ready for validation and action planning during the talent summit

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There was considerable stakeholder buy-in and engagement from a thoughtful process of involvement and inclusion. This was a key success factor in designing a talent strategy that all operating companies could support.

Phase two: Facilitating the talent summitAfter careful planning, Mercer facilitated a stimulating two-day talent summit with more than 50 representatives from five OpCos. The summit involved awareness building and creating a common understanding of the challenges and opportunities which lie ahead. This included external insights from a labor economist and a three-company panel of multinational HR professionals who talked about what their companies were doing, what was working and what wasn’t; as well as trends and themes from the talent marketplace by Mercer consultants.

The second stage was about taking action, prioritizing the critical strategic bets and making tough trade-offs on where to invest. Through a series of breakout sessions, teams of participants worked closely together on two key deliverables (see table below).

The output submitted from the breakout teams formed the input for a final day of planning with operating company CEOs and HR directors. This small team of 10 was tasked with finalizing the strategic choices around a six-month, 12-month and 24-month roadmap for change including a governance process, initiative ownership and metrics by which this group would be held accountable.

Creating a talent strategy through engaging stakeholders

Accelerated diagnostics and summit planning

Facilitating the talent summit Maintaining the momentum

Input Process Output

n Conduct interviews with key OpCo leaders, HR and other stakeholders to determine current and desired state

n Conduct set of focus groups with employees to determine current employment experience as well as desired experience

n Light-touch inventory of existing human capital practices

n Conduct talent movement and turnover analysis

n Undertake summit planning

Day one: Awareness building

Day two: Action planning

Day three: Prioritization

n Develop HC roadmap based on agreements, priorities and plans post-summit

n Work with HR to evaluate the degree of change required to deliver HC roadmap

n Work with "talent council" to drive design and implementation of roadmap

n China employment outlook (Macro- economic view)

n Current trends and challenges

n Feedback from diagnostics review

– Current and desired state

– Breakout on talent challenges

n Multinational external HR panel and Q&A: leading companies discuss what's working, what's not

n Define critical talent requirements given the business strategy, goals and stated challenges

– Talent segments

– Talent priorities

– Talent skills; technical behavioral

– Workforce forecast

– HC programs needed for support

n Define the desired employee value proposition to compete for talent

n Finalize the strategic choices around a six-month, 12-month, 24-month roadmap for change

n Agree governance, assign owners,

determine metrics

n Pitch to global board of directors

Phase three: Creating a talent strategy and maintaining the momentumFrom this collaborative process, a talent strategy was then created, a presentation on recommendations and investment requirements was delivered and a final paper was submitted to the board of directors in the US. The organization received the full funding from the board of directors it needed to execute on its talent strategy in China.

Developing a talent strategy to engage and up-skill staff

A global multinational with a significant presence in China felt a growing concern that more should be done to engage and develop the staff within the marketing function. Engagement scores were down, customer satisfaction results were falling and a technical skills audit found the China team at the bottom of global rankings.

ChallengeAs with many multinationals in China, critical questions needed to be asked and answered if they were to deliver sustainable results through people. Questions such as:

n What type of talent do we need to execute our business plans?

n What is the optimum mix of local versus expatriate and “buy versus build”?

n Can we grow fast enough with the workforce we have?

n What is the current capability of our existing staff?

n How does that compare to the market?

n What programs, practices or policies need to be put into place to achieve our objectives?

The organization determined that if it was going to embark on a transformational experience, it was committed to delivering results in three categories:

For the employee For the organization For the project

n Clarity on and excitement around career opportunities

n Access to and enrollment in world-

class technical development

n Clarity on what it takes to be

successful

n Satisfied and motivated workforce

n Build a world-class marketing function

n Create a great place to work within three years

n Grow local talent first and fast

n Create a longer-term plan to help create a talent pipeline for

marketing

n Increase the engagement of the

workforce

n Establish an employment brand

n Deliver on business expectations

n Engage the current workforce in determining its desired future state

n Deliver an end result to which employees respond

n Build programs that deliver results

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ActionMercer was engaged to help execute these aspirational, yet achievable objectives. We shaped a three-month project around three key phases:

1. Discovery: Collecting insights and perspectives from leadership, HR, employees and internal customersWe conducted a meta-analysis of existing data to understand the current state of affairs. It included a review of current engagement results, career dimensions, attrition data, organizational metrics, technical competency assessment results, as well as existing HR programs. The size of the gap between the existing and required workforce was also studied by reviewing the “SPECs” of the current state:

n A Size gap: Are we going to need more or less people in the marketing function going forward based on different revenue/growth assumptions?

n A Performance gap: Are the people in the role performing at a high enough level and are they productive?

n An Engagement gap: Do our employees deliver enough effort? Do we need more retention or more commitment outside of the marketing role? Do we have an attraction/retention issue?

n A Capability gap: Do our marketers need more, deeper or different capabilities to meet the future business needs?

We determined that this organization needed to redesign its talent strategy and the tactics that deliver the employee experience if it was going to execute on its career and customer promise. This was validated through a series of interviews with the entire marketing workforce capturing the current and desired employment experience.

2. Feedback and prioritization workshopsTo ensure ownership and accountability for the findings, a series of workshops with leadership and other stakeholders were facilitated to review findings and prioritize actions. The focus was to agree on what it would take to become a world-class marketing function in three years.

Three themes emerged as critical for future success:

n Strategy: Setting the strategic direction for building talent – both getting the right support from internal resources and giving the right support to help execute

n Channel: Equipping front-line people managers with the right skills and the right support to execute on the people agenda, along with reinforcing ownership and accountability for grooming and managing people

n Tactics: Creating an environment for building talent with suitable education, collaboration and application for marketers

3. Design: A new roadmap for managing talentThe final step resulted in the creation of a robust talent strategy with priorities and tactics owned by the business. While a draft roadmap was developed, collaborative working sessions were held with key leaders to refine tactics, deadlines and metrics. Ownership for driving the design and implementation was also agreed.

OutcomeBased on our partnership with this organization, our recommendations not only focused on getting the foundational processes right but more importantly on getting organizational commitment to change. Final recommendations were then tested with employees through a series of focus groups to ensure relevance and attractiveness.

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Developing a highly skilled workforce during rapid growth

A professional services firm with 20,000 employees and an annual revenue of more than US$4 billion faced a crucial talent management issue. For the past 10 years it achieved uninterrupted growth and has ambitious goals for preserving its brand and driving profitable growth through geographic expansion and a more diversified portfolio. In the near term, the company projected more than 20% revenue growth and 10% growth in headcount.

ChallengeThe rapid growth planned by the business was dependent on its ability to build and sustain superior talent. The key challenges included:

n Building skills rapidly: Even in a recessionary economy, the labor market is highly competitive for top talent. Some of the company’s mission-critical skills are scarce and external hires are not a sustainable source of capacity – the company needed to learn how to develop and deepen skills internally, and quickly.

n Retaining and engaging a technical workforce: Technical talent was increasingly disengaged. The existing career path and reward structure sent messages about the relative superiority of managers and business developers compared to technical experts. Employee surveys and focus groups revealed an increasing propensity to leave, particularly among mid-level specialist staff.

n Finding more innovative ways to work: Major revenue growth areas and changing customer needs required a more flexible deployment of staff to new geographies. Significant shortages in mission-critical talent and hard-to-fill skills provided the company with the opportunity to leverage new ways of working that met client demands and attracted, developed, retained and engaged critical staff.

ActionThe talent challenges were identified through Mercer’s perceptual and behavioral data analyses and facilitated data inquiry sessions with the company. An early, valuable step was to assemble all the “facts” (for example, recruiting statistics, termination data, exit interview results, skills profiles and employee survey data). As a result of this work, Mercer quantified the unintentional “buy versus build” talent strategy, and put a cost to it. We also tracked promotion rates of key constituencies, finding that the worst bottlenecks in the career ladder were not the ones closest to partnership, as assumed by senior management.

External competitor analysis also proved to be equally important. We collected Mercer data, clients’ own research, public literature on competitor career path strategies, and used findings to understand employees’ career choices when making decisions to join the company or leave when already employed.

The first step involved the production of a fact book – a 200-page “living” book of client data, interview findings and competitor intelligence that we continued to evolve and use throughout the project to ensure credibility of our facts and recommendations. The next stage involved a full-day client workshop provided to team members to review best practices in career progression and techniques in fact-finding and solutions design.

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The project team conducted interviews and focus groups to understand perceptions about what was working or what was not working regarding career progression and how to position a new career strategy to optimize growth. This step included focus groups covering all levels of about 200 employees and more than 70 management and staff interviews. In addition, five online chat room surveys and more than 20 competitor interviews were carried out.

OutcomeThe early indications of staff satisfaction with career progression was positive, as measured by coded chat room comments and in the validation and socialization briefing sessions with managers. The project team delivered a long-term and short-term career progression strategy, including highly visible pilot programs to showcase interim design solutions while testing them. For example, a proto-type technical belting program that was already in progress in one business unit was integrated into the program and implemented as a pilot.

A statement of principles reflecting the organization’s vision and values, business imperatives and career strategy implications was also created. This documentation guided all career strategies going forward. Based on the job content analysis and other fact-finding activities, the organization’s career ladder was changed to accommodate more advancement opportunities and new recognition for technical specialists. And promotion criteria and the organization’s existing competency model were adjusted to align with the new structure. Finally, a new horizontal career path for technical specialists was constructed providing opportunities for skill enhancement, rewards and status for those who enriched their skills without necessarily wanting to advance vertically.

The people strategy vision was first operationalized into a set of year-by-year building blocks

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Visiondesired future

state

Current state

Wave 4: Long term2011+

Wave 3: Mid term< Dec 2011

Wave 1: Near term:< April 2009

Wave 2:Short term< April 2010

Moreleadersfaster

Recognized for developing best-in-class leadership

FLL model defined and communicated

Accelerated development for high

investment, earlycareer leadersLeadership assessments

and curriculum in placefor leaders at all levels

Internal staff is primary sourcing

channel

Refreshed EVP defined and

communicated

“Establish Institute of Technology”

Belting and fellow programs fully

developed and piloted

Fully integrated and aligned processes driveand support business

strategy

Develop specifications for job andemployee profiles

Comprehensive view ofworkforce capabilities – the

“talent inventory” – in relationto current and future business need

Viewed as destination employer

in primary markets

Inventory technical skilldevelopment needs

Continual improvement of talent acquisition metrics,including buy-to-build ratio

Intentional career development across functions and locations

WOW model developed based on learnings from

pilot programs

Straw models of firmcompetencies, “belting” and

fellow programs, level structureand promotion criteria, and

streamlined assessment process

Consultant of choice, with technical pre-eminence

Remote deliveryand virtual teamsthroughout firm

Define mission-criticalroles and hard to fill skills

Monitoring and metrics for talentdevelopment, career progression,

resourcing and mobility and governance and maintenance

What needs to change to better reflect your vision of the journey?

Balancebuild and

buy

Scale upprocesses

Implementing lean manufacturing processes for a services-based organization

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A US-based not-for-profit health care company with 8,000 employees wanted to overhaul its management process and adopt the lean manufacturing methodology for its operational processes for its workforce.

ChallengeThe US health care system was transforming itself as a result of national health care reform mandates. The recession and industry consolidation have accelerated the need for financial and operational efficiencies. The company wanted to introduce lean management processes to improve its performance and financial positions. Lean concepts are commonly used in the manufacturing sector rather than services so there was an obvious challenge adopting these principles in the services environment. However, adopting lean management processes for services-based organizations is becoming a fast-growing trend and the company was keen to take advantage of the benefits many of its cohorts had realized by adopting lean methods.

ActionThe organization wanted to get input from its leadership – the top 100–200 leaders within the company – to better understand and prioritize the human capital requirements necessary to execute its new business model. In fact, talent management was viewed as a potential bottleneck for the organization to successfully implement operational improvements. Leadership wanted to build a talent roadmap that would detail future people capabilities (for example, technical depth versus managerial breadth), organizational structures and management reporting relationships, workforce communication and communication needs, and HR infrastructure.

Mercer's propietary Human Capital Scan was launched to address these questions. In addition, leadership interviews were conducted with the top 10–18 executives. Findings from the scan and leadership interviews were synthesized and presented at an HR leadership workshop. The outcome of the workshop was a straw model talent strategy the HR business leader could socialize with the other business leaders during the executive management operational forum.

Overall findingsThe performance management system had a very wide span of control (1:25 or more). Goal setting was focused on tactical activities and not tied to strategic and operation initiatives such as lean. Future performance management technology investments were in the IT pipeline but had not been financed.

The second talent priority that was identified was the need to further build the future talent pipeline. Individual and managerial career paths need further definition and clarification. Most important was to develop the new generation of middle managers and supervisors skilled in lean management and efficient operations.

The company didn’t differentiate levels of performance so high achievers were treated the same as low achievers. This meant turnover was low because few people left the organization as it was seen as having a friendly culture. This kind of environment wasn’t driving high levels of productivity.

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OutcomeMercer advised the organization with respect to best practices in performance management. We recommended that the company’s performance management system should be able to clearly differentiate high achievers from low achievers.

Role clarification, with respect to individual contributors versus managers, was another recommendation. In a streamlined, lean business model roles and responsibilities must be clear with a direct line of sight to end results.

Succession planning at higher levels was adequate but the company needed a pipeline for middle managers. Mercer recommended the development of a rigorous management competency model to enable the organization to identify, evaluate and develop future middle managers with strong operational and financial acumen.

The talent management straw model workplan was evaluated by the company’s leadership team. Recommendations were prioritized and funded with an 18-month implementation timeline.

Leadership and key talent developmentIdentify competencies uniquely required for a lean organization

Lead

er-

level

com

pete

nci

es

Creates a sense of urgency, accountability and enthusiasm to achieve ‘stretch’ targets by removing cross-functional barriers, aligning efforts across departments to maximize value to company

Drives the achievement of objectives, setting ‘stretch’ goals for the department; continually seeks opportunities to exceedresults ensuring alignment between department and company’s goals

Corporate leader

Manager/senior professional

Supervisor/professional

Competency 1

Competency 2

Results and performanceorientation

Competency 4

Competency 5

Competency 6

Competency 7

Engages self and peers in setting challenging goals and targets; encourages persistence and creativity in overcoming obstacles while aiming to achieve objectives set

Designing a talent strategy through a three-day summit

An oil and gas company wanted to review its current talent practices and integrate them into a longer-term strategy, addressing current gaps and mapping the roadmap for the next three years in terms of focusing its investments in talent and mitigating key risks. The organization’s environment has been hypercompetitive and complex and therefore required thoughtful investments in talent. The company realized the link between better talent and business performance and wanted to systematically close the gap between the talent it had and the talent it needed to successfully respond to current and emerging business challenges.

ChallengeIn an Oliver Wyman study, it found most oil and gas companies lacked an integrated talent management strategy that simultaneously focuses at a high level on attracting, developing and retaining employees with the knowledge and capabilities required for success. Oil and gas companies must get ahead of the curve in terms of knowing what their talent needs will be tomorrow and developing an overall approach to sourcing.

The study on global oil and gas employment trends confirmed the issues experienced by the company. The highest priority challenges emerged as:

n Insufficient supply of external candidates

n Compensation competitiveness

n Breadth of career opportunities and challenges

n Aging workforce

n High attrition among tenured employees (10 years+)

The company had several talent management strategies in place including a well-developed performance management system, a leadership development framework and functional career ladders. Its reward practices were strongly positioned in the market and had significant support from the parent company. The company had identified replacement candidates for its key positions and also recently developed a compelling employee value proposition. It was also using a 360-degree tool to measure leaders’ values behaviors.

ActionMercer spent three days over two weeks working with the company to analyze its desired outcomes, share labor market trends and talent best practices and conduct a high-level gap analysis. Together with the business, Mercer then agreed its key priorities and drafted a three-year roadmap for the implementation of a talent strategy. It was important that the roadmap was focused and realistic as the organization is currently overloaded with business initiatives.

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Mercer started with the end in mind. This included understanding the outcomes the company hoped to achieve and analyzing industry and global labor market issues that would affect them. The outcomes the company wanted included:

n To be a net exporter of talent

n To be less dependent on expatriates

n To retain individuals in business-critical roles

n To compete effectively for talent

There were many areas of critical skills in the organization as there are in the rest of the industry, especially in technical, drilling, sub-surface engineering, social performance and operational excellence. Furthermore, there is a swelling rank of retirees combined with low birth rates and caps on immigration which reduces the working-age population by 20% to 40% over the next few decades. The average age of oil and gas industry workers across the value chain is the mid-40s with more than a third expected to retire in 2012. There is difficulty in attracting entry-level talent into the industry, partly due to harsh and remote exploration and production locations, which have a major negative impact on attracting new talent.

In 2010, there was a 38% shortage of engineers and geoscientists. The organization’s succession bench strength for both leadership and critical positions was already weak and there were fewer experienced candidates available in the market.

The priorities and gaps that emerged reflected a need for understanding talent segments and the talent risk associated with each, with better use of workforce analytics. The potential loss of knowledge and experience through retirement and termination of expatriate contracts needed to be addressed urgently. Retention strategies and further flexible work arrangements needed to be put in place for higher-risk workforce segments.

There were no talent committees or forums where bench strength was analyzed and planned for and this needed to be addressed. The organization was ready to move from simple replacement planning to strategic talent management based on its future needs.

OutcomeKey recommendations included a very focused three-year strategy that started with embedding practices that already existed like a performance management process, functional career ladders and development paths. Furthermore, it was important to start off with a further and more detailed segmentation of the workforce and to conduct talent risk assessments on these segments. The company knew already that it was vulnerable because of an aging workforce and a large dependence on expatriates.

An urgent focus was needed on mentoring and knowledge transfer interventions to ensure that significant organizational knowledge was retained. The initial segmentation and risk data are also useful for building a business case for more sophisticated talent management interventions to gain senior level support.

The company started to assess potential for the top talent pools and started talent reviews for those groups first before adding other talent pool assessments and reviews. In the longer term the organization would like to create talent pools at every layer of the organization. It also intends to implement better systems that will assist in using more advanced data analysis and metrics. Quarterly talent reviews were put in place using multiple assessments and data.

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Put performance back into management Introduce goal setting for entire workforce Hold mid-year reviews and facilitate development discussions Embed career discussions into performance plans

Create a talent management rhythm Analyze workforce segments: Identify critical functions and rolesIntroduce a talent review process Undertake assessment of performance and potential of key segments Establish talent pools and monitor key metrics

Develop workforce plan Project three-five year requirements and gaps Analyze and manage talent risks

Create an infrastructure of support Set up IT to support talent management Increase people manager capability

Three-year talent roadmap with key priorities to drive success

Creating a "best fit" talent strategy to close skills gap

Faced with a serious succession issue and a lack of technical skills in the external market, this critical business division within a large utility company in Greater China had exhausted all internal options for addressing the problem. It was determined that a unique talent strategy was needed to specifically address the challenges that this vital division was experiencing.

Mercer was engaged to help the company deliver the following key objectives:

n Define a talent strategy that will deliver the right capability, at the right time, in sufficient quantity to support this division both in the short term and longer term

n Build bench strength to meet business needs, including:

– Sourcing the right talent into the division

– Training employees to develop the right skill sets

– Building leaders to manage the division in the future, with a particular focus on short-term succession issues

– Developing a career path to groom technical talent from within

n Create an attractive employment deal to attract and retain the right talent, including:

– Creating a total rewards offer: pay, benefits and careers

– Offering employees opportunities to grow

– Presenting an attractive employment proposition to target employees

n Review existing organization structure, including:

– Assessing and redesigning the division's organizational structure and existing roles to meet both the business needs and staff development

ChallengeMaintaining high levels of service was dependent on staffing projects with the right caliber of technical capability as well as maturity of experience. Both of these were in short supply, internally and externally.

Three factors contributed to this unsustainable situation:

n An aging population and retiring senior technical staff made succession management a significant business continuity risk.

n Limited opportunities to present an attractive employment brand given the inflexible, uncompetitive and conservative total rewards offering. The pace of progression and promotion was too slow for a younger workforce compared with talent competitors.

n An improving business environment had also created an additional demand for talent and numerous competitors in the labor market – including the government – which offered better pay. The supply of labor in the technical discipline of this division was also in short supply.

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ActionThrough a rigorous four-step process, Mercer worked closely with this division to develop a comprehensive talent strategy that would address its unique challenges while still working within the parameters of the wider corporate HR policies.

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Develop talent management

strategy

Conduct gap analysis and

prioritizeaction steps

Define desired state: Clarifythe business

plan and futureworkforce

imliplications

Assesscurrent state

Step 1 Step 2 Step 3 Step 4

Step 1: Assess current stateThe first objective was to provide a precise and comprehensive profile of the division’s current workforce and people management practices (including the factors influencing attraction and retention) and to characterize the dynamic forces that drive the “internal labor market.” This information was gathered through a structured interview process based on Mercer's human capital model as well as by conducting an inventory of current practices and reviewing the degree of alignment to business strategy. The division’s “internal labor market” – employee movement, in, up and across the organization, the promotion patterns, recruitment statistics and attrition statistics – was also reviewed.

Finally, an external labor market analysis was conducted to review the competitiveness of the organization’s employee value proposition as well as the size and availability of talent. Mercer interviewed former employees to capture perceptions of the benefits and drawbacks of working within the division.

Step 2: Define the desired stateMercer then reviewed and assessed available data on competitor positions, people practices and competitive positioning in the external market. Workforce requirements were also outlined based on a business strategy review. Finally, a one-day talent workshop was facilitated to share findings from current state analysis and envision the future talent requirements and practices for the division.

Step 3: Conduct gap analysis and prioritize actionsWith the desired state clearly identified, we determined the gaps between current workforce realities and what was required to accomplish the division’s business goals. The implications of the findings formed the basis for the new way forward.

Step 4: Develop talent management strategyWorking with the division’s leadership team, we drew upon the core principles and priorities identified in Step 3 to define and articulate a new talent strategy including workforce capabilities and four dimensions: talent acquisition, development (including career management), performance management, and rewards (refer to table opposite). An employee value proposition was also developed directly from the talent strategy.

Metrics were defined to assess the success of the talent strategy, guide the design of specific programs, as well as monitor results. A final workshop with the design team and select leaders was also facilitated to agree the talent strategy and all key priorities.

Implications of current state findingsn Levels of employee commitment could be changed but require a new way of thinking about

employment and careers.

n Systematic development of all staff is needed given likelihood of increased turnover.

n Enhanced employment offer which may increase costs but deliver better service to end users and maintain a pipeline of talent.

n Different and alternate workforce characteristics and profiles are needed for a viable, stable workforce.

n Alternate routes to recruitment may help enhance the division's "employer brand."

n Required investment to develop clear, transparent talent management strategies that deliver against business commitments.

n Enhanced accountabilities need to be given to managers to develop them into future leadership positions.

n Uncompetitive pay impacting both attraction and retention.

OutcomeBased on Mercer's approach, we were able to develop a “best fit” talent strategy and corresponding tactical recommendations for closing the talent gap. These recommendations included a focus on the detailed steps, the rationale behind the recommendations, as well as internal and external constraints. In addition to key benefits, necessary resources and suggested measures of success were also defined.

An implementation roadmap was designed to communicate the timeline of activities. Finally, the estimated level of investment was calculated to ensure budgets were properly allocated.

Division's talent strategy

Division objectives

Talent acquisition

n Redefine target talent market for acquisition to enable more choice and stability in the workforce

n Communicate and implement an employee value proposition which is in tune with the new workforce requirements

n Improve division brand to enhance ability to attract targeted talent

n Over the long term evaluate a ‘partnership’ model with external consultants

Talent development

n Build a careers infrastructure to support talent strategy

n Define new behavioral requirements

n Increase division management capability to take on increasing levels of accountability

n Undertake assessment against new requirements

Workforce outcomes

n Be a business partner to internal customers

n Complete projects on time

n Make projects commercially successful

n Deliver on new and unique customer requirements (wind energy, LNG for example)

n Alignment with business imperatives

n Development of cost-efficient, flexible and well-trained internal labor market

n Better return on investment from human capital

n Increased productivity of staff

n Increased satisfaction and engagement of workforce

n Capture and share intellectual capital

n Enhance performance culture

Successfactors

Rewards

n Introduce a division-specific total rewards strategy that supports the business model, human capital strategy and a pay-for-performance culture

n Redefine titles to be more market oriented

n Introduce a retention program for 'at risk' critical talent (with clearly defined criteria)

n Undertake thorough market pricing which may imply changes to the definition of the talent market and positioning

Performance management

n Develop clear individual development plans; as well as execute on succession plans

n Clarify performance expectations

n Enhance transparency and (re)communicate performance management philosophy

n Launch new careers infrastructure and employee value proposition

n Positive community and stakeholder interactions

n Good network with the government

n Scale up for new skills sets

n A viable workforce model to meet future needs

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About Mercer

Mercer is a leading global provider of consulting, outsourcing and investment services, with more than 27,000 clients worldwide. Mercer consultants help clients design and manage health, retirement and other benefits and optimize human capital. The firm also provides customized administration, technology and total benefit outsourcing solutions. Mercer’s investment services include global leadership in investment consulting and multimanager investment management.

Mercer’s global network of more than 20,000 employees, based in over 40 countries, helps ensure integrated, worldwide solutions. Our consultants work with clients to develop solutions that address global and country-specific challenges and opportunities. Mercer is experienced in assisting both major and growing, midsize companies.

The company is a wholly owned subsidiary of Marsh & McLennan Companies, which lists its stock (ticker symbol: MMC) on the New York and Chicago stock exchanges.

About Mercer’s talent management services and solutions

To support effective talent management, Mercer offers services and solutions in the following areas:

n Talent strategy and workforce planning – Aligning talent with dynamic business needs

– Talent requirements, segmentation and critical roles

– Workforce planning

n Workforce capabilities – Building or improving workforce capabilities to drive business performance

– Core capabilities/skill sets/competency frameworks

– Career leveling and career management

– Mercer College

n Leadership – Building or improving the pipeline of ready, capable leaders

– Strategy

– Assessment

– Development

– Deployment/succession planning

– Leadership alignment

n Performance management – Accelerating workforce performance and productivity

– Performance requirements

– Outcome-driven goals and accountabilities

– Performance management programs

– Technology-enabled implementation

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About us

For more information about how Mercer can help your organization build the next generation talent management practices, please contact:

Regional

Brenda Wilson+852 3476 3813brenda.wilson@mercer.com

Hong Kong

Kate Bravery+852 3476 3818 kate.bravery@mercer.com

Singapore

Roland Ruiz+65 6398 2609 roland.ruiz@mercer.com

Australia

Marianne Roux+61 7 3234 4829marianne.roux@mercer.com

India

Anurag Aman+91 98 1086 7626anurag.aman@mercer.com

South Korea

Ki Young Sung+82 2 3404 8340kiyoung.sung@mercer.com

China

Miranda Shu+86 10 6103 5509miranda.shu@mercer.com

Japan

Tetsuya Furusawa+81 3 5354 1780tetsuya.furusawa@mercer.com

Argentina

Australia

Austria

Belgium

Brazil

Canada

Chile

China

Colombia

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