Are you suffering under the Dilbert Paradox?
Ever wonder why Dilbert and The Office are so popular?
Because inside every cartoon strip and TV episode are scripts we have all seen in our own organizations or those we interact with.
This post over on the HBR blog, Six Fundamental Shifts in the Way We Work caught my attention because it talks about what is fundamentally changing in the business landscape and offers some practical insights to get you rethinking your business.
I want to talk about one of the six fundamentals that resonated immediately with me.
# 5 The Dilbert Paradox holds the key. Here is what the authors said,
"Here's the paradox. Ask CEOs about their top priorities and inevitably they will cite talent as one of their top priorities. If this is the case, how do we explain the enormous popularity of Dilbert and The Office, which so eloquently describe the stultifying effect of our work environments on talent?
In part, the paradox arises because executives tend to focus on talent acquisition and retention, but do not invest much time on talent development throughout the firm. When they think about talent development, they spend time designing training programs rather than re-thinking the work environment to accelerate talent development. If they took on-the-job talent development seriously, they would reassess all aspects of the firm - strategy, operations, organization and information technology platforms - to find ways to foster even more rapid talent development."
I think these authors are getting at something fundamental. Isn't it much better to begin to think about your talent pipeline as a competitive weapon? Shouldn't your talent management strategy be specifically designed to accelerate your strategy implementation and the priorities of your organization?
Actually # 6 Passion is Everything and # 4 The Collaboration Curve Supplants the Experience Curve are also two more that I think are extremely relevant to what we are finding in CPA Firms and corporations as we talk about what is different since The Great Recession of 2008 began.
These authors also have a book out, The Power of Pull which I was introduced to by my friend Mike Willis at PWC - it is a user's guide to the New Normal and well worth a read!
We have written about this in several other posts:
Eight Benefits of Creating an Organizational Development Plan