Manager Talent & Skill Assessment
Do your managers have ‘what it takes’ to succeed in this challenging role? Getting the best out of their people and achieving team outcomes.
Assessing potential or current managers is a specialty of our firm. We often support client recruitment efforts as well as performance management issues with current managers by first assessing their talents for ‘people management’.
- We identify the strengths and limitations of managers to first assess their capacity for succeeding in the role as well as to develop their talents into strengths while supporting their management of their limitations.
- We then assess the current skill levels of capable managers and this provides a gap analysis to tailor learning and development that is specific to the individual’s talents.
- Talent assessments are completed in a one and half hour interview and High Performance consults with your organisation and manager as well as providing a detailed report.
- Recruiting for managers, creating development plans for existing managers and directing coaching and mentoring programs all result from effective talent assessment.
- Contact us to discuss this valuable and cost effective tool in the recruitment and development of managers in your organisation.
Talents for Managing People:
Our work and learnings over the last 10-15 years regarding top performing people managers indicates they have key talents for this role beyond their operational/technical expertise. From literally millions of assessment interviews talent researchers have learned that there are four key themes and 18 talents that we need to interview for when assessing manager’s capacity for this important role.
In a 1-2 hour interview we at High Performance assess current managers for their degree of these talents to support the development of their strengths and the management of their limitations. Sometimes this assessment results in the conclusion that the person is not suited for managing but is really a highly regarded senior staff member. We also assess aspiring or potential managers (or management candidates) to provide feedback to our clients (internal or external candidates). You need a clear understanding of each manager’s talents for leading and developing people to hire the best candidates and to develop the best managers.
Skills for Managing:
With little talent, skill development and management training is often wasted. When developing talented managers, we focus on three major areas (and these need to be customised to each role and organisation):
- How they manage their people,
- How they manage themselves, and
- How they manage their ‘business’
Managing People requires skills in performance management, building effective teams, managing projects, coaching, and continuous improvement.
Self-management skills include interpersonal skills in effective communication and building productive work relationships. Continual learning implies skills in their own professional development planning and their thinking skills. And managing themselves involves priority management, planning, and personal discipline.
Managing their ‘business’ requires skills in strategic planning, linking mission to operational objectives, business development, resource maximisation and managing knowledge.
Before any management development program, we seek to assess current skill levels in these three areas as effective managers have observable practices and behaviours. We use a range of assessment approaches to identify current skill levels of managers and this provides a ‘gap analysis’ necessary to create a relevant manager development plan (courses, projects, and coaching). High Performance provides a report on each manager after skills have been assessed.
Further Reading
Why “Management” is Not Enough
What is the “Job” of a Manager?
