ATTRACTING, DEVELOPING AND RETAINING TALENT

The War for Talent never ended. Executives must constantly rethink the way their companies plan to attract, motivate, and retain employees. The McKinsey Quarterly, January 2008.

Debra Ricker France, Marilyn Leahy and Mary Parsons

OVERVIEW: A signicant issue facing R&D managers today is maintaining a stimulating technology organization staffed with appropriately skilled individuals who share the vision of the corporation and constitute talented and effective teams. At the 2008 Industrial Research Institute Member Summit, Ernest R. Gilmont of the University of Pennsylvania and Robert Cook of Clorox co-chaired a discussion focused on identifying current issues related to how R&D organizations are responding to their human resources challenges to ensure viability of their R&D workforce. The case studies that follow are adapted from presentations by panelists from W. L. Gore, Roche Diagnostics and The Hershey Company. KEY CONCEPTS: human resources, organizational culture, creativity, Generations at Work. culture and its ability to innovate is presumed; however, a recent study reveals more precisely how some of Gores unusual cultural features support its innovators. I shall explore that here, after some brief words on our beginnings. The company was founded by Bill Gore and his wife, Vieve, who set out with two objectivesboth focused on unleashing great potential. Bill Gore saw untapped potential in a new materialpolytetrauoroethylene, the basis of Teon; he saw greater potential in people when they were supported by non-traditional organizational practices. At the DuPont Company, Bill Gore had experienced the invigorating effects of working in small, focused task forces where people came together without titles or formal hierarchical positions and brought great personal energy and commitment to achieving objectives together. He also resonated with Douglas McGregors description of a Theory Y culture in his 1960 book, The Human Side of Enterprise (1). His experience conrmed McGregors proposition that people will exercise selfdirection and self-control to achieve objectives to which

Creating Compelling Environments for Innovators, by Debra Ricker France

For much of its 50-year history, W. L. Gore & Associates has been acknowledged for its unique corporate culture and prolic innovation. The connection between Gores

Debra Ricker France is an associate at W. L. Gore & Associates, Inc., Newark, Deleware. Her commitment includes leadership and learning development for Gore engineers and scientists while her research focuses on leadership practices that support innovation. She holds a doctorate in adult learning and leadership from Columbia University. dfrance@wlgore.com Marilyn Leahy is a senior director of human resources for Roche Molecular Diagnostics, in Pleasanton, California. She has over 25 years of HR experience in the biotech and healthcare, consumer packaged goods and nancial services industries. She holds a bachelors degree in industrial psychology from the UniNovemberDecember 2009
0895-6308/09/$5.00 2009 Industrial Research Institute, Inc.

versity of California at Berkeley, and has completed the Advanced Human Resources Executive program at the University of Michigan. marilyn.leahy@roche.com Mary Parsons is vice president, global platforms and research insights, The Hershey Company, Hershey, Pennsylvania. She is currently working on front-end innovation including chocolate, grocery and health and wellbeing projects. Prior to joining Hershey, she was vice president, research and development at Frito-Lay, Inc. She holds a bachelors degree in chemical engineering from The Ohio State University. mparsons@hersheys.com

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they are committed, and that they do not need external controls or threats of punishment to achieve organizational objectives. The Gores set out to create an enterprise without the traditional industrial-age practices then regarded as necessary to induce people to work. As Bill Gore wrote in 1984, We as leaders can unleash much more of this inherent creativity and productivity by eliminating authoritarian aspects of our organizations, and depend on commitment and natural followership as controlling forces (2). Today, the company continues to operate with no managers, minimal hierarchy, small teams organized around opportunities, and signicant personal autonomy. The Gore culture supports achievement through engagement and support rather than control, which produces several conditions that create a compelling environment for innovators. The founders intent was to create an organizational culture that supported individual creativity and prolic innovation, and these cultural features still deliver on this promise today. For other companies to evaluate how the Gore practices might foster innovation in their settings, they need to consider the unique attributes of the Gore innovators and the specic Gore cultural practices that support them. Gore Innovators My 2008 doctoral study of Gore revealed that individuals need two things to innovate in the organization: They need a set of unique personal attributes to help them produce novel yet practicable ideas, and they also need a conducive environment to develop and shepherd their ideas to fruition as successful, innovative product offerings (3). Deep professional expertise As revealed in early research about creative professionals in organizations (4), I found that Gore innovators exhibit deep professional expertise, exceptional creativity skills, and the personal motivation to take the sometimes-risky path of innovation. At Gore, many of the innovators of new materials or new products are skilled scientists or engineers. It is not surprising that for them to be innovative scientists, they need to know their scienceprofoundly. To be skilled prototypers of an industrial or medical device, they need a wide range of design and fabrication skills. They all need deep personal expertise in their craft or profession, as well as other content-related skills. Other types of expertise the Gore innovators exhibit include a solid grasp of business skills and nancial knowledge. One Gore leader is fond of saying, Theres a reason people refer to their ideas as their children, and

The Gore culture supports achievement through engagement and support rather than control.
one of the toughest challenges in an innovation environment is when an idea must be killed. Many of the more experienced Gore innovators have reached a point when they know it is time to kill their own ideas. They frequently demonstrate the business savvy and nancial skills to be able to assess the market potential early enough that they know when to stop their own projects and move on to others that might have a greater chance of success. However, they do not merely assess an immediate market value. They also consider which features they were developing that could become foundational for other capabilities that could enable other signicant advancements. They think beyond this rst chess move to subsequent potential moves and whether there could be enough business value to pursue it. One innovator advocated vigorously to continue work on a distinctive cable for a relatively small market. Its not just to learn about these cables, he said. Its to learn about all cables! Another type of expertise the Gore innovators exhibit that may not be common among scientists and engineers is the ability to interact creatively with customers. Gore associates learn early in their careers how to manage intellectual property so as to protect the interests of Gore and its customers, but they also know how to engage and observe customers in situ. Prior scholarship on creativity and innovation in organizations suggests that individuals in some roles act as boundary spanners to bring market knowledge to insiders who then develop new ideas (5). At Gore, there are deliberate attempts to reduce the boundaries, so that the innovators do not need to rely entirely on sales associates or other customer-facing individuals to gather intelligence for them. Some innovators accompany surgeons during procedures; others visit installations to help trouble-shoot issues and see how the products are used, to trigger ideas for enhancements. One innovator describes how he prepares numerous crude prototypes

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and spreads them out on a table during customer visits. I will watch which one they pick up, he says. It wont end up like that, but theres a reason they picked up that one. Relationship skills are another type of expertise that some might consider as going against the personalitytype of many scientists and engineers. Many of the Gore innovators demonstrate interpersonal, inuence and collaboration skills, with each of these skills directly contributing to their ability to innovate. Most of these individuals have extensive networks. One of the innovators is quick to report that he can get an answer to any question in the enterprise within three phone calls. His relationships bring him into contact with subject matter experts who challenge him or help him develop his ideas. Innovators engage with associates and customers across the global enterprise who eagerly join them in generating new ideas and solving intriguing problems. Creativity skills Gore innovators also apply what innovation scholars refer to as creativity skills. The Gore innovators are able to frame issues differently, to incorporate large amounts of seemingly unrelated information, and to call upon unusual methods and bodies of knowledge when solving problems. They and their observers claim remarkable abilities to form connections among great quantities of disparate data to produce unexpected outcomes. In addition to problem-solving expertise, the Gore innovators demonstrate a propensity to hands-on idea generation through physical modeling and prototyping. Active, physical experimentation is a long-held tradition at Gore. It is often conducted in pairs or small teams, because the physical prototypes make it possible for others to grasp the idea quickly and engage with challenges, enhancements or alternatives. There are numerous examples in the company of prolic inventing teams where one associate brings an academic or theoretical background in science or engineering and another associate brings physical prototyping or operating skills to transmute the theoretical into a more concrete reality. For example, there is one biochemical engineer who works closely with a brilliant physical prototyper and together they have produced a great number of innovations in the last decade. The cognitive prowess to create new thought at the edge of polymer science, biomechanical engineering, and the other technologies where Gore contributes may be an innate quality in these innovators; however, as Bill Gore experienced personally, an organization and its practices can signicantly enhance or impede the individuals in expressing this quality. Tangling the innovators in tenNovemberDecember 2009

Opportunity to create something of unique value is the greatest motivator.

drils of bureaucracy, starving them of resources, or confusing them with misaligned rewards can cause the most luminous creative mind to darken. Countless Gore innovations would not have emerged without the companys deliberate investment in the lab space for experimenting, in adequate time to develop ideas in their early stages, and in additional materials costs for iterative hands-on prototyping. Harder to calculate is the considerable investment required for the cultural value of building an abundance of personal relationships across the enterprise, yet these relationships propagate the many connections that fuel the Gore innovators creativity skills. Similarly, whether an individual has the personal motivation to take the sometimes-risky path of innovation is a decidedly personal state; however, organizations can enhance or detract from this state. The greatest motivator reported by the Gore innovators is the opportunity to create something of unique value. To preserve this selfmotivation, the company needs to ensure feedback loops, so that individuals who contributed game-changing ideas early in a process eventually learn about valuable outcomes they enabled, even if that value is not truly known for several years. Another signicant motivator the innovators describe is the opportunity to be trusted with an extremely difcult challenge. This requires the company to create mechanisms for individuals to have fair access to compelling challengesjust as they need fair access to rewards. It is easy to see how a traditional organization can inadvertently stymie a technologists development of broad expertise when their deep expertise and capabilities are valued so highly; how a companys emphasis on predictability and productivity can dampen the expression of a creative thinkers sometimes-unsettling ideas, or how standardizing working conditions in the name of fairness can diminish the motivation of the most innovative individuals. Some of the Gore cultural practices foster innovation by supporting these individual innovator needs in a personalrather than systematicmanner.

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How the Culture Fosters Innovation Research on creativity in organizations points to many features of the Gore culture that are known to support innovation. Associates have extremely broad access to diverse points of view both inside and outside the company. Individuals and projects are resourced adequately to provide time for engaging others and challenging known solutions. Many individuals are encouraged to engage in dabble time, which is protected time to explore ideas outside their primary commitment. The lattice organization The companys organizational form is designed to facilitate both many and deep personal relationships. This is one of the many apparent contradictionsor polaritiesthat contribute to the companys creative tension. Gores extremely at structure is described as a lattice. The mesh-like complexity of the lattice makes it possible for associates to cultivate hundreds of relationships across the enterprise. Any Gore associate can reach out to any other associate anywhere in the world with no barriers from hierarchy or authority. Engineers relate to operators who relate to sales associates who relate to any other associates they encounter. In addition to the lattice, the company made an early commitment to numerous, relatively small, plants that house entire businesses. Most plants house a maximum of 300 associates who not only work together but eat together, run during the lunch hour, or play volleyball after hours. This investment facilitates close personal relationships. The early experience of working closely with diverse associates creates a mindset that all contributions are valuable, that relationships with as many diverse associates as possible are enriching, and that all types of associates are essential to achieving the companys objectives. The porous boundaries between associates of many professions and worldviews translate into broad access to stimulating new ideas and generous assistance with developing those ideas. Self-direction within a structure of small teams The primary organizing structure for Gore to achieve business objectives is the small team organized around an opportunity. Accountability to a team rather than a single manager requires associates to continuously seek out and consider differing views and interests. The companys bias is toward complexity and diverse thought, which keeps the organization more dynamic, agile and responsive to possibilities. This complexity can be both compelling and challenging for individual associates. Because there are no managers, associates are expected to balance their personal autonomy with individual responsibility. This balance of

autonomy and responsibility is another of many pairs of sometimes-competing factors that need to be in balance for associates to contribute most effectively, and individual associates may have very different requirements for these factors to be in equilibrium. For example, the optimal amount of autonomy for one individual might be either too unstructuredor too constrainingfor others. Another factor that individuals seek to balance is how much they work on known requirements of the business versus experiment with potential new ways of creating value. A business leader feeling an urgent need to solve a customer problem quickly might compete for the mind space of an innovator whose attention is being drawn to exciting future possibilities he has uncovered for that customer in the lab. This challenge is also reected in the expectation that associates balance risktaking with safeguarding the health of the enterprise. Polarity management Polarities are conditions that contain sometimescontradictory properties, which cannot be reduced or solved but which must be managed or balanced. This balancing act can be felt at an enterprise level, as in balancing efforts toward protability or growth, and they can be experienced personally, as in the precarious balance between the optimal amount of challenge versus the amount of support an associate feels when keeping his or her commitments. While some associates thrive on challenge, others need greater degrees of condence or support to contribute most effectively. An essential feature of the culture that helps associates keep their balance in this environment of complexity and sometimes-competing requirements is a role called sponsor. The role of sponsors My study conrmed that the role of sponsor is critical to supporting Gores most innovative associates. Every individual at Gore has a sponsor; the CEO has a sponsor and the newest associate has a sponsor. New associates are assigned a sponsor to help them through the onboarding phase, but they are expected within a very short time to meet enough people and to learn about their personal needs for support that they can choose their own sponsor. The sponsor is an associate who takes on a formal commitment to support another associates success. This commitment is essential to the success of every associate and to the enterprise. The sponsor is a developmental role, and Gore innovators report how their sponsors orchestrated opportunities early in their careers for them to learn many of their essential skill sets (3). For instance, experienced Gore innovators relate how their sponsors sought opportunities

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for them to connect directly with customers early in their careers. One masters-degreed chemist was sent to staff a sales booth within weeks of joining the company. An engineer was tapped to accompany a sales associate trying to save a large account that required a new approach. A young innovator tells how his sponsor challenged him to interact with marketing teams and project reviews that cultivated his nancial and business acumen. Sponsors report acting as talent scouts matching their associates unique needs for learning and development with projects that will require them to learn and master those topics. In addition to orchestrating innovators development, sponsors also provide them with air cover. They vigorously advocate for time, resources and opportunities for the innovators to work on projects of yet-to-be-proven value. They provide protection for the innovator when business leaders want all attention on known requirements rather than experimenting on potential new solutions. This activity often requires the sponsor to put his or her own credibility on the line, which can be risky when the innovator and sponsor can see the potential of a new idea long before it can be proven to others. In addition to lending their personal credibility to an innovator, sponsors also lend their networks, as well. Support for ideation and implementation comes through relationships across the enterprise, and experienced innovators tell how their sponsors will lend both their credibility and their networks until the innovators can build their own. This help is often essential when an extremely technical innovator is challenged by the rigorous interpersonal requirements for inuencing and building relationships in the Gore culture. Sponsors are also charged with ensuring that the associate is treated fairly, and this represents unique challenges for sponsors of innovators. By denition, innovators are often disrupting someone elses comfort and continuity. They introduce products and processes that require changes in every valued process of the organization. Machiavelli wrote in The Prince (1513) that, The innovator has for enemies all those who have done well under the old conditions. There is often a signicant time lag between the introduction of an idea and the perception of its value. Sponsors advocate for the innovator and the innovation to ensure the individual is supported with resources, opportunities, protection, and rewards in that uncertain period when the value of their contribution is not always recognized. Without help from a sponsor, the complexity of the Gore environment can confound individual innovators. While the opportunity to work on a challenging problem is very motivating, individuals vary in their experience of how much challenge is too much challenge and can ultimately
NovemberDecember 2009

The role of sponsor is critical to supporting Gores most innovative associates.

be counter-productive. Similarly, while all the Gore innovators I interviewed reported valuing the amount of individual autonomy they are afforded at Gore, individual innovatorsand their sponsorsadmitted that they sometimes struggle with achieving the balance between delivering what the business needs now and exploring what the business could develop for the future. Sponsors explained how they ne-tune the type of support each innovator needs to be most effective. If one innovator reliably produces enormous value with absolute autonomy, the sponsor might merely provide additional context and support for resources. Another innovator might be more effective when her sponsor suggests how much time she can safely spend experimenting without losing support from a business leader who has other technical needs. A sponsor might guide one innovator to protect a certain number of hours per week for experimentation, while steering another innovator to nish a valuable project for the business to rebuild credibility and earn the support to return to experimentation. While autonomy, challenge and novelty are often associated with environments that support individual creativity, Gore sponsors have learned that individual innovators often require different degrees of these qualities to be optimally effective. The one-to-one relationship between sponsor and innovator allows each sponsor to personalize support for each innovator. Fine-tuning the microprocesses In 2004, organizational innovation researcher Teresa Amabile called upon creativity and leadership scholars to carefully consider day-by-day microprocesses that inuence performance (6). At Gore, the sponsors customization of each associates environment by netuning these microprocesses and conditions uniquely supports innovator performance. Gore sponsors are willing and resourced to treat each person uniquely. They ensure that each innovator they sponsor experiences the optimal balance of support and challenge, of autonomy

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and constraint, of pressure and protection, of learning and doing, of inventing and delivering. Ashbys Law of Requisite Variety (7) would suggest that for Gore to serve complex markets and industries with its thousands of advanced technology products, it must be at least as complex internally. While there is a risk that this complexity could be staggering for some individual associates, when the complexity is facilitated by sponsors who are willing to personalize a micro-environment for each Gore associate, that complexity creates a compelling environment for innovators. Some of these practices might be infused into other organizations if there is a similar willingness to customize the personal experiences of highly valued individual innovators within the larger organization.
References 1. McGregor, D. 1985. The Human Side of Enterprise. Boston: McGraw Hill. 2. Gore, W. L. 1984. Freedom vs. Organization. Internal company document. W. L. Gore & Associates. 3. France, Debra Ricker. 2008. An Organizational Case Study of How Individuals Foster Innovation in Others. (Unpublished dissertation) Columbia University. 4. Amabile, T. M. 1983. The Social Psychology of Creativity. New York: Springer-Verlag. 5. Delbecq, A. L. and P. K. Mills. (1985). Managerial Practices That Enhance Innovation. Organizational Dynamics 14(1), pp. 2434. 6. Amabile, T. M., E. A. Schatzel, G. G. Moneta and S. J. Kramer. 2004. Leader Behaviors and the Work Environment for Creativity: Perceived Leaders Support. The Leadership Quarterly 15, pp. 532. 7. Ashby, W. R. 1956. An Introduction to Cybernetics. London: Chapman & Hall.

A Global Culture Located in the San Francisco suburb of Pleasanton, California, our culture is unusual in that we can walk down our halls and hear one group of employees speaking in German, another group in French, another conversing in Swiss-German, another speaking in Japanese, and still another group who might be from Latin America, speaking Spanish. In any one hallway experience, you can feel like you have representation from almost all parts of the world. This is intriguing and exciting, but it also presents a great many challenges to your decision-making processes, how your matrix management works, and how you drive to better decisions. The need for individuals who can work and manage globally is imperative with this highly diverse workforce. Additionally, employees need to witness measurable steps in their development or they will leave or, worse yet, stop giving full effort. Rotation assignments take employees completely out of their comfort zones. When people go abroad on rotations, they come back with a renewed sense of the organizations purpose, a broader view of the business and importantly, how like work can be done in different ways. On the personal side, the relationships built during expat assignments often last a lifetime, and it isnt uncommon for expats to visit each others families or vacation together long after the assignment is over. Our international rotations create an opportunity for us to share best practices around the world. Our KPIs (key performance indicators) allow us to track and measure different aspects of the business and learn from other parts of the world. This gives us an opportunity to broaden our understanding, broaden our experience, accelerate product development, and leverage business relationships across the world. This is also consistent with our promote-from-within-whereverpossible philosophy. Working with Expats We have done a lot of things right with our expats. We have had the opportunity to harvest some of our learning and extend our technical expertise to people who wouldnt otherwise have had exposure to technologies around the world. For instance, our scientists have coordinated around-the-world R&D fairs, where novel research can be showcased. The scientists interact with one another and discuss opportunities to expand different technologies into other parts of the business. Weve also seen with some of our expat assignments how cultural barriers can be broken down. Recently, I asked one of our employees who had returned from an expat assignment what he had learned in Japan that had

Making Global Rotation Work, by Marilyn B. Leahy

Roche Diagnostics is the smaller of the two divisions that comprise the operating businesses of Roche, a researchfocused healthcare company with 80,000 employees and $42 billion in 2008 sales. Like our Pharmaceutical Division counterparts, Diagnostics is a research-intensive business with R&D and manufacturing sites around the world. Our biggest platforms, though, are in Switzerland, Germany and the United States. The future business focus at Roche Diagnostics is on personalized healthcare, the management of a patients health based on his/her individual characteristics and genetic make-up, including age, gender, height/weight, diet, environment, etc. This requires people with highly specialized skills in microbiology, biochemistry, chemistry, human genetics, infectious disease, and oncology. There are a limited number of people who possess these skills, however. Moreover, global skills are very much required to advance into top management. One has to understand how decisions are made in different parts of the world, how operations are run, and how to be effective with individuals who dont approach problems from the same perspective.

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made him a different business person. He replied, Our methods of working together are very different. In the U.S., we try to put as much as we can out on the table during our meetings, whether its customer issues, product problems, inventory, whatever were trying to work on. We typically try to make decisions and then move very quickly to implement our solution once we have made that decision. In the Japanese culture, he continued, they talk a lot about an issue or topic during the typical day, but actual decisions arent made in the ofce. Decisions are made after hours. It is expected that you will work with your team members most nights until around 8:00 pm, and then join them for dinner. By 10:00, after dinner is nished, the real issues are talked about. By midnight, we have our decisions. If youre not there, you will not have a voice in that decision. Its a very different decisionmaking model than we have here in the U.S. I bring this up because we often had miscommunication with our Japanese colleagues, and through our rotations we all learn to understand each other better and how to operate across cultural barriers. Consensus on Talent One of the byproducts we were looking for in our global process was how to get consensus on talent. It seemed that we had all of the business areas advocating for their employees, but little consensus as to who was best for a particular role. We now have reviews that are conducted on both a geographic and a functional level. The functional heads are required to approve the individual who is being nominated for global assignments, with the understanding that the organizations goals and the individuals development needs are met. With stronger attention and better processes, weve been able to come closer on our alignment on talent and outline appropriate development steps needed to ascend to the next level. Problem Areas Theres actually a lot more that wasnt working well over the last ten years, and which I shall cover now. How do we get the most out of our dollars that were spending for expat assignments? How do we bring the international learning to other parts of Roche, including Genentech, which we acquired in March 2009? The rst problem area we found was that people got comfortable in their expat assignment and, in many cases, became so acclimated that they didnt want to leave their new homein some cases for reasons beyond the actual job. A number of people found their spouses while on an expat assignment, others had kids in school, and in some cases, they fell in love with the new country. And, our expats have many of their expenses covered while
NovemberDecember 2009

International rotations create an opportunity for Roche to share best practices around the world.
they are abroad, so nancially it can be advantageous for them. Second, we found managers resistant to giving up their best talent to these assignments. Third, we were making the wrong candidate choices. Fourth, we werent preparing people well prior to their departure. Fifth, we were not coordinating very well with the receiving manager; in some cases, a new expat would show up on their doorstep without the proper advance planning. And there was frustrationand this is probably the main reason why we have taken a deep look into our processes. People returned after taking these great assignments and instead of being motivated and energized, they were frustrated. They came back into a company that had changed; many of their peers had been promoted, or were on to different projects. In some cases, the priorities shifted. Leadership at the top often changed, so those who had been big supporters, were onto different assignments themselves. In a nutshell, the expat had a great experience, but reentry was very difcult. One of the key things we found is that we would spend a lot of money on our assignments, typically twice as much as if they stayed domestic, and they would return for half a year and then leave the company. We werent getting the return on investment that we wanted. Finally, very briey, are some of the other issues we have had to deal with:

High-potential talent not willing to leave their current country. The critical thing we now do is to discuss this at the time of recruitment. In the beginning, when we sat down with individuals, we would advise them that their career, if they wanted it to be, would involve assignments that could take them to different parts of the world. Now we identify certain key positions that are rotational and

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only put somebody into those jobs who has expressed a desire to move internationally.

We communicate the program openly. It used to be a sort of clandestine discussion between the employee and the manager who would say, We really think youre smart. We like you and we want you to take this move, but dont tell anybody about it. So weve become much more transparent about it, going to all of the management meetings and talking about rotations, talking about some of our success stories, and explaining how people have benetted from such experiences.

We now allow spouses or domestic partners to go on some of the initial investigation trips. In the past, because of the expense, we would wait until we decided on the nal candidate before we included the signicant other. We found, however, that it has paid off by helping the partner truly feel a part of the decision.

We have a strong pipeline process, and we demonstrate it at almost all of our succession and talent management meetings. We talk about how our pipeline has to be a numbers game; you have to bring in people at the junior talent level in order to feed the larger pipeline of talent down the road. We want people who really desire exciting international opportunities. It is up to the local level to foster and bring in people who t the prole and criteria, and that we on-board them correctly so they are primed for success at the earliest point with the company. When you are a long-term, junior talent with the company, you are tracked within your country and your function. It is largely up to the local management, together with HR, to ensure that the early assignments are as robust and accelerated as possible.

Weve talked about giving shorter assignments than the standard three to ve years. Weve already begun one-year assignments. Another thing weve tried is to allow people to testrun the assignment by shadowing a current incumbent in the job for a couple of weeks before making a nal decision. When someone nally decides, it is with more complete knowledge of what their assignment is about.

Junior talent is typically in the emerging talent or long-term talent pool for approximately three years. That means they have to consistently demonstrate strong leadership, all of the leadership capabilities and competencies that we expect of people who are high potential. Then, if individuals decide that for whatever reason its not right for them to take an international assignment, we dont exit them out of the organization. We simply manage them more as local talent and try to work their development through the local processes.

We received a lot of manager resistance, as I mentioned, to offering up the best person in their department. The mentality of some of our best managers was, Im not going to give up my best person without knowing what I will get in return. The consequence of this is that we would have our second-tier employees taking the assignments, which left a bad taste in everyones mouth. On the receiving end, they had someone who wasnt the perfect t, and in some cases wasnt successful in the assignment, so the sending organization would feel that the investment made in the employee was never going to pay off. We have since reframed the prole and made sure that we only send those individuals who are on our global talent list and have been approved up through the highest levels of the organization.

At the director level, you are part of the divisions succession planning. Individuals are sent to programs sponsored by the company to help assess strengths and weaknesses. Based on what their development needs are and what the position requires, people who meet the criteria are called for jobs anywhere around the globe. International Careers I believe we have a unique program. One of its elements we call our Perspectives Program. It is an opportunity for individuals coming out of Ph.D. and M.B.A. programs who wish to have an international career. This program affords a select group of people four international assignments, rotated every six months for two years in different countries in different functional areas, with opportunities to learn many different skills. For instance, we might take a biochemistry Ph.D. and put her in a manufacturing assignment for six months in China. Then, six months later, she might be going to New Zealand. After that, she might go to Switzerland in a manufacturing role. Then she could come to the U.S. for an opportunity in sales. This is a very active rotational program. It takes a special kind of person to want to have that kind of career, but imagine the learnings for the individuals who have gone through the program! We have nished our fth year with this program and have had an approximately 95-percent success rate. The individuals who come out of these roles often move into

We have a strong biannual succession and talent management process. One of the key things weve also done through that process is arrange one-to-one swaps. So if I send my key high-level contributor, I want someone in return that I have invested in as well, and were going to do a one-for-one swap.

Another way were improving is, again, trying to identify the right people to take these assignments. We actually have corporate development programs in place that are a form of assessment center to help people who are on these assignments or to tap into the talent and help them get ready for different movement opportunities.

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either senior manager positions or director-level opportunities. A lot of them actually move out of what they thought they were going to do when they came in. Weve had nance people who came out of Berkeley or Harvard thinking they wanted to be CFOs, but after this experience they wanted to become general managers. Weve had Ph.D.s who got opportunities to work on full life-cycle products. Early Briengs Here are a couple of other ways were improving. Were making a concerted effort to brief the functional managers and employees prior to going on assignment. We talk about their key benets of that opportunity, reinforce why they were picked, explain what we expect from them and what the company has invested in them to take these opportunities. We talk about their goals while theyre gone, what they should be learning and/or teaching during their stay. And, we discuss some of the other success stories of those who have been on these assignments and how their careers have progressed in very signicant ways as a result of the opportunities presented to them. Were also trying to tie the receiving manager and the employee much more closely together. We are getting the receiving managers involved in the selection process. Theyre also involved in the assignment plan, which talks about the length of the assignment and clearly spells out the development opportunities for the individual. We talk about the start and the end date, and the key milestones. We put together a very formal orientation program for the individuals on these assignments. Repatriation We also manageand this is probably the biggest area where we had previously failedthe entire repatriation process. We had the faulty logic that if people came from the organization and went out on an assignment, they would naturally slide right back into the company. What we often didnt recognize were either the changes in the organization while the person was gone, or the changes in the person as a result of this amazing experience. We now begin the next position conversation much earlier in the process so that when the assignment ends there is a better opportunity for the employee to utilize the newly acquired skills. Re-recruiting We have learned that we need to actively re-recruit these people, that they need to understand they still have a place in the organization, and that we have to t the right assignment for them. We use individual development plans. We have a very aggressive re-on-boarding proNovemberDecember 2009

We want people who really desire exciting international opportunities.

gram for them as they come back in. We look at multiple opportunities for these folks. We also look for opportunities outside of our immediate business area. We have a woman who worked for us in the U.S., was in Singapore for two and a half years and is now in Canada. She actually had opportunities to come back to Pleasanton, but we opened up the world for her and asked her where she wanted to go. She had multiple opportunities to choose from. When she nishes this assignment, she will likely move into one of our life-cycle positions, which is a way to get general management training opportunities. So, in summary, weve improved. We put effort into executive sponsorship, aggressively manage the attrition by re-recruiting these individuals, drive swap arrangements with various countries, and send only our top talent. We are looking at different (shorter) assignments and giving more scrutiny to the selection process. Weve tied the success and talent management process to bonuses, and we keep our expats very present, through constant communication and touch points with key executives who travel to the expats temporary home. Importantly, we make sure there is better planningbefore, during and after assignmentsand that we, again, participate actively in the re-recruitment process.

Generations at Work, by Mary Parsons

The concept of Generations at Work comes from William Howe, Neil Strauss and others who have published several books on the subject. Generational theory suggests that people born at a certain time share common experiences in their life, such as education, parenting, historical events, and cultural inuences that result in shared common beliefs and attitudes. Most of todays workplaces have four distinct generational groups working side by side. By understanding generational inuences, we as R&D leaders are better able to address the needs of our businesses and help our employees to reach a higher performance level. We are also better placed to attract and retain new talentprincipally the so-called Millennials, people born after 1980.

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I became interested in Generations at Work at Hershey when we introduced a training program that highlighted how understanding differences between generational groups enables managers to better motivate and reward employees. By understanding the common beliefs and attitudes that the different generations bring to work with them, we are better able to understand our employees work ethic, their view of rewards, and ultimately their motivation and energy. For the rst time, we have four generations working together side by side. The so-called Silent Generation comprises those aged 6484, who either retired during the past 20 years or are nearing retirement. A surprising fact is that there are currently over 20 million Silent Generation people in the workforce, with many coming back to work for a second career. The Baby Boomers, who exceed 78 million, have reached their fties and sixties and are just beginning to retire. The third group, typically called Gen Xers, are in their thirties and forties and are a much smaller population of around 53 million. The nal group, the Millennials, are just starting to enter the workforce, and by 2020 they will be over 120 million strong, with a strong inuence on the future work environment. Generational Behavior Generational theory proposes that work behavior is driven by core values held by each generation. For instance, members of the Silent Generation shaped by World War II have core values of dedication and sacrice. They believe in hard work, duty and honor. In the workforce, they are an exceptionally loyal populationthorough and expert in their chosen elds. The Boomers are optimistic and condent in their ability to shape the world. They also have a strong work ethic, a need to be involved and to make the world a better place. Boomers are seen as a driven generation. Relationships are important to Boomers and they seek approval from the Silent Generation. When the Boomers attain adulthood, they aspire to make the world a better place. Its as if they are asking, Hey mom and dad, how did I do? The Gen Xers were the rst latchkey generation and children of divorce. Raised by Boomer workaholic parents, they tend toward self-reliance and pragmatism. Gen Xers grew up in a more diverse and global world compared to either previous generation. This generation is adaptable, independent and seeks autonomy in the workplace. Millennials were raised by Boomer workaholics or by Gen Xers determined to raise their children differently. Although early in the development of their generational characteristics, the Millennials appear to be an optimistic and can-do generation. Not surprisingly, they have very strong feelings for civic duty and a desire to make

For the rst time, four generations are working together side by side.
a positive difference in the world. Raised in a much more diverse world, they also expect diversity in their workplace. Although we expect Millennials will be open to instruction, they are also condent of their ability to make a contribution and will be looking for opportunities to make an impact fast. Millennials are coming to maturity in the technology age and are very comfortable with multi-tasking. Workplace Attitudes Through the work of Howe, Strauss and others exploring this area, common characteristics and values have been proposed, as well as how the generations may be expected to behave in the work environment. So lets take a look at some other aspects of these four generations and specically how they view leadership, authority, work life balance, and job accountability in the workplace. The Silent Generation respects hierarchy and looks for the person in charge; they are very accepting of taking orders. Boomers desire consensus and want to draw people together to make one collective decision. Gen Xers do not need consensus or care who is in charge, because they desire competence from their leaders. Finally, Millennials, who were educated in teams, are also less concerned with leadership and look rather to team structure and a clear common goal. As might be expected, the Silent Generation is respectful of authority and will obey it. Boomers challenged authority in their twenties and have evolved through an initially negative to a much more positive relationship with authority. Now in positions of authority themselves, and with a passion to make the world a better place, Boomers love and accept authority and what it enables them to do in society. Gen Xers are unimpressed by authority and look for competence. The Millennials were raised to be polite to authority, so expect politeness from your Millennial employee. The Silent Generation admires hard work and does not expect play, while the Boomer employee comes from the original work hard, play hard generation.

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Gen Xers who were raised by Boomer workaholic parents, appreciate hard work, yet desire balance and view work as an enabler to life. Finally, Millennials work for good grades. In the workplace, this means they desire achievement and want to be rewarded for it. Work/Life Balance Another aspect of workplace environment that differs among the generations is the balance between work and personal life. The Silent Generation does not understand or relate to the concept of balance because balance conicts with their core value of sacrice. Boomers are the original sandwich generationsandwiched between career and family and driven by an intense desire to excel at both. Gen Xers are looking for balance now; while they are happy to work hard, they expect time to live and enjoy their life and children. The Millennials want exibility of not only time but in their personal environment as well. Values among the generations also differ. The Silent Generation values loyalty to the organization, while Boomers focus on success. Boomers have a sink-orswim mentalityemployees should jump in and get the job done on their own. Gen Xers value stimulation, balance and feedback. Gen Xers want to contribute and they want to be stimulated in their job, which should be fun. I often hear people say in reference to Gen X, You shouldnt always expect your job to be fun or interesting. Sometimes our work isnt much fun or interesting, and we need to do those things as well. Gen Xers do expect, and we as leaders will need to provide, stimulating jobs if we want to retain and attract Gen X employees. The Millennials are a somewhat cosseted generation compared to previous generations, and we as leaders will need to nd ways to provide this generation lots of support through training for their job accountabilities and in providing encouragement and coaching. Millennials have received support from both their families and their schools and they expect support from their employers as well. As we look at the changes we face in the coming years, and particularly with the Millennials entering the workforce, there will be a real sea change in our workplace culture, organization and dynamics. Consider where we have been and to a certain extent still are. Our places of employment are bonded by loyalty to the institution, are predicated on work directed through rank and hierarchy by employees willing to follow rules and processes, and motivated by career advancement. Our new world is moving toward free agency. The oncoming Gen X and Millennials want to manage their own careers and will gravitate to the company with the best offer on the table. They want independence, interNovemberDecember 2009

In Hershey R&D, new Millennial employees are paired with experienced Boomers.
esting work assignments, fun, stimulating jobs, and autonomy. How do we put autonomy into jobs, especially as we bring people on board, train and help them to learn the arts of business? Gen X and Millennials are looking for action and results. They want to be able to have challenges and to manage risk, all while maintaining their work/life balance. Hershey Updates Its People System If this is the new work world we are facing, we as leaders should look to overhauling all of the components of our work systems and processes. How do you motivate Millennials and Gen X? Inspire? How do you provide feedback? What should our recognition systems look like? What should our organizations look like? What is the new job design and career path for these generations? How should we communicate? How will work be done? I suggest our people systems should be reviewed and updated to enable our future business success with Gen X and Millennial employees. At Hershey we are creating a new employee value proposition to ignite passion, unwrap potential, build our capability, drive performance, and win in the marketplace. To unwrap potential, we have put in place an R&D mentoring program based on the principles of generational understanding. In Research and Development, our new Millennial employees are paired with experienced Boomers. Concerned with leaving a legacy, Boomers are excellent mentors for this generational group. Another factor identied through succession planning is the need to create knowledge retention systems and to impart specialty technical knowledge to younger employees. Succession planning is an essential component of preparing for the new generations entering the work place and is especially critical to maintaining the expertise and knowledge among researchers.

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Branding your company employee value proposition is critical to attracting talent. At Hershey, we have a long and deep tradition of community involvement through our connection with the Milton Hershey School. The school has provided education and care in a family home environment for disadvantaged children for over 100 years. This core company value of commitment to community is a key component of the Hershey employee value proposition and is very appealing to Millennial recruits. As we look to ignite passion, we have created a marketing community circle to enable fast integration of new Millennial marketing talent and we have experimented with new ways to communicate with all of our generational groups through YouTube pop-ups, town hall meetings and desk drops celebrating new product launches. Redesigning Performance Management For driving performance, Hershey is taking a new and unique approach to re-designing our performance management system through a completely bottom-up approach. We pulled together people from all levels and all parts of the company for a complete overhaul of this system, which is used to set yearly goals, track development needs and successful completion of projects, and incorporate our newly rened values.

Another aspect of our new performance management system is the emphasis on how results are delivered, which captures how well we are living our values. Through this approach, we expect greater employee engagement and motivation as well as a performance management system that rewards employees for their contributions to the success of the company. By engaging employees from all areas and levels, we create ownership for goals and ensure that employees have a personal stake in their development. We also have a program called Quality Through Excellence. Through this program we engage the most committed and energetic thought leaders from all over the company and from different functional areas. These employees are a cultural leadership and are able to create passion for new programs and initiatives as well as provide feedback to the company about whats going well and what needs to be changed. This has been a very top-line overview, just touching on this fascinating topic. Many resources are available for those interested in learning more about Generations at Work. Howe and Strauss have done a lot of work in this area, particularly with the Millennials. See, for example, their Millennials Rising: The Next Great Generation (Random House, 2000) as well as Generations at Work, by Ron Zemke, Claire Raines and Bob Filipczak (Amacom, 1999).

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MOTIVATING, APPRAISING, REWARDING, AND RETAINING ENGINEERS AND SCIENTISTS

Fifty-two RESEARCH TECHNOLOGY MANAGEMENT articles on this subject are now available in paperback. To order, see inside back cover. Turning Technical Groups into High-Performance Managing Human Resources Teams Leading Your Scientists and Engineers 2002 Rewarding Technical Teamwork People Solutions for R&D Leading Global Product Development Teams What Matters to R&D Workers The Seventh Rule: Create a Learning Culture Best HR Practices for Todays Innovation Re: Project Team Empowerment Aboard the Management Starship Enterprise Motivating Technical Professionals Today Battle for the Best Motivating Your R&D Staff How to Keep MeRetaining Technical Professionals Personal Initiative Sparks Innovation Holding Your Top Talent How a Band of Technical Renegades Designed Holding on to Your Best People the Alpha Chip Why Should the Best Talent Work for You? Keeping Innovation Alive Turn Diversity to Your Advantage Involve Everyone in the Innovation Process From Analyzer to HumanizerRaising the Level Keeping Innovation Alive After the Consultants Leave of Management Thinking Leading Todays Professional Building Trust Is an Art Real Managers Dont Boss! To Build Trust, Ethics Are Not Enough Innovation Mentoring at Whirlpool The Changing Landscape of Leadership Product Champions: Truths, Myths and Management . . . AND MORE Leading Experts: One Managers Experience

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