Unique Talent Management Process

Talent Management is dark art at the best of times

Here at Poisson Rouge we have developed a unique process that we call ‘Navigator’.
This is our generic name for this process although when we embed it into a company culture we often develop a unique ‘brand’ name for the process that matches the style and lingua franca of the client.

So what is Navigator?

Navigator is an innovative assessment methodology used in Talent Management and Identification. It is a diagnostic technology used for exploring and contrasting current performance levels whilst simultaneously assessing future potential. It departs from current assessment methodologies by focusing on the ability to handle and manage complexity at all managerial / seniority levels within an organisation.

In particular, it examines:

* The headroom between applied capability (current) and potential capability (future)
* The capacity to deliver against role specific competencies (current) to mastery of supra-leadership competencies (future) that
cut-cross all leadership roles, and across all political, economic, technological, and change climates
* The likelihood that temperament (current) will fuel the emergence of a dark side of personality leading to derailment /
disruption.
* The contrast between motivation and personality (current) and aspirations (future) that support progress to higher level roles.

A Navigator candidate’s development and achievement potential is expressed in three ways:

* The ability to perform a higher level role – e.g., can / could the candidate in their (current) role successfully take on the
complexity demands of a next level or more senior position (future)
* Future potential – the maximum level of complexity that the candidate is likely to be able to master in the future – i.e., what is
the cap on performance (current and future)
* Time span – what is the time related progress curve of realising potential – e.g., in a Law firm when will a Senior Associate
(current) be ready to take on a Partner role (Future)

Navigator is based on an 8-level model of complexity, where each level is conceptually and significantly different than the previous level. Below is an overview.

A typical example of how we use Navigator is to look at the difference between say - our level 3 (Convergent Thinking) and our level 4 (Divergent Thinking).

Convergent Thinking typifies the technical professional roles (e.g. a practicing lawyer). Here the emphasis is on pure logic and linear thinking e.g. if London is bigger than Birmingham, and Birmingham is bigger than Sheffield, then the logical conclusion is that London is bigger than Sheffield.

Divergent Thinking typifies roles that go beyond technical delivery on its own and involve a degree of ambiguity (e.g. managerial role). Divergent thinkers are able to manage contrasting views and are able to manage two or more lines of thinking in parallel. Divergent thinking goes beyond pure logic. E.g., If Holland’s football team is far superior to Switzerland’s football team, the fact that Spain beat Holland in football, does not necessarily guarantee that they will beat the Swiss team (they actually lost 1:0).

As part of the set up we map the complexity of roles within your organisation against the navigator 8-level model. Then for each candidate we map their capability both current and future / aspirational.



HOW NAVIGATOR IS EMBEDDED IN AN ORGANISATION

Stage 1:
One-off diagnostic research of the organisation and its roles to map the roles into the 8-level model and profile existing good, bad and ugly!
Stage 2:
Candidates are filtered and selected by the client (in consultation with us)
Stage 3:
Candidates are invited to complete some pre-work (questionnaires incorporating psychometric, personal and career-focus instruments).
Stage 4:
Each delegate spends a min of half a day (4-5 hours normally) with a Poisson Rouge Navigator assessor to explore with them their career, personal profile, aspirations, and the findings from the pre-work.
Stage 5:
Complexity handling exercise
Stage 6:
Analysis and reporting