I watched the much derided game to movie adaptation Dead or Alive today. And guess what? I really enjoyed it! No, this isn't because I'm a masochist and it's not because I have extremely low standards in my movies. It's not even because I had such low expectations for this movie that I would enjoy 80 minutes of static. It is because I set my expectations of what to expect from this movie accordingly before I watched it. I was told the movie would contain fantastic action sequences, beautiful locales and incredibly sexy women and it delivered on all those accounts.
It is mid-year review at my workplace and everyone has to take some time during their fortnight to document what they did in the last 6 months and how they are in relation to their objectives. This is commonly known as "doing PMP crap", by the majority of people. Note in this post, I will refer to it as talent management, not the "Performance Management Platform" since being of project management persuasion, associating the PM Professional qualification with PMP is just too confusing. It may be obvious why it is called 'PMP crap', but lets elaborate for those not at my work.
Software engineers are a difficult lot to measure and for the most part it is impossible to create any discrete scale of performance. There are those who have done something 'really good' and those who are 'really bad' and there is the bulk of us which make up the 70% who make the business work, but not necessarily make it much better. Regardless of what we write up, it is usually clear which bucket we fall into from the start and hence promotions and salary are generally considered somewhat disconnected from Talent Management system.
And here is the problem. I think people have an expectation that the Talent Management System is about writing up why you deserve more money. This is like saying you watch DoA for a storyline. Yes, there is a storyline, but it won't satisfy you and if you expect it to, then you'll be disappointed. This was my problem for a while. I expected pay rises to get me in line with my graduating peers. Whilst I got great pay rises compared to my colleagues, I'm still significantly below my graduating peers and this was "disappointing"(read infuriating) until I came to epiphany about what the game was about. What you get paid extra in bonus or salary merit is reasonably random, regardless of the tripe they give about 'calibrating' your rank with what is in your talent management write ups.
So what should you be expecting out of Talent Management Time (TMT) about in my opinion? My expectations are for it to be an opportunity to do a personal retrospective and to conduct a marketing exercise.
Imagine if you were told you had company-allotted time every 6 months to spend time thinking about how you went? During this time, your peers and supervisors will also give you feedback on how you went, and how you can become better! Wow! Time flies really quickly when you are working and it's easy to lose track of what you have done unless you sit down and document it. The key to getting better is feedback via introspection and from those around you. Use this time to figure out what you did well, how you provided value to the company and most importantly how you are tracking against your own personal goals (you DO have these right?..right?). So I should EXPECT to get good feedback and I should EXPECT to have time to think about this properly.
The second part of talent management is a marketing exercise from both an internal and external perspective. Internally you are trying to sell yourself for better roles, more recognition and of course, better pay. What people fail to see is that there is an external marketing opportunity here. Every 6 months is a perfect time to update your CV. It is a good time to examine the market to see if recruiters are looking for the talents which you have been using. Using this information, you need to practise selling yourself, even if it is to a mirror. The only person who can market you is... you! And what you are selling is your RIGHT to that sexy new project, that interesting new role or hell maybe even a pay rise (This assumes your company has money...).
So remember to treat talent management accordingly and you will not be disappointed. When end of year comes around, you may be disappointed if the reward doesn't match your efforts, but you've already set expectations, right about TMT? And because you've been updating your CV and examining the market, you're in an excellent position to conduct your exit strategy* if you feel it's appropriate.
So on that note, please excuse me dear friends as I must leave you to go do some Talent Management write ups.
* Quick side note: Exiting is a GOOD thing if you ever feel like you are going nowhere, but you don't necessarily have to exit your current workplace. For example, each time I was on the verge of activating my company exit strategy, I've been offered new interesting roles and I got 'suckered' into yet another year of growth. Remember, new role, new place or new company are all exit strategies and the order of preference is an personal thing.
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