Talent Management - The Fergie Way

It's been one seismic football week. What with Wigan plundering the FA Cup and Celtic retaining their Scottish Premier crown in addition to Sir Alex Ferguson announcing his retirement from the management of Manchester United.

What can HR professionals learn from Sir Alex Ferguson? One of the areas is Talent Management. Let's make it clear I'm not a United supporter particularly but you have to marvel at the achievements over the years since he took up the reins at Old Trafford. Not much of an impact really!!!! 

One of the most difficult things to do in any business or otherwise is to build a winning team and keep it successful. It is no fluke that United have continued to successfully implement talent management - it was all part of the Alex Ferguson strategy right from the start of his career in the deepest recesses of Scottish football through to the momentous events of today. 

In fact you might even argue that Celtic played a big part in his success with the art of building teams and managing talent. This is despite the fact that you would normally expect that he would have been more likely to learn from Rangers but not so. He did not take that route. 

Many of the readers will not know the name of Sean Fallon who recently sadly died. He was a stalwart of Celtic football club and although highly tipped to become a Celtic Manager he never did - Jock Stein took the role and proudly led the team to be the first British team to win the European Cup. At Mr Fallon's recent funeral, the main eulogy was delivered by Sir Alex who fondly remembered that it was Sean who showed him the route to success was to bring young talent to the fore and build from inside. And upon that he started his plan for success. You can't avoid its returns - Leagues and Cups aplenty and the introduction of "Fergie Time" and "Squeaky Bum Time" to the football vernacular.

Yes of course he has spent money to bring players to the club, but there have been many players brought through the ranks.

For an HR professional, it is always a challenge to recruit and retain the best staff. In order to do that your business has to utilise strong and resilient approaches to managing its cohorts of employees and build up sound training and development strategies as well as comprehensive performance management regimes. Always be looking to stretch staff and reward them well for their work. Establish your benchmarked salary positions and stick to it. Recognise that your business doesn't always need to pay the highest salaries. Often providing development challenges and planning internal career moves and opportunities will show staff that they can have the career they want with your organisation; so no need to move to other businesses.

And importantly tell them often how much they contribute. People like to be praised and thanked. 

Sir Alex got this down to an art. His business doesn't always pay the highest salaries. But he was always resolutely setting objectives for the individuals and the team and getting the best out of them. He knew how to get the best out of them and was always willing to move them to new roles to support the bigger objective of the overall business. He might give them the "hairdryer" but in public there was always a solid team ethic.

Follow Sir Alex's road as an HR professional and you won't be too far off.

As always please share this blog widely. Your comments are most welcome.

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(C) Iain Williamson 2013