Modern multidisciplinary structures base their success on the conjunction and management of talent. However, there is immense potential waiting to be discovered and harnessed.
Technology has long provided us with video surveillance systems capable of remaining unaffected in stable environments, while everything remains still and quiet. However, it triggers alarm notifications as soon as it detects a disturbance, an intrusion, or a significant change in the programmed stillness. This situation is similar to the “Red Light, Green Light” game popularized by the series “Squid Game” with its bloody enactment in the first episode. As long as there are no changes in the environment, no movement or disturbances, no special attention is required.
Our brain is also programmed for this. Common places like home or work do not require any special attention as long as everything is in place. But from a team management perspective, is this what we should expect, what is desirable? Or, on the contrary, does immutability hold value?
There is a lot of literature advocating for competitive environments. We can agree on their relative success. In fact, promoting ideas and talent in the startup ecosystem is noteworthy, although it is starting to stagnate due to its dwindling ability to bring innovation and its high failure rate as a business project. Why such a high failure rate? It is a devastating but very interesting aspect worthy of analysis, where we shed light and offer solutions. Let’s discuss it!
Managing talent
In the business environment, how is talent managed? Historically, professional promotion has been understood as the responsibility of the workforce, of the hired individual. With this postulate becoming an axiom, strategies are established that encourage the constant dissemination of work done, personal achievements, or medals at every step, creating a constant propagandistic campaign within the company by the workforce with the aim of climbing the ladder. Unfortunately, all this professional clamor becomes excessive noise that makes it difficult to differentiate between professional talent and self-promotion. Despite this, traditionally, the easiest option has been promoted, buying into the propaganda and paying attention to what moves in the environment. Is that the right approach? It depends on what one intends to promote: real talent or, as we know propaganda tends to do, obscuring what lies behind.
The truth is that this garden is tremendously complex. However, that is precisely where its beauty lies. Taking on the responsibility of team management is a challenging, exciting, and delicate task. Especially once we overcome the dark times of respect based on fear.
Companies that want to grow in a changing, flexible, ephemeral reality, creative, emotional, and, ultimately, diametrically opposed to that of our parents (applies to anyone reading this), need talented teams and leaders. It’s not just about finding or promoting extroverted or vehement individuals capable of capturing your attention in three minutes and selling a fantastic image, which also has its place and undeniable importance. It’s also about finding and promoting talent that strengthens and adds value to projects at their core. That talent, most of the time, goes unnoticed because it doesn’t disrupt the environment; it camouflages itself and becomes invisible.
New challenges in a new society
The truth is, much is said about talent, talent management, talent promotion, and talent retention. You can find dozens of books and publications with these titles. And that’s great, I defend it tooth and nail, it’s absolutely necessary to achieve an advanced, pluralistic, and welfare-oriented society. But sometimes, it’s the same as with terms like blockchain, artificial intelligence, IoT, industry 4.0, startup, metaverse, or Fortnite. Opinions are formed and assumed, but often incompletely, from the known peak of inflated expectations, the euphoric phase, or the amount of ignorance. What do we do then? Keep learning! Move forward, seek tools that reveal that invisible talent and nurture it for the benefit of the individual, the team, the project, the company, and society as a whole. The best thing that can happen is that they are more capable than themselves.
It’s no small matter. Overcoming the meritocratic model and moving towards workplace well-being is the goal. Talent management is the very management of the work team. The person responsible for the team must pay attention to what happens and what doesn’t happen in work meetings and the work environment. Talent should not only be sought in loquaciousness, high availability, or hyperactivity. It’s also found in silence.
There is a lot of talent that is incapable of putting its value into words. In fact, it’s a facet that often doesn’t arouse much interest. What’s the reason? We must be aware that the new society is richer by expanding its range of responsibilities beyond the work environment. It takes care of family and friendships. It seeks intellectual and physical well-being. The world no longer revolves around a single and exclusive life project. That’s the new wealth with new challenges. And that’s where a significant portion of the talent we must seek and promote resides.
Winning by making others win
In short, I wanted to step out of the garden with trumpets and tambourines to make the blurred sketch of a complex reality in need of attention as inconspicuous as possible. But the message is simple: It’s difficult to know a person through a photo, a speech, a resume, or a questionnaire. Pay attention to the immutable environment to find the invisible talent that will enrich your human and business organization.
We take this very seriously, and from our short trajectory, we devote significant effort to promote, manage, and highlight both visible and invisible talent in national and international research teams, with the sole aim of their happiness and your empowerment. #OwnTheInnovation.
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