Industry reports reveal cutbacks by organizations in diversity programs as cost cutting moves in response to a down economy, according to Meagan Polakowski’s blog posting, Taking Sides. This tactic flies in the face of research:

What Strong Teams Have in Common speaks to Gallup research on the strong link between employee engagement and diversity and the key elements of strong organizational teams.

Research Links Diversity With Increased Sales Revenues, Profits and Customers notes that companies with the highest racial diversity had 15 times greater sales revenue, according to a University of Illinois study.

The American Sociological Review in Does Diversity Pay? reports diversity is as an important predictor of higher revenue, customers, and profits.

Clearly the numbers bear out what many already know: diversity is good for business and part of a winning talent strategy.

Executive perspectives on the economy are varied. But in the PricewaterhouseCoopers 12th Annual Global CEO Survey 2009, more than 1,000 CEOs were asked:

“How important are the following sources of competitive advantage in sustaining your growth over the long term?”

Here are the top three responses; all relate to talent management:
1. Access to, and retention of, key talent
2. Ability to adapt to change
3. Strength of your brand and reputation

Rather than believe the economy has deteriorated the importance of HR and talent, the PwC survey validates similar previous findings including:

• Taking It From the Top: Boards Concerned About Talent Management
• Talent Management: Top Business Priority
• Advantage: Talent Management

CEO turnover rose 39% in March 2009, as 114 CEO departures were announced during the month, according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas.

ExecuNet's 17th Annual Executive Job Market Report reiterates that the down economy is taking a toll on all executive employment. Here is one significant highlight:

The average executive tenure continues to decline from 3.2 years in 2007 to 2.8 years in 2008; a result of corporate belt tightening and increasing demand for different skill sets in key leadership functions.

Contrast this finding with the Mellon Learning Curve Research Study which found Median Time to Full Productivity for external executives at 26 weeks and internal executives at 16 weeks.

The gap between ramping up and leaving the organization is closing. These high executive churn rates are a costly productivity drain on the organization. Investing in succession planning, talent alignment, and onboarding can hasten that time to productivity and increase results.

Boosting productivity has always been an ongoing business goal. In a tough economy, the variation on that theme is doing more with less. So we are seeing a myriad of approaches and management strategies to improve productivity.

One example is productivity gained from specific workforce programs such as telework. Can Telework Cut Costs and Raise Productivity in Today's Economy? reports that productivity went up 31% for the 9,000 telecommuters at British Telecom.

Companies' Secret Weapon: Underutilized Executives says there may be more productivity available just for the asking, according to an Accenture survey called Untapped Potential: Stretching Toward the Future. Aligning talent to new roles and challenges equates to increased productivity with 58% interested in doing more.

However there is a more fundamental holistic talent management approach that produces systemic success rather than simply treating the symptoms. It’s succinctly stated in this memorable quote by the noted management guru Peter Drucker:

“Management by objective works - if you know the objectives. Ninety percent of the time you don't.”

Aligning talent to business is a fundamental benefit of unified talent management where performance management is linked to recruiting and goals are tied to performance and compensation. Cascading goals increase communication and boost focused productivity.

Talent management strategies powered by technology are making a business difference. Companies who use them are being recognized with awards for innovative recruiting and diversity programs.

The 2009 ERE Recruiting Excellence Awards featured these achievements in campus hiring, careers site, referrals, recruiting, and branding:

• Best Employer Brand - Ernst & Young
• Best College Recruiting Program - Ernst & Young
• Best Corporate Careers Website - Yahoo
• Best Employee Referral Program - Accenture
• Recruiting Department/Function of the Year - DaVita

Diversity.com has published the DiversityInc Top 50 Companies for Diversity® online. This year the top fifty includes seven Taleo customers in the top ten.

The DiversityInc Top Ten Companies for Recruitment & Retention includes these companies that are making diversity happen in a talent management framework:

• Accenture built an inclusive culture with deep resource groups.
• AT&T stresses exemplary benefits and inclusive corporate culture.
• Bank of America offers excellent benefits and resource groups.
• Johnson & Johnson focuses on retention, development, and benefits.
• JPMorgan Chase employs benefits, work/life programs, and counseling.
• Target demonstrates great results in recruitment and management.

We’re all in agreement that the research bears out: hiring diversity is good for business, and talent management practices drive profits.

Congratulations to all the winners! Many are powered by Taleo!

It’s mainstream news now that you can post messages and links for your followers in up to 140 characters on Twitter. Most people who tweet post current status, observations, and interesting ideas. All these messages are searchable.

Recently, a message by a candidate in the hiring process that they assumed was private was picked up by their hiring company. Not only that, but this individual has also become a public scapegoat for this public faux pas. The lesson here is that social media has increased personal transparency.

Twitter gets you fired in 140 characters or less goes further in reminding us that the Internet in general and social networking tools specifically offer public visibility. Curiously, in terms of social network profile use by recruiters, German recruiters are twice as likely to view candidate social sites as their UK colleagues. And candidates do not consider what they write on their social networking sites as less than a third think this will affect their chances of securing a position.

On the recruiting side, businesses are turning to Twitter to cut recruitment costs and pushing job postings out via tweetmyjobs and job search engine twitterjobsearch.com.

Taleo has joined the conversation on Twitter and has a presence on Facebook.

We’re also pleased this blog is now included in the new blog aggregation site called HR Tech Central. Check it out.