There is a compelling scene in HBO’s quasi-fictional Western, Deadwood, which qualifies as an instant lesson in the essentials of talent management. The 1870s mining boom town of Deadwood, which is just emerging from Wild West state-of-nature conditions, has attracted the attention of the robber baron George Hearst. Al Swearengen, the town’s incumbent strongman, adapts nimbly and switches from a governance-by-murder strategy to a more artful one, and in the process very effectively shifts power between his two key reports to reflect the priorities of the new situation. Dan Doherty, his dim and violent second from the lawless past, is gracefully shunted aside, while the more suave, but restless and underutilized Silas Adams is handed the tricky and critical “stretch” task of managing the relationship with George Hearst. Somehow, Al keeps both men motivated and loyal. Modern executives will recognize all sorts of very current themes in this little vignette. So how do you master these timeless elements of talent management, while operating in modern business conditions? You read Talent On Demand by Wharton’s Peter Cappelli, a book that completely validates my belief that talent management is the issue of the next decade (the purchasing function ranks a close second).
, or a manager in a larger company, your ability to understand and orchestrate your corner of the talent economy will make or break you and your company. Kicking and screaming, anybody with half a brain has accepted that the “
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