By: Clark Jenkins

Recently, ICC, along with several of our other global OI affiliates sent out a survey to several different industries in order to identify some of the key issues facing organizations as we begin to prepare for 2017.  We received over 300 responses from industry leaders in Manufacturing and Automotive, Healthcare, Energy and Mining, and the Financial Services industry.  Based upon this feedback, we are encouraging you to consider these ideas when planning your 2017 strategy.

Identify the Most Important Skill Set: The most important skill set at 64% from our survey was the ability to communicate. This skill set ranked far above effective conflict resolution, ability to manage diverse backgrounds, cultural agility and others.  Excellent internal communication does not happen by accident.  It is well thought out, planned, practiced and put into processes that are driven from the leaders’ activity.  Managers are then trained on how to coach this process within their own team. Determining the internal communication structure is step one in preparing your strategy.

Ability to Learn: What is the willingness of the organization to learn? Are we open to learning with methods such as reading, listening and thinking ability? Does your company offer e-learning or any mobile platform where remote employees are able to access and review content?  2017 will have more remote employees than any year prior.  E-learning, which used to be a luxury for companies will now become a necessity.

Preparing Your Bench Strength: How does your organization develop young workforce?  An alarming 47% of our survey respondents reported that managers lacked the skills necessary to coach followed by the inability to have career conversations with their team.  Perhaps one of the most often overlooked strategies is the development of our own bench.  Placing a training initiative with your human resources department to determine what training your managers need will provide the success for your young leaders to develop.

Talent: 52% of our respondents reported that attracting and hiring new talent was the largest obstacle they have faced so far in 2016.  After the hire, 46% stated that retaining top talent was a difficulty within their organization. Understanding what it is like to apply to your own company is a great place to start.  Have you personally tried to apply to your own company?  We all have blind spots and this is a very common misstep.  Take the time to go to your own website and discover for yourself the application experience.  Most likely, you will learn that some simple tweaks may bring in more qualified candidates.

Trending: Leadership development programs both internal and external received the highest response rate of what has been highly effective.  Career conversations, assessments and mentoring programs were also identified as effective methods for developing talent.  There is a strong trend showing an increase with one-on-one coaching from external providers and an increase in coaching workshops. The emergence of career pathing software for organizational internal development will increase substantially in 2017.  What does your organization currently have in place?