Leading thinker calls for industry overhaul

Organizations won’t survive if they stick with the same talent management strategy, says Brenda Barker Scott.

One leading thinker has spoken out about the risks organizations are taking if they refuse to revamp their talent management strategies.

“If we don’t rethink our concepts around how organizations work and how we leverage and manage people within the organizations, then we’re going to get totally left behind,” said Queen’s University IRC facilitator Brenda Barker Scott.

“If organizations don’t get ahead of the shift, they won’t be around,” she added.

Bygone days

Barker Scott criticised the “old-world order”, where people were simply “put in roles and given responsibilities.”

“We wanted everyone to follow their role in the way it was designed. You didn’t really have to develop your people or leverage the talents of your people, you just wanted them to follow orders,” she said.

Now, Barker Scott says the world has changed and if the corporate world has no choice but to catch up.

This dramatic shift, she says, has come because of the knowledge economy, and because the workforce of tomorrow is demanding a more innovative and purposeful environment and work context. 

“Before it was about dividing labour for efficiency, and now it’s about connecting people or talent for innovation and progress,” she said.
 
“If organizations or people aren’t doing their jobs, folks are going to come along and do their jobs for them – and they’re going to do them better,” she said.
 
Barker Scott will be leading the Queen’s University IRC 2015 Workplace in Motion Summit on April 16, in Toronto.

To find out more about the event, or to register, click here.