Discuss how the leadership at Home Depot intended to use its organizational talent to gain a competitive advantage in the Do it yourself industry
The leadership at Home Depot uses organizational talent to gain a competitive advantage over its competitors by using programs within the Home Depot organization. Such programs include employee recruitment schemes that hire, develop, and maintain staff through the use of innovative measures (Goldsmith, 2009). Organizational talent has been utilized within the Home Depot organization in the following ways.
According to Goldsmith, talent sourcing channels are a way of hiring top talent within the organization. Through this program, Home Depot can target and hire qualified employees who can provide quality customer service and help in problem-solving within the organization. By use of many talent sources like print media, internet hiring websites, TV, and job recruiting firms; Home Depot can tap from a large source of human resources where they can hire their talent.
Through partnership development used by leadership in partnering with different groups, they can tap their skills to their advantage (Silzer, 2009). Home Depot has partnered with organizations such as the Department of defense, AARP (American Association of Retired Persons), and Department of labor. This has ensured that Home Depot gets skilled workers from all the regions of the country; they have also partnered with Hispanic Association on Corporate Responsibility (HACR) with this partnership, they have been able to tap into the growing Hispanic market and become an equal employer within the Hispanic community.
By use of internal talent programs within Home Depot, employees are empowered to become more effective and efficient in the retail industry. Two of the specific programs include ILP (Internal audit Program) and SLP (Store leadership program), these programs have been designed to keep Home depot at a competitive position over its competitors (Rothstein, 2010). The ILP program is designed to recruit graduate entrant employees and train them to manage projects which optimize the business while the SLP program is designed to employ experienced people from many sectors such as the military trainees and train them to become competent store managers with promise of promotions within the Home Depot organization.
Discuss the key channels that Home Depot developed for recruiting talent
The key channels used by Home Depot when recruiting talent include partnerships; Home Depot partners with various organizations to hire staff, organizations which they use include the Department of Defense and Department of labor. These partnerships help Home Depot to hire and train employees who can help achieve the business objectives of the organization (Silzer, 2009).
Another channel used is leadership programs designed to hire top management who will work within Home Depot to improve, manage, and come up with strategies to keep Home Depot at a competitive advantage over its competitors.
The use of strategic alliances as a channel for hiring talent has been exploited by Home Depot, through the Department of Defense, Department of labor and veteran affairs having partnered with Home Depot to provide employees who have knowledge and skills. These alliances have made Home Depot tap into the skills of these employees in important departments such as Home improvement.
Home Depot makes use of recruitment agencies to select employees who meet their talent profiles, these recruitment agencies tap into the market for employees who are profiled to meet Home Depot’s requirement for employees. This channel of recruitment is effective in getting talented employees who have worked or performed in other sectors of the industry.
Discuss the critical programs used by Home Depot to keep talent in their pipeline
Home Depot has come up with several programs that have kept talent within their pipeline, these programs are practiced to come up and maintain a highly qualified workforce who are used in achieving the business objectives of Home Depot. The internal audit leadership program is a program meant to employ exceptional college graduates from varied fields into entry-level jobs. This program is a training program, in which entrants are trained and tested on project management, revolving assignments and they gain hands-on experience in the retail industry.
Another critical program adopted by Home Depot is the Store Leadership Program (SLP); this program is geared towards hiring people with at least ten years’ experience in other fields to join a program that will eventually lead them to become store managers. The people chosen for this program have a proven track record in leadership and high performance in their fields.
Talent channels such as partnerships are an example of critical programs that Home Depot has used to keep talent in their pipeline. Partnerships with groups such as the Hispanic Association on Corporate Responsibility (HACR) and other Hispanic groups have led to open relationships with different groups of people who will be able to interact with customers on a personal level. These partnerships ensure Home Depot keep a stream and pool of talent within their reach and development of other talent pipelines (Goldsmith, 2009).
Discuss three lessons learned by Home Depot related to talent management
Many lessons can be learned from Home Depot’s talent management, but the most important lessons are: The first lesson to be learned is the building of talent channels which will be used in the tapping of employees to work with Home Depot. According to Rothstein (2009) in the process of building talent channels, one should build many channels that will be used in putting the organization at a competitive advantage over other organizations.
Another important lesson to be learned is the use of partnerships to make the organization stronger through partner links. Partnerships help an organization to tap into employees with diverse skills and from different backgrounds; partnerships also enables an organization to tap into markets where their employees have a direct link to these communities. For example, the Home Depot strategy of hiring Hispanic to reach out to their Hispanic customers easily results in better relations with their customers.
The last lesson to be learned from Home Depot is branding and leadership programs. Home Depot has strategies that make them unique, such strategies of hiring of retirees through partnerships have enabled them to build on the experience and skills of these people in building their business brand. Home Depot has internal leadership programs, which enable them to train their current and new employees with skills used in improving the talent within the organization. Through innovation, Home Depot has been able to brand itself well in the market; this is as a result of making its services attractive to many market segments or groups.
References
Goldsmith, M., & Carter, L. (2009). Best Practices in Talent Management: How the World’s Leading Corporations Manage, Develop, and Retain Top Talent. New York, NY: John Wiley and Sons.
Rothstein, M. (2010). Self-management and Leadership Development. Chicago, IL: Edward Elgar Publishing.
Silzer, R., & Dowell, B. E. (2009). Strategy-Driven Talent Management: A Leadership Imperative. Boston, MA: John Wiley and Sons.