High potentials: these cracks have lost some of their superb in companies

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(For some countries articles are translated from our French site by an automatic translator).

High potentials: these cracks have lost some of their superb in companies

Sep 16, 2018, 17:07 PM by System

Too pampered, these hopes of the management have become mercenaries. HR is looking for talent whose qualities better serve the company's strategy.

The company's superheroes have lead in the wing. Over-educated and over-performing, the "high potentials" were supposed to embody, until recently, the elite of managers. Profiles capable of brilliantly taking over from the existing managers. In France, the major groups began to pamper them in the 1990s with bonuses, prestigious seminars and attractive career promises. These little geniuses, or supposed geniuses, were then enjoying all the favours.

But don't talk about favouritism to human resources departments: in their jargon, they talk about "differentiated policies for high potentials" instead. At Deloitte, for example, the top 10% of auditors have the opportunity to benefit from job mobility and international mobility for six months each. And at Axa, 30 cracks follow a programme each year called Télémaque designed to make them aware of the challenges of general management.

Detection, evaluation, training... and disappointment. More and more companies today are questioning this model and imagining other, more flexible and diversified career paths: enhancing "technical" and "customer" careers at IBM, developing programmes for women at France Télécom-Orange, La Poste or Areva. High potentials no longer enjoy the exclusive favours of the bosses and HR, and the management policies for high potentials are now organised with tools and tests to identify and develop these up-and-coming talents...

Spoiled divas with high wage demands

Mercenary behaviour that weakens companies.Don't become high potential who wants to. In order to join the very select club of these star executives, who generally represent less than 10% of the workforce, you must meet all the selection criteria: you must be between 25 and 35 years of age, come from a top-rated school, possess a good dose of leadership, have a global vision of the company and demonstrate a certain emotional intelligence.

But because they belonged to this privileged caste, many ambitious young people began to ransom the management, with aberrant salary demands and embarrassing whims. It must be said that in some groups they have a human resources director dedicated to high potentials, reserved stock option plans, and that the slightest of their requests is considered without delay by the top management. By dint of hearing that they stood out from the crowd and being treated with all due respect, many of them let themselves be exhilarated and behaved like divas!

A problem that is all the more annoying since, very often, these happy few are so overwhelmed by their manager that they are infantilized. And that they themselves tend to let their hierarchy take them in hand. Result: few have had the opportunity to make decisions in delicate contexts. And when it comes to making decisions in a crisis situation, they can find themselves very powerless. A bit embarrassing for future leaders!

Overconfidence, greed turning to obsession... The system has created its own monsters and many blunders. For some researchers, it even bears part of the responsibility for serious abuses, such as the "subprime" crisis. Kurt Eichenwald attributed the Enron debacle in particular to these high-potential schemes, blaming the cynicism of a handful of employees who had become all-powerful. In 2005 he devoted a book to this subject entitledConspiration d'imbéciles».

The startup of recruitment has above all led to an overbidding of salary requirements that escapes all logic, particularly in certain trades (financial investment experts, advertising agency creatives, etc.). And even if the employer closes his eyes to the "little whims" of a very good manager, he will not succeed in securing a long-term commitment to his services. He will behave like a mercenary, not hesitating to sell himself to the highest bidder. As in football, there is a real mercato of high potentials which weakens companies. How can you bet on a young talent when you know that he or she may end up with a more generous competitor the following semester?

A survey of 1,052 finance stars revealed that 36% had left their employer within 36 months of being hired and 25% planned to leave within the current year. A third of those surveyed admitted that they did not make all the necessary efforts in their work and 20% said that their aspirations were not in line with what the company offered them.

Another study also shows that this type of behaviour becomes systematic over time: each time the star executive changes jobs, the probability of him or her leaving again increases, especially in favour of more bidding recruiters. Knowing that the departure of an executive is likely to cost up to 200% of his/her annual salary, depending on his/her level of skills and responsibilities, recruiting a "star" executive represents a financial risk that must be carefully considered.

Performance overvalued by human resources

The lure of gain is not the only reason why some key executives leave the company. Other reasons can lead to more or less sudden exits: stress, which can lead to burn-out at a certain level, is a serious threat. So why bet everything on these big fish? Robert and Marilyn Kriegel, authors of "The C Zone", divide employees into three categories. The "A" group is in permanent over-regulation. Panicked inside, they follow a frantic rhythm that leads them to overwork and then to loss of control. The "Bs", on the contrary, don't sprain themselves, suffering more from boredom than from stress.

Finally, the "C's" lie somewhere in between these two extremes: they navigate in calm waters and show lasting performance. So, rather than trying to put a service at risk under an "A" frame, why not consider putting a "C" at the helm? In 2002, journalist and author Malcolm Gladwell asked the same question in the columns of the "New Yorker". He denounced the tendency to focus on individuals rather than the organisations around them. You can be a demigod at Areva and moderately good at Danone! A good manager is not intrinsically good. His success is linked to the context, the composition of his teams, the corporate culture, the type of clientele he meets, etc. This is the case of the Wall Street super-financiers who are driven out. Most of the time, they prove to be less successful with their competitors.

Demotivating and unfair favouritism for other employees

How can we justify this policy of favouritism towards a few elected officials to a legion of little-regarded employees? Why them and not me? This question is all the more relevant as some studies report that 80% of employees consider themselves to be better performing than the average of their colleagues. The system is totally misunderstood... Perceived as unfair and unjust by the vast majority of employees who remain behind the scenes, the system has the perverse effect of demotivating the troops. And it is collective performance that suffers. Some companies even try to hide the identity of the members of these programmes from employees in order to avoid jealousy. In vain, most of the time, the list of the happy few is an open secret!

Nor is it easy to exist next to a star, especially when she shows ill will towards her colleagues. It is indeed commonplace in teams to see high potential people reluctant to bring the best profiles up to management. When you are at the top, why take the risk of being overtaken by someone more talented than you are and lose your advantages? There is a strong temptation to keep the best people in your department, or even to hide their existence from the hierarchy. Isabelle Hébert, a specialist in compensation issues, has highlighted several types of procedures used by these executives who are a little too jealous of their prerogatives: preventing others from expressing themselves at meetings, actively looking for culprits in case of blunders to avoid criticism, launching personal attacks or depriving people of a healthy autonomy, in particular by controlling their work down to the smallest details.

Accelerated and privileged career development.

These policies favouring the fortunate few are fundamentally discriminatory. One study shows that selection into the company's elite corps or relegation to the second division function as self-fulfilling prophecies. Selected? You are pampered, supported, trained and motivated: career opportunities are plentiful and all the conditions are in place for the young crack kid, already predisposed to succeed, to come out on top. It's up to him, but one thing is certain, he will lack nothing: human resources have set up specific detection, development, career management, remuneration and evaluation methods.
A range of tools is available to the darlings of the box: training in corporate universities, MBAs in prestigious schools, "fast track" career paths, etc. Career committees, which are held every three to six months, are designed to help those concerned progress quickly through frequent job changes or succession plans. High potentials are also sent abroad more often than others, usually for short-term stays. Aim of the game: to strengthen their interpersonal skills and to confront them with different cultures.

On the other hand, belonging to this caste is not acquired forever. Refusal of an international assignment and it is disgraceful: one is relegated... Farewell to special treatment. One finds oneself left to one's own devices, in the second division. And, in this category, you don't benefit from the same aid. To get yourself noticed and to achieve the same result as high potentials, you have to make considerable efforts. Finally, the 90 to 95% of employees who are not selected automatically have less chance of standing out and progressing at the same rate as the company's top performers.

Discriminatory actions that mainly exclude women.

These HR policies dedicated to high potentials undermine the notion of equity in the company. In fact, it is always the same profiles that are favoured: young men, graduates of top schools, MBA graduates, etc. Several populations are excluded from the outset: senior citizens, first of all, since age is a determining criterion. The notion of high potential would imply that after a certain age, the individual would no longer have sufficient capacity to occupy positions of high responsibility... Another group to bear the brunt of this policy: women. When the companies hunt their future leaders, they target managers who are between 25 and 35 years old.

This is precisely the age at which women have children. At worst they find themselves out of the game, at best they are faced with a difficult choice: children or career? The model is not only discriminatory, it is exclusionary! It can largely be blamed for the low proportion of women on management committees. Moreover, these practices run counter to CSR (social and environmental responsibility) and diversity management, which companies promote.

Talents" are beginning to replace high potentials and tests make it possible to identify and manage them better.

Although still in force in almost all CAC 40 groups, this system is being challenged by a new approach to HR that revolves around the notion of "talent". It is no longer a question of attracting and retaining a few individuals with rare qualities, but rather of precisely identifying the expertise that contributes to the company's growth. Who are the employees whose particular skills serve the company's overall strategy?

The good old age-sex-school trio is therefore beginning to lose ground to less discriminating behavioural criteria, such as the ability to communicate and organise, alertness, motivation and, above all, strategic vision. Companies are looking for a better balance in the way they treat their employees. They are no longer overvaluing a handful of expensive stars at the expense of many other deserving individuals.

If you are an employer interested in this type of test you can apply for a essai gratuit test for the detection and management of high-potential managers.