Margaret Spence argues HR should ask employees what they want instead of imposing fixed career paths. She debunks the myth of innate leadership traits, warns that scarcity thinking breeds disengagement, and urges HR to create multiple pathways and align personal goals with organizational purpose.
What do we want from the people who work for us? That's the first part. We have to get really clear about what we want from our talent. The second part of this is, what does your talent want from you? How many of you have ever walked into your company and said to any individual, "What do you want? What do you want from your career?" I have one person raise their hand and said they've asked it. Two people. Three. We need to arm ourselves with powerful questions that we ask our employees that jar them into their own reality. We are not telling them anything. We are asking them to find their own door. So what is your dream? Before you ended up here, what did you want? What are we doing to the next generation who's going to sit in our seat when we miss seeing them as talented individuals? Can the individual that you've asked the question to trust you to deliver on what they want? 80% of you have talent. 20% of you are leadership ready. 20% of you have that magical leadership attributes. You know what? In my upcoming book, I wrote leadership attributes is a lie told by HR to keep you here. And honestly, you haven't figured out what you want. You haven't asked for what you want. So until you do that, you're gonna be in search of the elusive leadership attributes. Because no one has leadership attributes. No one. It's a misnomer. Some guy, guru, figured out one day, "Let me label that." They came up with the word leadership attributes and they dropped it on it. And as HR folks, we latched on. Just like an octopus, we went, "Chk," and we sucked onto it. And so we tell people all the time, "You don't have leadership attributes." It's nonsense. Leadership is learned. Leadership is demonstrated. Leadership is groomed. And if you— when we operate from a place of scarcity, we convince employees that there's only one job and one opportunity for them. It creates dogged competition in your workforce. It creates the people who stab each other in the back to get that job. We have to say to people, there are multiple roads, there are multiple doors, there are multiple ways to get into leadership, and we are here to show you all the doors and all the ways to get there. We can't operate from a place where we are so scared for our own positions that we don't empower people to find the position that's right for them. When the person gets unhappy or uncomfortable with what you have to offer, they've already checked out. They've already left your company. Let me say it to you. When I'm uncomfortable and I'm unhappy, I've already checked out. I've already left your organization. I may still be showing up every day. I may still be working for you, but I am not there emotionally and I'm no longer connected to you because my why and your why aren't in synergy any longer. Imagine if an employee could be honest about their future. Let me give you an example. I was talking to another one of my clients a couple weeks ago, and she said, "I have the perfect person in my organization to replace me in 5 years." And I thought, "Okay, wow." Does she know that you plan on her replacing you in 5 years? Has she signed on to that 5-year commitment with you, or is that 5-year commitment in your own head and it's really not what she wants. So I called her up and I said, "Hey, how are you?" And she said, "Great." I said, "I understand that your boss is planning to groom you for this job and we need to start the process of working towards that." And she said, "Well, I'm doing my master's in organizational development." I said, "Okay, does anybody know you're doing that master's in organizational development?" And she says, "Oh yeah, everybody knows." They know that I'm done in June. I graduate in June. Really? And they know this and you're taking OD and they're trying to make you a risk manager? Are you serious? So I said, so tell me what it is that you wanna do. And she says, well, nobody's ever asked me that. They just keep adding responsibilities to my desk And they assume by adding the responsibility, this is where I wanna be. This is not where I wanna be. This is my pit stop on my way to somewhere else. So imagine the phone call that I had to make back to her boss to say, I hate to tell you this, but your 5-year plan is not her 5-year plan. Again, we haven't connected the why and the why. My why with your why. But let me give you the most intricate part of this. This employee is scared to death to actually tell her boss what she wants in the future. Because ladies and gentlemen, when HR gets it in their head that we should go somewhere or we should be someone that we don't want to be, when we tell you no, your ego gets bruised. Managers take it personally when employees say, "I don't want that." Because I'm too good, because I've mastered my potential here, that you cannot lose me to move on somewhere else. I want you to feel comfortable allowing me to grow my wings, and when I grow my wings, I want you to be comfortable with me being able to fly away. We have to feel empowered within our role as HR in order for us to empower others. So the key takeaway that I want to leave you guys with, and the one thing that I want to ask you, is to go back to your organizations, erase the job descriptions from your mindset, and just start communicating, talking to people, and asking them, what do you want, and how can I facilitate helping you get what you need. It's really simple, ladies and gentlemen. Empower me, and I will be empowered. Thank you very much.
