Career Management: Critical Success Factors That Make Careers Work.

1. "High tech - low touch" comfort for employees to think and feel congruent with changes in the work place¹. High tech, high touch is relevant when technology appears to dominate people and their contribution within organizational setting. Corporate top management have consciously taken cognizance of the need to push human touch as a real issue to study and care given flexing distance between people and process owing to technology and its impact. High tech, high touch implies:

2. Blend of "thinker - doer" ² competency in every individual. That there is a critical needs to review thinking capability along with doing or implementation is essential for making things happen. Gaining acceptability to ideas and new ways of managerial practices is dependent on execution of new thoughts. While it is possible to generate ideas that may appear to be path breaking its implementation is all the more important. Another assumption that is giving way is the realm of academically or theoretically inclined working professionals. From days when a well read professional is written off as theoretical and not practical enough, the days have changed to accept and welcome a knowledge intensive professional. In a sense corporate of tomorrow is likely to look like a well-managed university with teaching and administrative faculty. In effect:

3. Creativity and solution providers ³. That success is a function of creativity and problem solving has again come up in this research quite clearly. A fact that creativity, new ways to handle problems, being prepared for an unknown economic future, that there is a paradigm shift in working ways in organizations all have contributed to a priority on thinking beyond the box. Quite so through: 

4. Self-managed stress and ability to handle business weight ⁵. A high-pressure work environment and consequent personal stress and hardship has been assumed to be real. In fact the study shows that management of stress would become an important managerial competency. In fact:

5. Strong "value based" leadership ⁶. A finite difference has been drawn in this learning. That it is not good enough to be just a leader with all the skills and attributes of effectiveness but a leadership that encompasses a value based working style and behavior. That espoused values are indeed the practiced values. Many companies have stated value articulation. Guess the time has come where the leaders are expecting that this is just down in the hallway as a portrait but is something that is internalized in the minds of every employee and actively pursued. Effectively this implies:

6. Balance between "specialization & general management"⁷. The study does indicate an equal importance between generalization and specialization indicating the need to know more of an area and at the same time possess a deep appreciation of other factors that impact business bottom line. An HR manager should understand financial statements good enough to interpret and work the HR functioning to meet with financial objectives of the corporation. On a to do basis:

7. Compelling "vision & leadership" ⁸ . That a vision and mission statement is more than an inspiration is being stated with "compelling" as a qualifier. And that the leader has to perform an up front role in gaining commitment to both vision and leadership is indicated clearly. Vision is an inspiration, no doubt, but will remain an inspiration only if a organization is pursuing policies and actions that are logically connected with the vision statement. The leader does the pursuit of goals. Strategic plans that are independent of the vision statement would have no buying from the management team. That this is an expression of desire by the leaders themselves implies a state of reckoning by them that it is perhaps a current reality that not always do corporate articulate and practice statements on vision, values or working philosophy. Some companies have even articulated "the way we work" as a written statement and it is a sad reflection to see them fall gloriously by the way side on execution of even one of the stated statements when called upon to act with resolve. Some Indian business houses are notorious for putting up banners of vision, values and way we work statements just to demonstrate professionalism and attract talent. Soon after they have realized their goals intended of their employee their ability to discard employees is a story of deceit and Machiavellian managerial styles. Therefore, 

8. "Cross-cultural" adaptability ⁹. For both employees and the organization as a whole learning ways to cope with and adapt to situations that involve gaining comfort with globalization, working in locations beyond ones imagination, meeting and working with colleagues from diverse backgrounds. Cross culture adaptability implies a firm organizational resolve to move beyond the geographic horizons of the current environment. The study indicates the top management perspective in asking for successful managerial preparedness to meet with this inevitability. This would mean:

9. "Quick responses" to unprecedented change ¹¹. The research has thrown up speed and responsiveness as a people success factor. In a era where customers have taken quality and product features for granted, speed, service and responsiveness takes a prominent position. Change enablement, as a program is now an important consulting activity. E.g. Arthur Anderson. Responding to change effectively is a critical managerial characteristic. Craving for intellectual challenge alone is not good enough for people success. Ability to manage change and adapt to a new circumstance is essential for corporate performance. Some suggestions are:

Article by Ganesh Shermon of www.hrmindia.com and is available on ganeshshermon@hrfolks.com. The article is based a research study conducted by the firm and its associates.