Welcome To My Blog

Welcome to my blog.  For those who don’t know me, I’m David Cohen, Founder and Principal at Strategic Action Group Ltd.

I’m a contrarian consultant with a passion for connecting the talent of people with the strategy of organizations.

I believe that people bring the most commitment, creativity, and energy to the job when personal and organizational values are aligned.

I think that leaders who live the values of the organization, and prize learning and growth, get the most out of the people who work for them.

I like to debate, and I don’t often agree with the fads of consulting in the talent management world, so please let me know when you agree or disagree with my strongly stated opinions. Let’s generate an exchange of ideas, experiences, and perspectives.

We’ll be talking about talent management, including issues related to:

Still Incompetent About Competencies

Given the proliferation of consultants selling globally research behavioural competency models it must be confusing to pick one that actually fits your organization’s culture and business strategy.  These behavioural competency models provide you with a long list of categories further broken down into supposed behavioural statements.  Given that you know they are research based and sold by an internationally reputable firm you are comfortable bringing this generic and cleansed dictionary into your organization.

Reality is you are giving people a clear roadmap of behaviours for them to follow that has not been tested by your employees, validated by your organization and built off of your corporate culture (values) and strategic business plan.  You now expect employees to demonstrate actions, which in the past they have not demonstrated, even though the actions they are currently doing are leading to the desired results. Suddenly you are comparing your people against the new model of expected behaviours, that you paid outrageous amounts for, and suddenly good people have new deficiencies.

Issues with competencies models and performance management and selection: