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6 1GX THE TIMES Wednesday October 6 2010 European pick of the bunch T he IESE Business School in Barcelona is trawling top European universi- ties for talent in a move that will make its MBA cohort one of the most youthful ever. Javier Muñoz, the admissions director and leader of the school’s young talent programme, explains: “Employers were telling us that they could not find the talent they needed, especially in these diffi- cult times.” Although hundreds of thousands of graduates flood on to the jobs market each year, some employers are very selective about who they attract and retain. Working with more than 15 international partners, including BCG, Nestlé, Philips, Johnson & John- son, Microsoft and Santander, IESE has established a profile for unearth- ing young talent. Muñoz says: “Our preferred candidate will have two degrees and fluency in two or more modern languages. They will be good communicators, have a well-rounded profile and have travelled extensively. We are talking about the top 1 per cent. These are people who are even better than our MBA students.” In the UK the school has contacted the universities of Oxford and Cam- bridge as well as the London School of Economics. So far IESE has discovered 76 supercharged individ- uals — more or less equal numbers of men and women — and placed them in companies linked to the scheme. Two to three years later the young talent will interrupt their careers to do a one-year full-time MBA. Fahey Sheble, 24, from North Carolina, took a business degree in Spain. Since joining the talent pro- gramme she has worked as an intern at L’Oréal in Madrid and has now been offered a full-time job. The injection of so many younger students into what is a traditional full-time MBA cohort will lower the age profile from its current 27 to 24 or 25. Muñoz says: “We wanted to attract more young women to the MBA because a career break at 27 comes at a time when women might want to start a family and could well have other commitments. Employers are also telling us that they want to see younger people with MBAs.” Boston Consulting Group in Spain, one of the partners in the talent programme, believes that the partner- ship with IESE is helping to contrib- ute to an intellectually stimulating environment and strong client teams. “These young talented profession- als are helping us to find insight in very diverse business situations,” says Maria Bosch, recruiting manager of BCG Spain. The school and its business part- ners are delighted with the take-up of the scheme but are realistic. They are dealing with generation Y, an age band whose desire for greater work- life balance and values-driven mind- set have brought them into conflict with traditionally minded employers. Muñoz says: “We put no obligation on any of our young talent to study for the MBA. They might decide that further study is not for them.” On the other hand, employers who have made a commitment to sponsor students to take an MBA commonly make them sign a contract guarantee- ing that they will return and work for the company for two to three years after graduating. IESE is also investing in the scheme by putting on a regular one- week workshop at its Barcelona campus to bring the young talent to- gether, introduce some of the MBA faculty and ideas and build a commu- nity. Last July more than 70 prospec- tive students attended. “We see that as a positive sign that these people are on track to join us for an MBA,” Muñoz says. ALAIN SHRODER/GETTY IMAGES GOFF PHOTOS/ITV Academics cannot agree on the meaning of talent, writes Stephen Hoare MBA Susan Boyle, singing star of Britain’s Got Talent, has made people think about talent and how it can be nurtured Even as an engineering undergraduate Guillem Rojo knew he needed high-level business skills to succeed in his chosen profession. “I was studying at the University Polytechnic of Catalonia and just before my final year I applied to take a year out studying business at MIT in America,” Rojo, 24, says. “I was selected from more than 200 students to take part in an exchange programme.” In Spain it is possible to mix and match degree modules between institutions and, on his return from MIT, Rojo applied to take a single module in macro economics at the University of Barcelona to run concurrently with the final year of his engineering degree. Then a friend tipped him off about IESE’s newly launched young talent programme. Rojo was invited by IESE to apply for fast-track graduate management development programmes among its partner companies. He now works for Boston Consulting Group and plans to join IESE’s MBA cohort in 2012 when he will have three years’ management experience under his belt. “I’m working as part of a team helping an international telecoms operator to develop a five-year business plan,” he says. “I will return to the Boston Group after my MBA but my ambition is to set up my own business.” STEPHEN HOARE Spanish success Been there, done it A ny business wanting to boost its performance and profitability will be familiar with the term talent manage- ment. But, despite piles of books on the subject, academ- ics still argue over the meaning of talent and MBA courses are failing to incorporate current best practice. Saïd Business School’s executive education arm works with organisa- tions to design talent management programmes that identify and dev- elop future leaders. Saïd has worked with BAE Systems and the Govern- ment of Abu Dhabi to identify their skills needs and to develop their talent in line with business strategy. Andrew White, associate dean of executive education at Saïd, says: “We do extensive research within organisations to find out the strategic issues they are facing. More and more companies are using customised development plans to stretch their talented individuals and to prepare them for leadership roles.” Paul Sparrow, director of the centre for performance-led human resources at Lancaster University Management School, is using research into the way businesses nurture talent to boost the MBA syllabus. He believes that organisa- tions need to apply talent manage- ment far more widely than merely developing the top 1 per cent. “Organisations should be aware of all the capabilities and skills that their people can bring. All the long-term challenges that organisations face are around innovation and change. They need to find a way of putting their people at the heart of strategy.” Cutting-edge talent management brings HR and business strategy together in a powerful boost to busi- ness performance, says Sparrow, who is designing a new MBA module called Leading HR. “Leaders should all be talent managers. The module is about the challenge of being a leader who takes responsibility for people — recognising and helping them to develop their talent.” Lancaster’s centre for perform- ance-led HR recently commissioned a paper from the talent directors of Royal Mail, RBS, the Department of Work and Pensions and NG Bailey, the electrical contractor. Posted on the school’s website, it points to the need for a more evidence-based approach to talent management. The findings indicate that talent management should be driven by line managers and not by HR, which should act as an enabler and reflect business challenges such as demo- graphics and regulatory change. Busi- ness schools face an uphill struggle convincing students that talent man- agement is cutting edge and not some fluffy abstraction. “Talent management is arguably the biggest single preoccupation in boardrooms in the UK and interna- tionally,” says Mark Batey, lecturer in organisational psychology at Man- chester Business School. Batey confronted his students with a recent IBM global survey of chief executives that demolished the myth that business success equates to im- proving technical skills. The large majority of chief executives attribut- ed their success to creativity, innova- tion and being able to manage com- plexity, none of which is taught as part of the standard MBA fare. “If that is what chief executives want, then I do not believe business schools are doing a very good job in preparing people for future leader- ship,” he says. Professor Chris Brady, dean of BPP Business School, part of BPP Univer- sity College, says: “Managing talent is not a skill you can learn in the class- room. It’s a skill you can pick up.” He believes that by bringing together talented individuals, an MBA helps people to work collaboratively in teams, mixing with individuals from across many cultures and, in the pro- cess, developing their own manage- ment style. He certainly has a point. The Manchester approach to talent management is more proactive, shift- ing students’ mentalities and challeng- ing their ways of thinking. Batey discusses the results of psy- chometric tests with each student and gets them to focus on their individual management style, their strengths as well as their blind spots. “An individual’s greatest strengths can also be his greatest weaknesses. A meticulous organiser, for example, can become over-controlling and tyrannical. Assignments and group work are designed to help students to grow as individuals.” IESE is seeking to discover the brightest young students, says Stephen Hoare MBA Ken Brotherston, chief executive of Kinsey Allen International, the City search and selection firm, has some uncomfortable news for MBA students. He rates the qualification as less important than the ability to communicate and to think creatively. “For me talent consists of three things — education, experience and personality. The MBA is not a guarantee of talent, it’s only something to be looked at in the round,” he says. “I think increasingly that success in a leadership role boils down to an ability to communicate. I have seen too many MBA students who come out of business school speaking management jargon. Speaking jargon on the shop floor is not going to go down well. In a leadership role you have to be able to engage the workforce.” And, when it comes to experience, employers are looking for people who have dealt with rapid change and steered a business through turbulent times. Management theory learnt on an MBA is no substitute for hard knocks. Brotherston says: “Employers would prefer people who have been there and done it; people who have experienced working through a downturn. To survive, high-flyers must be people who are comfortable with change and able to deal with complexity.” In spite of the battery of psychometric tests the best indication of ability for search agencies and employers is a lot more mundane. “A CV that demonstrates consistent achievement is always going to be the best indicator of talent,” Brotherston says. STEPHEN HOARE Finding top performers The Barcelona school is hoping to attract more women at a younger age
