Coming soon · Book Profile
Talent Wins
A CEO playbook for transforming a strategy-first company into a talent-first organization where human capital is deployed as rigorously as financial capital.
A profile of this book is on the way.
What it’s about
Written by three seasoned advisers to top CEOs, boards, and recruiters, Talent Wins argues that in today's fast-changing, unpredictable economy, talent—not strategy—creates value, and therefore must lead strategy. The book provides a seven-step playbook that shows CEOs how to manage human capital as wisely as financial capital: forging a G3 core leadership group of CEO, CFO, and an elevated CHRO; identifying and cultivating the 'critical 2 percent' of value creators; digitizing HR; aligning the board around a new TSR (talent, strategy, risk); designing agile, platform-based organizations; reinventing HR into a source of competitive advantage; unleashing individual talent through customized development; and building an M&A strategy for talent. Rich with real-world examples from Marsh, McGraw-Hill, Facebook, Haier, BlackRock, GE, Amgen, Volvo, and others, it is an actionable guide for any leader who wants to put people first and win.
The through-line
- Who it’s for
- A CEO (or senior executive) who recognizes that talent is the key competitive advantage of the twenty-first century and wants to build a company that wins by putting people first.
- The problem
- The company's talent practices are vestiges of another era—designed for predictable environments and rigid hierarchies—and can no longer compete for or deploy the talent needed to create value. The CEO feels uncertain whether the company has the right people, the right HR, and the right approach to drive change, and daunted by how radical a transformation is required.
- The plan
- Forge the tools of transformation: create a G3 (CEO, CFO, elevated CHRO), identify your critical 2 percent, and digitize HR.
- Energize the board to help talent drive strategy via the four R's (reintroduce, reorganize, reprioritize, retell) and a new TSR.
- Design and redesign the organization for agility, platforms, and meaning.
- Make HR a source of competitive advantage through talent value leaders and reinvented HR careers.
- Unleash individual talent using data, modern feedback processes, and continuous training.
- The payoff
- Human capital is deployed as effectively as financial capital, driving exponential value creation. · The company attracts, develops, and retains the best talent in its field. · The organization is agile, adaptive, and continuously reinventing itself.
See our guide
- Compensation Analyst →
- Compensation Analyst →
- Compensation Analyst →
- Compensation Analyst →
- Do Human Resources And People Management Well →
- HR Business Partner →
- HR Business Partner →
- HR Business Partner →
- HR Business Partner →
- HR Director →
- HR Director →
- HR Director →
- HR Generalist →
- HR Generalist →
- HR Generalist →
- Learning & Development Specialist →
- Learning & Development Specialist →
- Learning & Development Specialist →
- Learning & Development Specialist →
- Recruiter / Talent Acquisition →
- Recruiter / Talent Acquisition →
- Recruiter / Talent Acquisition →
Related profiles we’ve built
- An Everyone Culture: Becoming a Deliberately Developmental Organization →
- Apa Handbook Io V2 →
- Applied Psychology in Human Resource Management →
- Armstrong’s Handbook of Strategic Human Resource Management →
- Beyond Hr Boudreau Ramstad →
- Antifragile (Incerto) →
- Coaching for Leadership - The Practice of Leadership Coaching from the Worlds Greatest Coaches (J-B US non-Franchise… →
- 50 Top Tools for Coaching A Complete Toolkit for Developing and Empowering People →
Additional reading
- Immunity to Change: How to Overcome It and Unlock Potential in Yourself and Your Organization · Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey
This is the authors' previous book, which provides a deep dive into the ITC framework that is presented as a key tool in Chapter 6 and used by the fledgling DDOs in Chapter 7.
- In Over Our Heads: The Mental Demands of Modern Life · Robert Kegan
This book lays out the foundational theory of adult development and mental complexity that underpins the entire DDO concept, explaining the 'adaptive gap' that DDOs are designed to address.
- Mindset: The New Psychology of Success · Carol Dweck
The book explicitly references Dweck's work, contrasting the 'fixed mindset' (prevalent in ordinary organizations) with the 'growth mindset' that is fundamental to a DDO's culture.
- Organizational Culture and Leadership · Edgar H. Schein
Mentioned in the book, Schein's work provides a foundational understanding of organizational culture, which is the primary medium through which DDOs operate.
- The Functions of the Executive · Chester Barnard (1938)
Chapter 10 identifies this book as providing the seminal concept of 'willingness to contribute to the cooperative system,' which forms the theoretical foundation for the modern construct of Organizational Citizenship Behavior (OCB).
- The Psychology of Careers · Donald E. Super (1957)
Chapter 3 cites this as a foundational work that established the concept of career stages, a model that has profoundly influenced career development theory and research for decades.
- Decision-making in the employment interview · E. C. Webster (1964)
Chapter 6 highlights this as the key report from the influential McGill University studies, which revealed the cognitive biases inherent in unstructured interviews and shifted the focus of research toward understanding the interviewer's decision process.
- Principles for the Validation and Use of Personnel Selection Procedures · Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP)
Multiple chapters (e.g., 13, 15) refer to this document and the related AERA/APA/NCME 'Standards' as the authoritative professional guidelines that define best practices and core concepts, like the modern unitarian view of validity, for the entire field of personnel selection.
- Managing Human Assets · Beer, M. et al. (1984)
This is a seminal book that introduced the 'Harvard framework' of HRM, emphasizing a multi-stakeholder approach that considers the interests of employees, not just shareholders. It provides a foundational 'soft' HRM perspective.
- Strategic Human Resource Management · Fombrun, C. J., Tichy, N. M. and Devanna, M. A. (1984)
This book introduced the 'Michigan framework,' which advocated for a 'hard' HRM approach focused on tightly matching HR strategy to the business strategy (vertical fit). It is a foundational text for the strategic alignment concept.