Best Practices in Talent Management: How the World's Leading Corporations Manage, Develop, and Retain Top Talent

FROM COMPLEX TO SIMPLE

One of the most important changes made in Avon’s talent practices was the radical simplification of every process. We believed that traditional talent processes would work (that is, grow better talent, faster) if they were effectively executed. However, we understood from our experience and a plethora of research (Hunter, Schmidt, & Judiesch, 1990) that most talent practices were very complex without that complexity adding any significant value. This level of complexity caused managers to avoid using those tools, and so talent wasn’t grown at the pace or quality that companies required.

We committed ourselves to radically simplifying every talent process and ensuring that any complexity in those processes was balanced ...