Calling a Ceasefire in China's Talent Conflict

I believe I can bring the War for Talent to a peaceful end. I came to this realisation two months ago after I was invited to present at the ‘Corporate Travel and Technology World’ conference in Shanghai. The topic, “Selecting Potential Leaders and Turning a Company from Good to Great”, was provided some months earlier, giving me plenty of time to source opinions from around China. However, from the beginning of my research I realised that the title was a misnomer. From Beijing to Hong Kong, the opinion was (and still is) the same. Being able to ‘select’ a candidate is a luxury. In today’s war for talent the demand is far greater than the supply.

"Jessica" and "Bob" are two managers at a major multinational company in China. A few months ago, their organisation went through a significant restructuring process which placed everyone's job in jeopardy. During this difficult period, Jessica and Bob faced the unenviable task of trying to persuade their top employees to stay with the company, even though they could not offer job security. After much discussion and a series of meetings between the two managers and their respective teams, over 80% of Jessica's staff chose to stay, while fewer than 40% of Bob's staff remained with the firm. Both managers faced the same unfavourable circumstances, but Jessica was able to persuade her team much more effectively. Why was this the case? Jessica mastered the art of persuasion, whereas Bob did not!

Back in the days when most of the world made its living by growing its own food under an agricultural model, hunger drove our motivation. If a field lay uncared for, people would starve and communities would collapse. Therefore, farmers needed little motivation to get up each morning and work from dawn to dusk to provide food for their families. As society progressed and resources were organised more effectively by the industrial model, motivation did not evolve in a corresponding fashion. While the responsibilities of workers became more complex and varied, their motivation stayed fixed in their bellies. A miner's or mechanic's motivation to work remained unchanged from that of their agricultural predecessors. If they fell short of their employer's production expectations, they would be fired. Without a job and its requisite pay, industrial workers faced the same circumstance of starvation as the farmers of the past faced when harvests failed.