Talent Management In Politics-Pahle Andhi, Phir Gandhi

In this forum, I have read power point and other presentations about the importance of goals, mission and vision etc. Some consultant said that setting goals is so important that children should be habituated right from Childhood. It is strange that what is relevant for a company is not so relevant for a country.

Similarly take other HR concepts- performance management for instance. Sportstars and filmstars sons have to prove themselves but politicians progeny have a free entry. Somebody like Sachin Tendulkar has short term accountability if he does not do well in a world cup but no one bothers about the goals and performance management of the political class. Is governance so simple and can be taken for granted. A country is bigger than a company.

These and other issues on my article "Pahle Andhi, Phir Gandhi" which was published in the HR magazine "Management Compass" in October'2007. Since October 2 represents Mahatma Gandhi's birthday, this article highlights the all pervasive fall in ethics and hence performance in Indian society and also tries to explore ethics in society and talent management/performance management in politics. :-

http://wplay.wordpress.com/2007/10/0...i-phir-gandhi/

Thanks, Peer. After writing the post yesterday, I saw today how the Times of India is trying to organize the debate among the lead participants in the lead India campaign. That is a good sign as someone is at least taking the initiative to gauge political talent.I strongly feel however that elected representatives should also have clear goals, Job descriptions and specifications etc which they can customize according their constituency's needs. Most important thing though is a monitoring mechanism which would be a tool for performance management which the Times of India has not touched upon yet.

What does Sachin do, they play for money and nothing else, whole their clothes, cap, bats they rent for advertisements> If they win in one match our people give much unnecessary respect and accolades for them,, but the winning is one in ten, that too with shameful and pathetic performances. In any industry I dont think your company might accept that u perform well for some 2-3 months and then perform worst for a month and then again repeat this game.
This we accept for filmstars, politicians and sportstars..

There is nothing wrong if cricketers play for money as they have a limited shelf life and what is wrong in that anyway? As for doing well one in ten, it may apply to some past and other cricketers but I don't think that Sachin comes under that category.
The basic point is that in HR we have goals, talent management, performance management etc for companies then why not countries? A country is bigger than a company and entails more responsibility because of the public nature of the work.

Mine is working but you can have it again if you like:-
http://wplay.wordpress.com/2007/10/0...i-phir-gandhi/

I cannot but add this since we are talking in the context of Talent management in Politics. In the article above it is mentioned how Gandhiji had to bow to the voice of the people and return to South Africa if needed. However President Abdul Kalam could not stay on as President even though the voice of the people said so. Instead, we have somebody whose name stands for talent(Pratibha) but somebody who can hardly stand up to Mr Kalam. The President herself has set a bad precedent. How can any country prosper genuinely if there is no talent mangement is politics.