Let The Pigeon See The Hole

“THE WAR FOR TALENT”, “HUMAN CAPITAL” – divisive and unhelpful phrases that undermine our efforts to advance the hopes and aspirations of people at work.

“How so?”, I hear you ask.

Well, there are times when I’m surprised more people don’t run from their places of work at the end of the day like Patrick McGoohan in The Prisoner screaming “I am not a number, I am a free man!”
People are messy, contrary, complicated, complex lifeforms. We’re not neatly labelled. We don’t want to be pigeon-holed or reduced to digits on some CFO’s spreadsheet. You want creativity and innovation? Well, don’t refer to us as assets or resources. We’re not “talent”.

So much of the language we use in business is dehumanising to the point where we can move those digits around on the spreadsheet without concerning ourselves with the lives they represent. Euan Semple got it bang on…