The retention of an organisation’s strongest people and key contributors is rightly high on the agenda of Executive Committees. Many organisations therefore invest in talent programmes, leadership tracks, wellbeing initiatives and individual incentives. Yet persistent attrition remains, even among the very people companies are most keen to retain in critical roles.
This raises a fundamental question:
are we mainly optimising existing systems, or are we willing to question the system itself?
Part of the answer may lie not in new HR models, but in a sector that has been dealing structurally with talent diversity for years: education.
Education is often viewed through a care lens, but in reality schools have been actively working for more than a decade on identifying and developing very different forms of potential: cognitive, creative, social and practical. They do this not out of choice, but out of necessity: they cannot select who participates, and must organise development for both vulnerable learners and strong performers.
What is often underestimated is how much education has evolved towards differentiation, guidance, enrichment and multiple learning pathways, not as exceptions, but as structural choices. More importantly, schools have learned that measures initially designed for specific groups often raise the performance of the entire system. What benefits some frequently improves outcomes for everyone.
That is a highly relevant insight for business.
Organisations today also invest in initiatives around inclusion, neurodiversity and wellbeing. These efforts are valuable, but too often remain disconnected from the core: how work is organised, how performance is assessed, how careers progress and how contribution and potential are recognised.
The result is a paradox: significant investment in programmes, but far less in rethinking the structures in which people operate every day. In some cases, more attention goes to visibility than to structural impact, turning well-intended initiatives into sticking plasters on a system that remains fundamentally unchanged.
Education shows that change does not start with additional programmes, but with different choices in approach, using existing people and resources. This does not require large budgets, but strategic focus and consistency.
A second structural constraint lies in how organisations define and identify their strongest people. Many companies still rely on narrow detection channels: accelerated tracks and talent programmes for those who perform visibly and quickly within existing frameworks. This is manageable and efficient, but increasingly fails to reflect the full range of value and capability within the organisation.
Those who fit the system are seen.
Those who contribute differently are more likely to remain unnoticed.
This is not a matter of intention, but of system logic. And that is precisely where Executive Committees carry responsibility: systems determine which behaviours are rewarded, who gets opportunities and who feels safe to show up fully.
New entrants make this tension more visible today, not because they are less resilient, but because they are accustomed to multiple development pathways. They are not lowering standards, they are expecting systems to evolve. In that sense, they are not the problem, but the signal.
For Executive Committees, this is not an HR issue, but a question of value creation and risk management. When key contributors leave or operate below their capabilities, organisations lose not only capacity, but also knowledge, innovation power and future leaders.
In fact, the greatest cost is not those who leave, but those who stay and are structurally underutilised. This results in predictable performance, fewer breakthroughs and increasing dependence on external hiring for critical skills, exactly what makes organisations vulnerable in fast-changing markets.
Schools have learned that potential that is not challenged does not disappear, but stagnates. Companies see the same phenomenon today, yet often label it as a motivation issue or a generational problem, when in reality it reflects structural underutilisation of human capital.
Many organisations today compete for the same profiles with similar promises and career models. This drives up costs and increases dependence on the external labour market.
Companies that succeed in activating more internal capability and hidden strength create a structural advantage: faster skill development, stronger internal mobility and more robust succession pipelines. Not by lowering standards, but by enabling more pathways to high performance and meaningful contribution.
Education has demonstrated that when systems are designed so that more types of talent can grow, overall performance capacity increases. For business, this means not less ambition, but more routes to impact.
For Executive Committees, this ultimately comes down to a clear choice:
This is not an operational HR discussion, but a strategic question about how innovation, value creation and leadership continuity are structurally secured.
New inflows make clear that existing models are reaching their limits, not because they were wrong, but because the context has changed. Organisations that take this signal seriously can transform their talent strategy into a genuine growth engine. Those who do not will keep paying for growth, while their real competitive strength quietly erodes from within.
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