These are trying times world-wide. The market is hoping there will be a sustained post Iraq war bump in the US economy. However, Europe is in the doldrums and Japan has yet to solve its deflation and banking crises. Lastly it is summer; half of the decision makers are on vacation, the other half are wishing they were. One could reasonably argue that the outlook is difficult. However, these are the best of times for organizations to take advantage of the ample and highly qualified human resources available to adjust their skill mix amongst their employees. The leading edge technology companies are asking themselves, "How can I reskill the organization to maximum benefit?" This article will explore three aspects to consider when determining next steps your organization should take for optimizing human capital.

1. DIY vs. Outsourcing: The first issue one should consider, when thinking about reskilling the human resource pool, is your organization's core competencies. What should remain within the organization and what are ancillary functions or services, which can be outsourced. This Do-It-Yourself versus Outsourcing determination is a crucial one. It can lead to substantial savings for the organization and bringing a higher level of focus. As an example many software companies, in the mid to late 90's, manufactured their own boxes and burned their own CDs. This, while a key part of the business of building and operating a software company, is not an area where the core competency of the organization (writing and building software, not boxes) is leveraged. Therefore, many of the best companies in this sector moved these operations to partners with which they have long term agreements to provide these services. These agreements represent some of the first Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) deals that were implemented and can showcase the benefit (and risks) of such a policy. Consider your organization. What are its core competencies? What can be done better by an external provider? A call center? A billing and collections function? Or even something as simple as receptionist services. Outsourced services not only add value to the organization from a cost savings perspective. But often these providers can often provide a higher level of service than your own organization, simply due to the scale and volume of their operations and the investments they make in their own capabilities. Thinking about what your organization should itself, versus what can be outsourced, will give you the first part of the answer for how to reskill your organization.

2. Builders vs. Operators: The second aspect to consider when examining your organization's human resource skill set is the set of individuals in your organization that are "Builders" versus "Operators." The former, as the name would indicate, are those individuals that excel in building order from chaos or something from nothing. The latter are the group of leaders that can take an existing group or product and move it to the next level of operational capability and maturity. There are a rare breed of people that can do both, these like diamonds, need to be retained within the organization at all costs. Given the current tough market environment it is possible that your organization has skewed more towards operators versus builders. This action is a logical reaction to the need to run lean and mean and reap maximum efficiency in today's business environment. However, there will soon come a day when the growth engines of the world will re-emerge. These will be times of great opportunity for forward thinking technology ventures (see article Where To From Here….) In order to maximize the opportunity in this period of time it is necessary for organizations to begin to rebalance their skills sets between builders and operators. Now will there still some uncertainty organizations should strike and build up their capabilities to launch new ventures with builders. In most organizations a mix of 25-75 (build vs operate) will be fine. For especially fast paced environments and sectors a 50-50 or even a 60-40 mix may be necessary. Balancing between builders and operators will add the second angle to consider when reskilling your organization.

3. Upgrade vs. Downgrade: Lastly consider the HR talent pool as a whole and determine what set of skills need to be upgraded and which downgraded. Upgrading means ensuring that you have the most highly qualified and capable individuals in the key positions in your organization. The core competency analysis done for item 1 will help identify what these positions are within your organization. Often as an organization grows or matures many key positions are filled with the best managers available at the time, rather than the best managers available, period. Therefore, opportunities to rectify this situation by hiring the best managers for the job can actually have a stimulating effect on the organization. The individual in question can be better applied towards areas where they have core competency. The organization can add brand new talent and reap these benefits. Finally the group in question understands and believes that management is effectively addressing the issues that face their business giving them greater confidence and inspiration. Downgrading means ensuring that your not trying to kill a fly with a sledge hammer. Often organizations that are more mature and have built up processes over time, tend to employ some of the best talent to some of their less necessary tasks. It can lead to quite a significant impact on the bottom line to free up this talent and apply it to key areas in the company (see upgrading section above). The task at hand can be done by a level of talent to which it is more suited. Over time this individual and task will also need readjusting as skill sets improve with experience. But that is a problem for another day. The final vector to consider when reskilling your organization is what areas need to be upgraded and what tasks can be effectively downgraded.

Net net, a strategy to successfully manage your human capital includes outsourcing appropriate functions, balancing between builders and operators and finally by upgrading or down grading the respective areas within the organization. Effective management of the HR talent n your organization will enable your organization to rise to the top of the technology heap after this market turns around.