Our notion of a “Transformational” tour of duty is that upon completing a mission objective over a realistic period of time (usually 3-5 years), the employee will transform both his career and the company’s growth trajectory. Hoffman: The key to orchestrating successful tours of duty is the individual manager-that’s where the burden of talent management lies on a day to day basis. How can a global company implement this kind of model when there are so many options and places someone could go? Who should orchestrate these moves - the manager? HR? And does everyone get to take these tours or only high potentials and high performers? The more critical adaptability is in your industry, the more of your employees you will want on defined tours of duty.īersin: Your discussion about 'tours of duty' is very analogous to what we often call 'facilitated talent mobility' in companies. The principles behind the Alliance started here in Silicon Valley, but they are spreading into jobs and industries all over the world, wherever employees and companies want to be entrepreneurial and adaptable.

Yet even those franchise players don’t sign a single “lifetime” contract when they join the team they serve multiple tours of duty that span their career on the team, so that both sides consciously re-commit to each other after incremental objectives are met. In the world of sports, some players switch organizations all the time, but others stay with the same club their entire career.

These principles apply whether the employee expects to stay at a particular company for a couple of years (likely on a Transformational tour of duty), or a couple of decades (what we call a Foundational tour of duty). Hoffman: The Alliance is all about building an honest relationship based on mutual trust, mutual investment, and mutual benefit. My experience is that people still do want stable employment and a job they feel they can call 'home' - what about the people who want that kind of long term career and feel very committed to their companies?

Bersin: You talk about the change in employment contract to that of an 'alliance' relationship, similar to a sports team.

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