The Hidden Cost of Misalignment
The 80/20 principle is still widespread in almost every position, in every company, across all industries. The performance bell curve still ends up being 10% A performers, 15% B performers, 50% C performers, and 25% D performers. This results in an almost uniform 33% human capital efficiency.
This factor in business creates the single biggest opportunity for increased growth and profits. The Human Capital Audit (HCA) was developed by Taylor Protocols to identify where misalignment exists and prescribe specific actions to correct it.
What Is a Human Capital Audit?
The Human Capital Audit evaluates the optimum core values required by a company or department and compares that optimum profile with the actual CVI scores of all players. This reveals who, where, and in which positions changes are required.
Application of the Core Values Index and the Human Capital Audit can greatly reduce the ineffectiveness of growth processes that typically happen through trial and error. Companies that have been in existence for some time without change of personnel, often without any re-alignment of people and jobs, benefit most dramatically.
The reality is that the world and its markets continue to change. If a company or department has been static in its application of people resources for more than two years, you can bet the efficiency and appropriateness of job assignments is significantly misaligned.
The Audit Process
- Assess Everyone: All team members complete the Core Values Index to reveal their unchanging inner nature and contribution style.
- Define Optimal Profiles: For each position, determine what core values combination produces top performance based on task requirements and successful incumbents.
- Map Current Reality: Compare each person’s CVI profile against the optimal profile for their current position.
- Identify Misalignment: Flag positions where there is significant gap between the person’s nature and the role’s requirements.
- Recommend Repositioning: Develop specific recommendations for moving people to positions that better match their core values.
- Implement Changes: Execute the repositioning with clear communication about why changes benefit both individuals and the organization.
The Power of Simple Repositioning
Often a simple shuffle of job assignments, an exchange of tasks among the players, can create a tremendous increase of energy and improve results. Sometimes there is a need to bring in new energy or eliminate people who are committed to resisting required change.
The Core Values Index makes the need for these sometimes painful decisions clearer and less personal. When decisions are based on objective assessment of inner nature aligned with task requirements, they become business decisions rather than personal judgments.
Case Study: Sales Team Transformation
A commodity products distributor’s sales had dropped off by 30% over six months. The president was stressed and constantly trying to retrain new sales people, running back and forth between territories like a juggler with plates spinning on a stick.
The company’s sales staff was making sub-industry income and their turnover rate was nearly 60% per quarter. This is not a formula for success.
The Human Capital Audit revealed that the president, sales manager, and two best performing sales people were all Intuitive Contributors (Builder/Merchant). The solution: cut the staff in half, keeping only Intuitive Contributors, and double the size of each person’s territory.
The method of selling to smaller customers shifted from a route sales approach to an inventory stocking program with telephone sales, stretching site visits from once per week to once every six weeks. Excess energy went to pursuit of larger accounts.
Within three months, the company was setting new sales records, doubling the business in just six months. Sales people were making more than 50% above industry averages. Turnover went to 0% over the next two years and average order size doubled.
Right People, Right Jobs, Right Way
The result was having the right people doing the right jobs and doing them the right way. When they hired their next sales person to support new product lines, they hired an Intuitive Contributor who wanted to make better than the industry average compensation and was willing to work their system to do it.
Since it takes a great deal more time and energy to perform tasks for which we are not qualified, or not disposed to enjoy or perform well, realignment very often eliminates the need to increase staff size. Often we find that we will accomplish far more by eliminating team members than we would by enlarging the group.
Beyond Hiring: Organizational Optimization
As companies succeed, the demands for administration, customer service, production, production management, quality control, accounting, and finance begin to demand greater and greater energy. The company must evolve with these demands, inviting into the spectrum of current employees people who do not necessarily fit comfortably with the personality of the founder.
This evolution is always disruptive and sometimes painful. Wrong choices are often made, requiring growth of staff through a process of trial and error. Application of the Core Values Index and the Human Capital Audit can greatly reduce the ineffectiveness of such a growth process.
What the Audit Reveals
Builder Misalignment
Builders in roles requiring extensive detail work, long deliberation, or heavy relationship management may underperform. Move them to action-oriented, results-focused positions.
Merchant Misalignment
Merchants in isolated roles, purely analytical work, or positions with little human interaction may struggle. Reposition to customer-facing or team-building roles.
Innovator Misalignment
Innovators in highly structured, repetitive roles or positions requiring extensive social interaction may disengage. Move them to problem-solving or strategic positions.
Banker Misalignment
Bankers in chaotic environments, roles requiring quick decisions without data, or constant improvisation may struggle. Position them in quality, compliance, or analytical roles.
The Return on Investment
The Human Capital Audit delivers ROI through multiple channels: reduced hiring costs as fewer wrong hires are made, increased productivity as people work in aligned positions, lower turnover as engagement increases, and improved profitability as the performance bell curve shifts toward A and B performers.
Organizations that have adopted these technologies experience higher profitability than was previously thought possible—simply by ensuring that each person’s inner nature matches the work they are asked to do.
Audit Your Human Capital
Ready to discover where misalignment is limiting your organization’s potential? The Human Capital Audit provides the objective data you need to optimize your most important asset—your people.