What is the 9-Box Talent Review Grid?
What is the 9-Box Talent Review Grid?
Looking to know about the 9 Box Talent Review Grid? You’re at the right place, then.
Developing a solid succession plan is the core requirement of any successful organization. Succession planning enables managers to boost employee engagement. To build a succession plan, you need to evaluate the performance of individual employees.
An employee’s performance appraisal is challenging, and most managers fail to conduct it. Various tools and techniques are used for this purpose, but one of the most popular is the 9-Box Talent Review Grid.
This article will discuss the 9-box talent review grid for performance management and its advantages. Watch the video below to learn more. Otherwise, skip ahead.
What is a 9-Box Talent Review Grid?
The 9-box talent grid is a performance management technique that helps assess employees’ performance and determine their competence level. This grid also enables you to assess how well an individual has performed against key indicators in their job role and decide whether they are meeting expectations.
It is one of the most effective tools for measuring employee performance, as it helps track progress over time, identify specific areas for improvement, compare employees’ performance against each other and with industry standards, and assist you in writing annual performance reviews.
How Does the 9-Box Talent Review Grid Work?
The 9-box talent review grid is a simple yet powerful tool for evaluating employees based on two key dimensions: performance and potential. Each dimension is plotted along an axis to create a 3×3 matrix, resulting in nine distinct categories for placement.
Explanation of the Performance and Potential Axes
- Performance: This axis measures an employee’s contributions, results, and overall effectiveness. Key indicators often include meeting goals, delivering consistent results, and demonstrating technical skills and expertise. Performance evaluations rely on tangible data like key performance indicators (KPIs), productivity metrics, and manager feedback.
- Potential: The potential axis assesses an employee’s ability to grow, adapt, and take on more complex responsibilities or leadership roles in the future. It considers traits like learning agility, problem-solving capabilities, and emotional intelligence. Evaluating potential is often more subjective, relying on manager observations, assessments, and sometimes psychometric tools.
How Do You Fill Out a 9-Box Talent Review Grid?
Now that you know the nine-box talent grid, it’s time to create one. If you want to build a 9-box talent grid, you need to follow these steps:
1. Assess the Employee’s Performance
The first step is to assess the performance of employees. You need to identify employees and document the areas in which they excel and those where they need improvement. It will help you determine how to rate their competence on the grid. You can use various ways to assess the performance of your employees.
Every organization has different appraisal systems based on industry and business requirements. On the grid, employees’ performance is categorized as low performance, moderate performance, or high performance.
Employees with Low Performance
These employees are not meeting expectations and need improvement in most areas. They have low potential and are not expected to grow much in the future. They lack essential skills that need to be developed, and their proficiency in implementing their knowledge and abilities is low.
Employees with Moderate Performance
These employees meet the expectations but lack some essential skills that must be developed. Such employees have moderate potential and are expected to grow in the future. They lack some essential skills that are required for excelling in their career.
Employees with High Performance
These are the employees who are meeting all expectations and don’t require any development. Such employees have high potential and are expected to grow as future leaders. They have the necessary skills, knowledge, and ability to contribute to the organization.
2. Evaluate Employee Potential
The next step is to evaluate the employee’s potential. To create a 9-box grid, managers have to assess performance by noticing employees’ strengths and weaknesses. While assessing potential, the managers have to analyze how much a worker is expected to grow in the future, their proficiency in implementing their knowledge and skills, and their ability to contribute to the organization.
On the grid, employees are categorized as having low potential, moderate potential, or high potential, depending on their potential.
3. Build a 3✕3 Grid
Once you have determined the performance and potential of all the employees, you will build the grid. The performance and potential of each employee are plotted in a grid with three rows and three columns.
How to Use a 9-Box Talent Review Grid for Succession Planning
The 9-box grid is a performance evaluation tool used to identify employees’ potential and help with succession planning. When you identify each employee’s role, you need to evaluate their performance as a valuable employee.
To build a solid succession bench, you need to have a list of ready employees who can take up the role. The succession bench is created with people from all organizational levels to find someone who meets your requirements when there is a vacancy in upper-level roles.
You can use it for talent review. Using the 9-box grid, you can determine which employees have managerial or professional capacity. This grid can also be used to measure the performance of your employees and help you decide where they fall in their job roles.
You can then upgrade the employee’s skills with various talent management tools, like training or a development program, monitoring, and feedback system. It can help you lead your organization to success with the right succession planning in place and identify high performers with the skills to take on greater roles in the future.
If you’re new to the human resource field and are looking to master mandatory skills like employee succession planning, performance reviews, and much more, then take a look at our top-rated HR courses:
How to do Performance Management Using a 9-Box Talent Review Grid
Once you have generated the grid, it’s time to use it for performance management. Categorize the employees into nine groups depending on their performance and potential. You need to create a separate development plan for each category. The following are nine categories you can get by employing the 9-box grid. Let’s take a look at how to manage them.
1. Low Performers with Low Potential
The employees who fall into this nine-box grid category require a lot of attention. They need to be trained deeply in their weak areas. Identify the root of the problem and provide support to improve their performance. You don’t need to give much attention to this category of employees as they are not expected to grow much in the future.
2. Low Performers with Moderate Potential
This 9-box grid category of employees needs some attention and support from the managers. They lack some essential skills that need to be developed. Help them identify their weaknesses and provide support to improve their performance.
This type of employee can work with the organization if they receive the necessary training and development. However, they lack proper training or experience.
3. Low Performers with High Potential
This category of 9-box grid is rare, but it does exist in every organization. Employees lack some essential skills that need to be developed. Provide them with training, mentorship, or coaching by senior management in the areas where they are lacking and provide support so their performance improves. You can use a talent management tool to manage talent and their skills.
If an employee falls into this category, you need to give them special attention. If you provide them with the necessary development, this type of employee can contribute to your organization’s success.
4. Moderate or High Performer with Low Potential
The employees in this category are not expected to grow much within the organization. They lack essential skills, and training is required to improve their proficiency. Provide them with some extensive development to contribute toward your company’s success.
5. Moderate or High Performers with Moderate Potential
This category of employees is expected to grow within the organization. They also lack some essential skills that need to be developed. However, they can work with the organization if they get some training and orientation.
If you help them with their weaknesses and provide support to improve their performance, they can contribute to the organization’s growth. This category of employee needs some attention, but not as much as the low performers with moderate potential.
6. Moderate or High Performers with High Potential
This 9-box grid category is not a problem, but they need attention so their skills don’t become obsolete. Keep providing leadership and skill development training to keep their performance high. They can handle things without interdependencies and don’t require much help from managers.
This category of employees is expected to grow within the organization. They have all the skills, knowledge, and ability required to contribute to your company’s value.
This type of employee can help your company go to the next level. Providing them with development is essential to improve their skills and knowledge.
Benefits of Using a 9-Box Talent Review Grid
9 Box Grid brings numerous benefits for managers and business owners. Below, we have mentioned some detailed benefits of using the grid:
Ease of Use
9 9-box grid is quite easy and convenient to use. You don’t need a huge setup to use it. Employers can use this practice as often as they want to assess employee performance. You can apply this practice to all the employees. While evaluating your employees, you need to match the performance and potential of each worker with the correct box.
Help in Employee Talent Assessments
Any business owner’s objective should always be to reach the pinnacle of success. For this, it is important to have the right talent in place. A company can reach its goals with the help of dedicated and hardworking employees.
The grid is also helpful in the talent review process. It can help identify which employees have the potential to move up in their careers. This is done with proper training and development program planning and execution.
You can also use this grid to measure your employees’ performance and determine their strengths and weaknesses. It can help you understand which employees need more attention and development to contribute more to the organization.
Better Transparency
The grid helps provide transparency to your employees. Explaining the performance of each employee and potential level with numbers makes them more aware of the situation. You can use this data to communicate with employees at all organizational levels so they understand their roles better.
This practice will also help engage them by allowing them a strong sense of ownership.
Post-Appraisal Actions Management
A company can progress if it has dedicated and motivated employees. It is possible to create a culture of trust with your employees. When the managers evaluate all the employees of their company using a 9-box grid, they can build action plans for promoting employees who have the potential to move up in their careers.
Teamwork Promotion
The grid is a perfect tool for measuring the performance of an employee and the team. It can help you improve employee communication because they will be more aware of their role in achieving company goals. It helps them work together as a single unit towards success, thus promoting teamwork among your organization members.
Disadvantages of Using a 9-Box Talent Review Grid
The following are four disadvantages of using this tool:
The Subjectivity of Managers’ Perspective
The grid is dependent on managers’ perspectives. Different managers can have different opinions about an employee’s performance and potential, which can lead to disputes among employees and hinder their productivity.
Inability to Measure Aptitude
An employee’s aptitude is another crucial factor in a company’s success. If an organization has an employee with great potential but lacks aptitude, the company and its goals can fail despite the employee’s hard work.
The grid is not a foolproof tool to measure an employee’s capabilities. It will give you a rough idea of the performance and potential level of employees. It also doesn’t provide any objective data about your employees’ attitudes toward their work, which is an essential factor in determining the success of your organization.
Difficulty in Categorizing Employees
It can be difficult to categorize employees into nine boxes. This is because not all employees will have the same level of performance and potential in all types of assessments. Some fall under multiple categories, while others do not fit into any categorization. Employees’ performance can also vary occasionally, depending on their efforts and the working environment.
Struggle in Identifying the Potential of an Employee
The potential of an employee is not always easy to identify. It is impossible to recognize an employee’s potential by looking at their performance and choosing a category. HR professionals have a difficult time determining which employees have the potential to move up in their careers. This is because managers have different opinions about an employee’s performance and potential.
Best Practices for Using the 9-Box Talent Review Grid
The 9-box talent review grid is a valuable tool for assessing talent, but its effectiveness depends on its application. Following best practices ensures that it becomes a strategic asset rather than a mere labeling exercise.
Incorporate Feedback from Multiple Sources
Gathering feedback from multiple sources is essential when evaluating performance and potential to ensure accuracy and minimize bias. This can include input from managers, peers, direct reports, and data from performance reviews and assessments. Incorporating diverse perspectives provides a more holistic view of an employee’s capabilities and opportunities for growth, making placements on the grid more objective and reliable.
Use the Grid as Part of a Broader Talent Management Strategy
The 9-box talent review grid should not be used in isolation but as part of a comprehensive talent management strategy. Combine it with other tools and processes such as succession planning, leadership development programs, and workforce planning. The grid helps identify high-potential employees and development needs, but its value lies in driving long-term strategies aligning with organizational goals. Regularly reviewing and updating the grid ensures it remains a relevant tool for dynamic talent management.
Focus on Development Opportunities Rather Than Labeling Employees
One of the most critical aspects of using the 9-box talent review grid is emphasizing growth and development rather than categorizing employees. Employees placed in lower-performing or lower-potential categories should not feel penalized but instead see opportunities for improvement. Tailor development plans for all employees, focusing on enhancing skills, building confidence, and creating pathways for advancement.
High-potential and high-performing employees should be given stretch assignments and leadership opportunities to keep them engaged and motivated.
Final Remarks
9 Box Talent Review Grid is a widespread human resource tool HR experts use to assess employee performance, potential, and leadership. Above you can find the detailed procedure for carrying out the process. Make sure to follow the step-by-step guide to avail yourself of the benefits of using the 9-box talent grid.
FAQs
Below are the most commonly asked questions and answers related to the 9-box talent review grid:
What is a 9-box talent review grid?
A nine-box talent review mentions employee performance on a grid system, with performance on the x-axis and future potential on the y-axis. The grid includes nine categories, or boxes, that show employees’ characteristics.
How do you use a 9-box talent review grid?
There are three steps to creating a 9-box grid that assesses employee performance through performance. The first step is to determine the employee performance against the employee performance expectations. The next step is to assess the employee’s potential using past behavior and expected future behavior during the performance management process. Last but not least, combine the performance and potential into a 3×3 grid.
What is the McKinsey 9 box talent review?
This talent review promotes open and constructive dialogue during talent management decisions. It encourages the senior leadership to become a part of discussions related to the future of the company’s workforce. All these conversations lead to better-informed decisions related to strategic thinking initiatives, employee development, promotions, and more.
What is the 9-box talent management grid for leadership succession?
The 9-box talent management grid is a matrix that maps employee performance to identify future leaders. In a talent landscape, nine squares are based on two axes: current performance (below, meeting, and higher expectations) and potential (low, medium, and high).
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