Investing in talent requires a dedicated cross- functional leadership team that works to build solutions with, not for, the frontline. One of the barriers that emerges amid attempts to implement change is the idea that talent is a concern that belongs to particular domains or to HR only. The reality, however, is that HR, operations, logistics, engineering and other functions all need to come together to drive talent innovations. Critically, all of the sites visited in the Frontline Talent of the Future Initiative prioritized employee involvement in ideation. They’ve created means and mechanisms to solicit, curate and implement ideas that originate with the workers closest to frontline processes. They’ve used idea collection tools, town halls and/or other meetings that facilitate dialogue, along with events like “hackathons” to bring employees together to solve problems. Doing this requires a cross-function team of HR, operations, logistics, engineering, finance and technology leaders who are dedicated to implementing frontline change. A crucial element is robust dialogue with workers to collect feedback during implementation and continuously adjust. Progress on operationalizing talent as an investment is limited so far. Even companies at the vanguard of the quest to transform the talent landscape have only begun to realize the potential of what’s possible. Many of them do not have formal talent investment approval processes or infrastructure. However, they have all begun to turn the theoretical into the empirical by connecting their innovations directly to impact. Any organization seeking to transform should begin by measuring the results of talent innovations. This means identifying KPIs, measuring quantifiable metrics and digging in to find the evidence of ROI. The initiative has revealed that there is much more to do when it comes to defining how organizations determine the ROI on investing in talent. Likewise, there is room for progress in how they evaluate trade-offs between various potential investments so as to best suit their operating context. 3.2 Building a cross-functional team Putting Talent at the Centre: An Evolving Imperative for Manufacturing 26

Putting Talent at the Centre An Evolving Imperative for Manufacturing 2025