A Move Toward the Future?: Linking Strategy and Human Performance Technology

The intense competition within the business environment today suggests that performance technologists shift their focus toward performance opportunities that would give organizations a competitive edge. “Opportunities occur when current performance standards are being met but there is a chance to improve by 20 percent and thereby create a significant competitive edge” (Center for Industrial Services, 2010). Strategy is forward looking, concerned not only with how the organization will compete in the current environment but also with what will become of the organization in the future (Grant, 2008). Strategies provide organizations with a sense of direction and purpose, the ability to efficiently deploy resources and to coordinate decisions across functional or business units made by employees. Strategy development requires an organization to address three key questions: Where are we now; where do we go; and how do we get there (De Kluyver & Pearce, 2003). The where are we now reviews an organization’s current performance, mission, stakeholders, and current trends; whereas, how do we get there is addressed through performance analysis when the human performance technology identifies the drivers of performance or the barriers to performance (Rossett, 2002), which prompts the performance improvement consultant to devise a roadmap that addresses the future direction of the organization, where do we go .