I’ve often described myself as a “failed employee”. The longest role I held was for about 18 months, although I did stay in one organisation for over 5 years (doing numerous roles).  

I worked with a woman who had been in the same organisation for 20 years.  I asked her how she stayed interested. She says there was always something new happening, or another new job to go to. In her career she has had a number of overseas assignments, worked across numerous departments and had led a variety of different projects. This was a great example of how talent likes to operate.
 
Talent likes to move around.  

Talent gets itchy feet after 5 years.

Current talent strategies are typically linear:

Talent strategies of the future might need to be more circular in nature:

Years ago, I worked with a large professional services firm that did this often by accident rather than by design. Often, a tax or audit consultant would leave the firm and go work for the client. Years later, they might return to the firm with all those years of invaluable experience of working within an industry.

By way of contrast, I heard a leader address a group of graduates (and prospective recruits) telling them that if they worked hard, in 10 years they might be in a leadership position. Talent won’t wait and they certainly won’t gamble on a 10 year investment.  
 
Some things to consider:

• Which organisations could you partner with to “share” your talent, to provide with greater depth and/or breadth of experiences?
• What is your Alumni strategy? When people leave your organisation, do you stay in touch?
• If your organisation is large and global enough, what is your talent mobility strategy?