Find the single stage most holding back the others, so the work fixes the cause rather than a symptom.
The five stages follow the employee lifecycle. An upstream weakness constrains everything downstream, so it is fixed first. The rule: your weak link is the lowest-scoring stage that sits highest in the lifecycle order below. The one override: an acute compliance gap in the foundation is a risk addressed immediately regardless of sequence. If two stages are tied, the one higher in the order is the weak link.
| Order | Stage | Why it sits here |
|---|---|---|
| 1 (most upstream) | Hiring and selection | The wrong person in poisons onboarding, performance, and retention no matter how good they are. |
| 2 | Onboarding and integration | A good hire not made productive is a good hire wasted; onboarding sits on hiring. |
| 3 | Performance management | You manage the performance of people already hired and onboarded. |
| 4 | Compensation and retention | You retain people you have hired, onboarded, and managed; retention sits on the rest. |
| 5 | HR infrastructure and compliance | The foundation that systematizes the lifecycle. Exception: an acute compliance gap is addressed immediately. |
| Stage | Your score (1 to 5) | Lifecycle order |
|---|---|---|
| Hiring and selection | 1 | |
| Onboarding and integration | 2 | |
| Performance management | 3 | |
| Compensation and retention | 4 | |
| HR infrastructure and compliance | 5 (compliance gap = immediate) |
You cannot retain what you hired badly, or manage what you never onboarded; the upstream weak link caps everything below it. Carry the weak link and all five scores into the Prioritized HR Action Plan.
Your answers stay in your browser on this page and are never sent anywhere. Use Save or print to keep your copy.