The Effects of Globalization on Talent Acquisition

Leadership Strategies to Improve Business Performance

Herzberg’s two-factor motivational theory, simply put, holds that there are factors in the workplace that promote job satisfaction and factors that promote job dissatisfaction. Alrawahi, Sellgren, Altouby, Alwahaibi and Brommels (2020) conducted a mixed-methods study of the two-factor motivational theory in clinical labs in hospitals in Oman. They found through focus groups that the dissatisfaction factors included lack of health and safety protocols, heavy workload, poor salary, lack of opportunity for promotion, poor recognition and poor organizational policies. Factors that impacted satisfaction included positive relationships with co-workers and with leaders, and opportunities for professional development. The absence of hygiene factors were the cause of dwindling motivation, while causes of motivation were those that produced satisfaction in the workers (Alrawahi et al., 2020).

Another factor associated with motivation has been emotional intelligence. The study, by Khosravi, Rezvani and Ashkanasy (2020), shows that emotional intelligence is useful as part of a preventive strategy to manage negative influences throughout large projects, where tensions and frustrations can set in over time. Emotional intelligence was found by the researchers to be a way to engage with workers, and to provide them with emotional support so as to reduce the risk of negative emotions from causing setbacks and delays in the project. This study’s findings align with the findings of the study by Alrawahi et al. (2020) in the sense that both show how important relationships between leaders and workers are in the workplace and how these relationships contribute to and foster employee motivation in a positive way. The study by Shafi, Lei, Song and Sarker (2020) on the other hand shows that motivation is fostered through leadership strategies like stimulating creativity. It contrasts with the findings by Alrawahi et al. (2020) and Khosravi et al. (2020) in the sense that it indicates that giving employees room to develop their own ideas can create the necessary intrinsic motivation to see projects through to completion.

Employee motivation is certainly an important topic in the literature on leadership strategies to improve business performance. One key area that Khan, Wajidi and Alam (2020) identify as vital to motivation is communication. Their study of communication in the oil industry surveyed 340 employees in the industry and found a positive correlation between communication effectiveness and employee motivation. Communication implicitly figures into the findings of Khosravi et al. (2020) as well as Alrawahi et al. (2020) as well, suggesting that there is some overlapping correlation between communication, relationships and emotional intelligence in terms of enhancing performance among workers.

With that said, leadership also plays a part, as indicated by Shafi et al. (2020). Orr (2020) looks at how active learning can be used to help develop leaders who are thoughtful, engaged and proactive. She used three articles to frame how active learning helps leaders to develop mental models for success, apply contextual understanding to enhance situational leadership, and to promote reflection. These findings also support the conclusions of Shafi et al. (2020) who focus on transformational leadership, which can be applied to develop leaders from within. Essentially, leadership development can enhance performance in the workplace when time is taken to nurture candidates by providing them with the tools to develop their leadership skills, which again is supported by the study by Alrawahi et al. (2020) in their assessment of factors that improve job satisfaction and increase motivation.

Leadership strategies for enhancing motivation have been described by Shafi et al. (2020), such as allowing employees room to be creative; and by Khosravi et al. (2020), who highlight the role that emotional intelligence plays in supporting workers and motivating them to perform at their fullest potential. Other leadership strategies have been described by Super (2020) within the context of globalizing influences, which have complicated workplace environments and led to increased turnover rates in various sectors. As a result organizations have to rely more and more on expert teams that are not created overnight but that evolve after extensive training and leadership. Super (2020) shows that nurturing and building teams requires focused leadership strategies that essentially apply all the findings provided by the other researchers on this topic, including Alrawahi et al. (2020), Khan et al. (2020), Khosravi et al. (2020) and Shafi et al. (2020). The main conclusion of Super (2020) is that leadership strategies have to be personalized and relationship-oriented since long-term success is built on solid relationships within expert teams.

Leadership style obviously plays a part in that dynamic, and transformational leadership has been identified by Shafi et al. (2020) as supportive of motivational success. Caillier (2020) takes this subject a step further by testing the effects of autocratic leadership, democratic leadership and public service motivation on the performance of a public organization. Caillier (2020) found that democratic leadership enhanced organizational performance while autocratic leadership was associated with decreased performance. Motivation was interpreted to be at its highest when a democratic style of leadership was implemented, which suggests again that relationships and communication are vital to motivating workers and developing the kind of rapport in the workplace that increases job satisfaction.

However, having the right talent in place is also important, and talent acquisition has been found to be enhanced by the people analytic approach in the study by Utomo, Indiyati and Ramantoko (2021). Utomo et al. (2021) analyzed the data of 17,294 applicants using the random forest classification method, which ranks applicants into various classes that make it easier for human resources to assess the pool of talent and determine which candidate would make the best hire for the position. Matching candidate’s skills, traits, qualities and character with the job description is facilitated by this method.

Once talent is acquired, it also has to be managed and talent management has become even more complicated in COVID times, as Haak-Saheem (2020) points out. The researcher examines how Dubai has managed to sustain its own global talent pool during the difficult COVID pandemic by tapping the virtual labor market to take advantage of surplus labor even as inflows of expatriates (relied upon in Dubai) dried up as a result of COVID restrictions. The essential finding of the study by Haak-Saheem (2020) is that organizations have to stay fluid and dynamic in order to manage talent in a changing, globalized world, especially one that has embraced the utility of a virtual workforce. Of course managing talent virtually comes with its own special challenges since the workplace environment is different from that described in the Herzberg two-factor model.

Comparative theories to the Herzberg two-factor theory are thus helpful in understanding how to motivate employees to maximize performance in a digitalized world. Volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity are all identified as factors that now shape the workplace environment and alter the perspective that a leader must have on employees, according to the study by Bundtzen (2021). It is therefore not enough to consider hygiene and motivation factors, as Herzberg suggests, but rather a leader must also consider the ways in which the workplace environment are impacted by volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity, all of which also play upon the minds of managers and employees. Bundtzen (2021) indicates that management theories using Scrum and lean can be helpful in mediating these additional factors and enhancing the Herzberg approach. The theory of personal constructs was applied in the study to test the effectiveness of Herzberg’s theory in a contemporary workplace. Bundtzen (2021) found that intrinsic passion for the job and efficient working conditions were the biggest factors in stimulating motivation.

All in all, the recent research on leadership strategies to improve business performance indicates that motivation is best supported by leaders who provide emotional support to workers, engage in communication with them so as to enhance leader-worker relationships, and provide efficient workplace environments so that employees feel that they can do their jobs effectively. Other factors include allowing workers to demonstrate creativity and applying a democratic leadership style when the situation allows for it. Providing opportunities for development can also help. When these conditions are met, leadership should be successful in enhancing business performance, regardless of the challenges that may arise.