Tipping Point for Talent Management

Tipping Point for Talent Management

The economic environment and the need for talent management practices

The modern day economic environment is the result of numerous processes of change. The end result is a complex economic climate characterized by varying degrees of governmental intervention, the promotion of markets regulated by demand and supply or by liberalization and globalization. All these economic elements -- as well as several others more -- have generated a new need for talent management practices. Examples in this sense include:

The access to information led to the creation of more pretentious customers

The more pretentious customers demanded high quality products and services, which could only be offered through talented staff members

At a global level, a trend is observed of GDP generation from services more in the detriment of industry and agriculture (Central Intelligence Agency, 2010). But services can only satisfy the customers when they are delivered by high skilled staff members.

As a final specification, it should be noted that, unlike an initial perception, the emergence of the internationalized economic crisis has not halted talent management practices, but it has in fact created new grounds for their implementation. To better explain, a major mistake of most economic agents is that of striving to deal with the crisis by downsizing. Combining the downsized employees with the individuals who lost their jobs due to organizational bankruptcies, the availability of labor force significantly increases. In this context, organizational leaders are presented with the opportunity of accessing talented individuals who would otherwise be unattainable (HR Malaysia, 2009).

2. Globalization and the tipping point of talent management practices

The forces of globalization have represented one of the primary generators of enhanced talent management practices. Globalization opened national boundaries and allowed economic, political, technological and otherwise values and practices to transcend boundaries. A direct impact of the opening of boundaries was an increased organizational access to foreign resources, including capitals, technologies, commodities, but also labor force. Several organizations engaged in processes of outsourcing by which they took work outside one country to have it completed within a more cost effective region. But the labor force in the cost effective country was seldom trained and able to perform the tasks at high quality standards. The need for talent management rose both from the necessity to train the foreign workers, as well as from the need to adequately manage them.

The second means in which globalization forced talent management refers to incremental levels of competition among economic agents, which was created as the result of boundaries opening and market penetrations by foreign competitors. In this context, the adequate management of the human resource became an organizational need and a competitive strategy.

3. Talent management beyond training programs

Talent management initially commenced at the premises of offering training programs to the organizational staff members. The aim was that of increasing the skills and performance levels of the individual employees, with the ultimate scope of increasing overall organizational performances. As time progressed however, and as both employees as well as industry features evolved, talent management came to no longer be synonymous with training alone. In other words, talent management is now perceived as a complex set of techniques through which the organizational staff members are professionally supported, stimulated and managed in order to generate both personal as well as organizational benefits.

All in all, talent management refers to the totality of actions and decisions made in relation to the staff members. Talent management commences with the identification of the organizational staffing needs and the assessment of the skills required from the future candidate. It then continues with the selection and recruiting of those candidates who meet the desired conditions. The next step is that of hiring the individuals who meet the initially stipulated conditions and which also reveal an increased ability to become integrated within the working climate and the institution's culture. Throughout the employment contract, talent management continues with a series of motivational, stimulation, reward and retention strategies which ensure that the most talented staff members continue to generate organizational value (Bnet).

4. Talent management practices and talent retention

As early on motivational theory has shown, each individual -- or at least each specific and homogenous group of individuals -- is driven by specific elements. This finding can easily be extrapolated within the business community to understand that the employees are driven by various elements. While some search for the sense of belonging to a professional formation, others seek to be professionally recognized or financially rewarded. This realization specifically materializes in a necessity for economic agents to develop and implement personalized motivation and retention strategies. Some relevant example of noteworthy retention strategies include:

Flexibility in the working schedule, in the construction of team or in the selection of the projects on which to work

Employee empowerment and inclusion in the decision making process

Administrative transparency

Financial and non-financial rewards

Support in professional formation.

5. Effective talent management, organizational performance and shareholder value

Within the modern day community, talent management is becoming less and less of an option and more and more of a necessity. Talent management is in fact a competitive strategy through which economic agents increase their chances of improving the organizational performances and creating value for the shareholders.