Thesis report.
122
A PROJECT REPORT ON TALENT MANAGEMENT: RECENT TRENDS, CHALLENGES AND ITS IMPACT ON EMPLOYEES’ RETENTION 1
Transcript of Thesis report.
A PROJECT REPORT ON
TALENT MANAGEMENT:
RECENT TRENDS, CHALLENGES AND ITS IMPACT ON EMPLOYEES’ RETENTION
1
this I would also like to thank other persons for the valuable contribution in completing my
project.
CONTENTS
1. Title Page 1
2. Original Outline
3. Undertaking 2
4. Acknowledgements 3
5. Contents 4
6. Synopsis 6
7. Introduction 8
Why talent management important 10
Process of talent management 12
Traditional Approach Vs Talent management 16
Knowledge management 28
Recent trends in talent management 29
Literature Review 36
Problem Statement 39
Objective 40
Need of the Study 41
2
8. Methodology
Primary Data 42
Secondary Data 44
Statistical Tools 44
Sampling techniques 44
9. Main analysis/report 45
10. Observations & Findings 68
11. Recommendations 70
12. Conclusions 73
13. Limitations of the Study 77
14. Appendices 79
15. Bibliography 88
3
SYNOPSIS
Every organization has a talent management system whether it recognizes it or not. Something
happens to the talented people in an organization, whether they are being developed and
motivated or whether they are being stifled and neglected in terms of development opportunities.
The definition of ‘talent’ can also vary between organizations, or within
the same organization over time. Many organizations seek to map individuals across the
organization in terms of performance and potential, and it is those who are identified as high
performers with high potential who are most often the focus of talent management.
The research results suggest that most organizations define ‘talent’
through some reference to potential, in particular high potentials. These are people who are
demonstrating some potential to progress in the organization at any given point in time.
Everyone might be considered high potential in some organizations at different points in time,
while in other organizations an individual may need to reach a certain level in the hierarchy in
order to be considered high potential. It is for every organization to decide for themselves how
and who to label as high potential.
4
This summary version of the report details the overarching framework for defining and
understanding talent management that was used and developed by this research programme. It
covers the key findings and conclusions across the three themes of defining talent, how to
develop talent and the structures and systems to support talent management, and the main
recommendations that have been drawn from looking at the case studies and research results
holistically. The full report covers the additional main sections detailed below and includes
tables detailing the results from the survey of over managers; extracts from the individual case
studies and comments drawn from the extensive literature review.
Defining talent: this covers the six dimensions that contribute to how talent is identified and
defined in organizations.
Developing talent: a number of the dimensions occurring in talent management systems relate to
the development of talent. The dimensions that fall into this category concern development
practice in itself, and also career development/management processes and practice.
Structures and systems to support talent management: including the interdependencies
between talent management and performance management processes, the extent of technology
used, systems flexibility and the ownership of talent management within an organization.
Operationalizing the strategy: This section provides a review of how the eighteen dimensions
will differ according to the business perspective that is driving the talent management process
and includes key recommendations for the application the dimensions for each perspective.
Measuring the impact of talent management on business performance: finding the right
measure of return on investment is important and should stem from the perspective that is
5
driving the talent management strategy. This section offers some insights into how measures may
differ within each perspective.
INTRODUCTION
This new age economy, with its attendant paradigm shifts in relation to the human capital, in
terms of its acquisition, utilization, development and retention has placed a heavy demand on
today’s HR professionals. Today human resource is expected to identify potential talent and also
comprehend, conceptualize and implement relevant strategies to contribute effectively to achieve
organizational objectives. Hence a serious concern for every hr manager is to survive this “War
of talent” and is to fight against the diminishing and limited source of human resource talent
available in the market to replace the valuable employees when they leave the organization,
dramatically underscoring the difficulty to attract, motivate and retain the best employee. Human
resource has a compelling mission to provide “value added services. However this expectation is
often hard to describe. Further hr leaders are asked to provide the “line of sight” plans that
support institutional strategy and challenges and again not an intuitive task. It is perhaps more
clarifying to examine effective, leading-edge practices that have been or could be put in place
that deliver on the promise of excellence in the HRM. Human resource responsibility related to
talent management is to identify investments, design development strategies required to fully
deliver on its role in talent management and calculate the return on those investments. To
analyze the reasons of underscoring and calculating the return on those investments we first need
6
to understand what exactly “TALENT” means. According to Leigh Branham author of book
“Keeping people who keep you in business” a talent is not rare and precise. Everyone has a
talent- too many to possibly name all. Talent is behaviour, things we do more easily than the nest
person. We speak of “natural born talent” but those with a gift, knack, ability or flair for
something can refine and develop that talent through experience. Talent, however, cannot be
taught. As someone once said, “you can teach a turkey to climb a tree, but it is easier to hire a
squirrel”.
According to Vice president, HR seagram, Mr. Gopi Nambiar talent can be best described as a
combination of abilities and attitudes. The real trick is to match the right motivated talents to the
right role, individually and collectively, harnessing and harmonizing this crucial attribute to
achieve the objectives of your company.
Today in this competitive world, companies have become fiercely competitive and active when it
comes to attracting and retaining best talent. 75 % of executives admit that employee retention is
difficult today, obvious reason being the “increasing rate of turnover”. This dynamically and
actively changing volatile demand-supply equation with such erratic attrition and cut throat
competition has led organizations to focus on mechanism pertaining to attracting and retaining
the talent. It is the accepted truth that turnover will happen and companies need to formulate a
strategy to pull down the unprecedented turnover from affecting the organizational success.
Achieving zero percent turnover is neither realistic nor desirable because people in the
organization switchover due to a variety or number of reasons – more money, better opportunity,
better benefits and facilities etc. and this has been practices from the very beginning.
7
Despite intense competition being the key to market development and success, organizations
have failed to identify some of the major reasons which highlight why ‘good performers’ leave.
In his study, Branham clearly states that one major reason why people leave their organization is
because of the organization’s failure to bring about a correlation between pay and performance.
Human Resource experts in the industry believe matching the right blend of talent with the right
job profile can lead to superior performance.
The present scenario with abundant of opportunity has triggered a wave of employees,
perpetually “on the move” for seeking better opportunities whenever, wherever and however
they can. By focusing on the productivity, organizations are realizing that it is imperative to hire
employees who can do the job in a better way and be successful at it. The organizations no
longer just want to hire to hire, infact they are striving to find the right people, bring them into
the organization and retain their services. One of the critical functions of hr is a sound human
resource planning by which they are able to project the demand for human resource and
thereafter formulate the strategies for acquiring them. As many experts says, the solution is not
about finding the correct retention mechanism, but it starts from the very beginning by devising
ways to acquire the right people for the right job.
Why Talent Management is important?
Talent management has been identified as the key strategy for facing the problems relating to the
human resource issues, such as aging of the workforce and increasing retirement rates, limited
competitiveness, fast – paced changes in work, and the need for a diversified workforce at all
8
Imp
act o
n
sh
are
hold
ers
High
Low
HighLow
Key Business Processes
Service Processes
Support Processes
Leveraging Processes
levels. Talent management therefore has become a corporate and departmental priority. The
implementation of the transparent and equitable talent management process is expected to create
an environment for the people to develop their skills in preparation for the future possibilities
and the changing roles. Talent management is about discovering and managing the demand,
supply and flow of talent across the organization through the human capital engine based on the
SWOT (i.e. Strength, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) of the organization. There is a word
called “Strategic” is relation to talent, which intimates the organization to maintain a sustainable
competitive advantage and wish to emphasize on one organizational capabilities and
deemphasize on the others. When the organization understands, what motivates and drives
talented people, and then organizations become innovators and recognize that they do not need
same segments of talent pool all the time. There is a matrix which helps the organization to
classify the talent on the basis of difficult to replace and value added.
Key Business Processes
The following matrix appropriately defines key business processes for an organization:
9
Talent management is a key business process and like any business process takes inputs and
generates output.
Talent difficult to replace and value added Matrix
The process of Talent Management
10
Difficulty to replace
Value added
Difficult to replace and low value added
Difficult to replace and high value added
Easy to replace and low value added
Easy to replace and high value added
People are, undoubtedly the best resources of an organization. Sourcing the best people from the
industry has become the top most priority of the organizations today. In such a competitive
scenario, talent management has become the key strategy to identify and filling the skill gap in a
company by recruiting the high-worth individuals from the industry. It is a never-ending process
that starts from targeting people. The process regulates the entry and exit of talented people in an
organization. To sustain and stay ahead in business, talent management cannot be ignored. In
order to understand the concept better, let us discuss the stages included in talent management
process:
Understanding the Requirement: It is the preparatory stage and plays a crucial role in
success of the whole process. The main is to determine the requirement of the talent. The
main objective of this stage is developing job description and job specifications.
Sourcing the talent: This stage of the process involves targeting the best talent of the
required industry. Searching of the people according to the requirement of the main
activity.
Attracting the Talent: It is important to attract the talented people to work with you as
the whole process revolves around this. After all the main aim of the process is to hire the
best talent available in the market.
Recruiting the Talent: In this stage, people are being invited to join the organization.
Selecting the Talent: This involves meeting with different people having same or
different qualifications and skill sets as mentioned in job description. Candidates who
qualify this round are invited to join the organization.
11
Training and Development: After recruiting the best people, they are trained and
developed to get the desired output.
Retention: Certainly, it is the sole purpose of talent management process. Hiring them
does not serve the purpose completely. Retention depends on various factors such as pay
package, job specification, challenges involved in a job, designation, personal
development of an employee, recognition, culture and the fit between job and talent.
Promotion: No one can work in an organization at the same designation with same job
responsibilities. Job enrichment plays an important role.
Competency Mapping: Assessing employees’ skills, development, ability and
competency is the next step. If required, also focus on behaviour, attitude, knowledge and
future possibilities of improvement. It gives you a brief idea if the person is fir for
promoting further.
Performance Appraisal: Measuring the actual performance of an employee is necessary
to identify his or her true potential. It is to check whether the person can be loaded with
extra responsibilities or not.
Career Planning: If the individual can handle the work pressure and extra
responsibilities well, the management needs to plan his or her career so that he or she
feels rewarded. It is good to recognize their efforts to retain them for a longer period of
time.
Succession Planning: Succession planning is all about who will replace whom in near
future. The employee who has given his best to the organization and has been serving it
for a very long time definitely deserves to hold the top position. Management needs to
plan about when and how succession will take place.
12
VisionMissionStrategy
Structure, Roles
Competencies required(Selecting and developing)
INPUT
TALENT MANAGEMENT
Knowledge Tapping the full potential
Breakthrough Performance
OUTPUT
Exit: The process ends when an individual gets retired or is no more a part of the
organization.
Talent Management process is very complex and is therefore, very difficult to handle. The sole
purpose of the whole process is to place the right person at the right place at the right time. The
main issue of concern is to establish a right fit between the job and the individual.
13
Talent management Vs Traditional Approach
Traditional Human Resource systems approach people development with the view of developing
the competencies in the organization. This can actually be risky approach for the organizations,
especially for the companies operating in fast evolving industries, since these competencies
become redundant with time and needs to develop new competency. Thus, over time, the entire
approach to development of the people might be rendered obsolete calling for rethinking the
entire development initiative.
Talent management on the other hand focuses on enhancing the potential of the employees by
developing their capacities and effectiveness. Capacities are the basic DNA of the organization
and also of the employees. It can be described appropriately in the following manner.
14
D N A
Point of Departure Navigation Point of arrival
Translating organizational
vision into goals and mapping
the required level of capacities
and competencies to achieve
goals
Aligning individual values
and vision with organizational
values and vision
Clear understanding of the
Varied roles in the
organization and appreciation
of the value-addition from
others leading to building
a culture of sharing and
team orientation
Assessment of talent to profile
the level of capacities and set
of competencies possessed
within the organization
Enhancing capacities to learn,
think relate and act through
development initiatives
Individual growth to meet and
accept varied, incremental and
transformational roles in an
overall scenario of
acknowledged need for
change
Gap analysis and
identification of development
path
Helping individuals realize
their full potential through
learning and development
Developed individuals
enabling breakthrough
performance.
15
Seven Talent Management practices that matter
Competing in a "flat world", a term popularized by columnist Tom Friedman, requires (well)
rounded people. Becoming a well rounded talent requires continuous learning and development
of knowledge and skills. Organizations that want to succeed in flat world competition better be
creating enriching workplace experiences if they wish to attract and retain the high-caliber talent
they need.
How can you create an enriching workplace? It isn't easy and doesn't happen overnight. But with
some planning, a lot of persistence and adept execution of seven key practices, any organization
can create an enriching workplace.
1. Job Stretch and Mobility
Feel like you're stuck in a box at work? If you do you've got plenty of company. Many
organizations define jobs narrowly and allow little or no movement across organizational
boundaries or even within them. But to grow, talented people need to be constantly challenged
and stretched. This means the ability to take risks, to try new things, and yes, even to fail -
whether by doing something differently in an existing job or tackling an entirely new one. If
experience is indeed the best teacher how much are we learning if what we do rarely changes?
16
SEI Investments, a leading global provider of outsourced investment business solutions, has
created an environment that provides continual challenge to staff and enables them to regularly
move around the organization and to frequently take on new tasks and responsibilities.
2. Mentoring Not Just Managing
Nothing speeds up the transfer of knowledge and know-how or enhances individual development
more than a quality one-to-one dialogue between an experienced person and an up-and-comer.
W.L. Gore, creator of Gore-Tex fabrics, is a mentoring-intensive organization. Managers are
called "Sponsors" and act as advocates for their assigned staff. They commit to being
knowledgeable about their activities, well being, progress, accomplishments, personal concerns
and ambitions. Each associate has at least one sponsor and some have more than one.
3. Freedom and Stimulation
Often the environment in which people work can make a huge difference to the speed and quality
of people development. Two ingredients essential to making a workplace conducive to learning
are stimulation - through frequent exposure to a wide variety people and ideas and the freedom to
explore and pursue individual ideas and passions.
Google is a nirvana for the best and brightest technical talent in the world. The company's
commitment to human capital is strong and was a core principle expressed in its now famous
IPO filing in 2004. Staff are given huge amounts of freedom to determine when, where, how and
17
on what they work. Each is allowed to spend 20% of their time each week working on personally
initiated projects.
4. Deep Immersion
Nothing frustrates talented people, particularly young up-and-comers, more than being asked to
wait their turn before getting the opportunity to contribute to important projects or initiatives.
This is not only demotivating to people but counter-productive to performance as opportunities
to contribute depend more on tenure and pecking order than merit.
Trilogy, a software company based in Austin Texas not only avoids this problem, but has created
a fast- track, merit-based process that starts with every new hire. Its induction program is on
steroids - goals are not only cultural induction, bonding and skill development but to create the
company's next generation of ideas, products and leaders. The program is led and run by
Trilogy's top executives, including its CEO.
5. Teaching and Coaching
This means having people in the organization - both managers and specialists - whose role it is to
help others to grow, learn and realize their potential. Many organizations have de-emphasized
this key task as pressure to meet quarterly performance targets have cascaded down to every
level of the organization.
18
Schools provide an inspiration and model from which other organizations can learn. They have
teachers whose only job is to develop their student's skills and learning. While few organizations
are positioned to employ full-time teachers, many should encourage and help managers and staff
to take on this role. They can do this by explicitly acknowledging the value of teaching and
coaching and including these responsibilities in the expectations and measures of performance
set for managers and staff.
6. Diversity of Talents and Personalities
The value of diversity in business seems obvious to most observers, but few leaders really know
how to leverage the differences that people bring to the workplace. As Ricardo Semler, head of
the innovative Brazilian conglomerate Semco puts it - "I prefer Coq-au-Vin to Chicken
McNuggets". He is not talking about food but rather cultures that blend diverse talents and
perspectives (like the ingredients in a slow-cooked Coq-au-Vin) versus those that impose
numbing conformity on their people (like the industrial-style sameness of Chicken McNuggets).
And believe me, many companies have Chicken McNugget talent - mass produced, standardized
and consistently mediocre. Far better to blend diverse ingredients into a rich and unique tasting
Semco backs up its words with actions. It regularly pairs younger and older workers together. Its
"Lost in Space" program affords young staff the opportunity to move around the company on a
regular basis during their first few years. This helps them to both develop new perspectives are
well as inject their own fresh ideas throughout the business. Their "Trading Places" initiative let's
people trade jobs as a way of gaining new experience and skills.
19
7. Horizontal Growth Paths
Flattening of hierarchies in recent years has severely curtailed growth paths in many
organizations. But growth shouldn't just be up the ladder or depend purely on acquiring
managerial skills. Another productive growth path is horizontal and progressive organizations
have created lateral paths that allow people to broaden their skills and knowledge within their
disciplines and jobs.
Companies like IBM, Texas Instruments and Intel have instituted technical mastery programs to
allow individual contributors and specialists to develop their knowledge and learning and to be
paid and recognized for it. This means talent can advance based on their learning pace rather
than have to change jobs or be promoted to get ahead.
Hype or Reality?
So how does your workplace stack up on these seven practices that matter most to creating an
enriching workplace? Are job stretch and mobility, freedom and stimulation and horizontal
growth paths the exception or the rule at your employer? Are mentoring, teaching and coaching
rare or pervasive throughout your organization? Is diversity merely an overused word in your
company's communications or a real principle on which your organization operates every day?
20
Most large organizations talk about Talent Management as part of their wider strategy. It is a
crucial way of securing, developing and motivating people with the right skills and approaches to
meet business objectives.
But how many of our strategic goals are fully met by our talented people? All too often, we find
that we don't have the right people in place to fill a gap when it appears, or we simply can't keep
hold of the individuals we want. Even worse, talented people may simply not be operating at the
levels we require.
So what can we do to seize these missed opportunities? I believe that the biggest single challenge
is achieving genuine "connectedness" between Talent Strategy and Business Strategy. A wide
range of people processes often take place without a clear relationship with the ultimate aims and
culture of the business.
Think about recruitment, performance management and development - to what extent are these
processes based on a clear analysis of the talents and skills that people will need to operate at the
next level? To what extent do you build people's capability and motivation to meet the needs of
the business in a few years' time? It is vitally important to build a clear definition of what each
organisation really means by talent throughout the organisation. The acid test is simple - do
people with these qualities deliver the kinds of business success we are aiming for?
21
Integrated talent management wheel
Talent is now a global game. It requires a much broader horizon than just a specific company,
city, region or country. And it requires a much broader vision even within a company. The
Talent Wheel (Figure 1) highlights the key talent functions that need to be coordinated and
integrated within organizations.
Workforce planning looks at the supply and demand for talent over a two-year or longer period
of time for key jobs within the enterprise. Key issues are retirements, planned and unplanned
attrition, varying staffing options, competencies for superior performers and bench strength for
key talent.
Talent acquisition is the ability of a company to attract and hire key talent. This is one of the two
most pressing needs according to Accenture’s 2005 survey of global executives. Key issues are
compelling employment brand and value propositions, referral recruiting, and keeping a gold
standard for new talent entering the organization.
Talent engagement represents the extent to which the workforce identifies with the company, is
committed to it and provides discretionary effort so that it can be successful. Engagement is a
key leading indicator for high performance workplaces, improved employee productivity and
subsequent turnover. Keep engagement surveys relatively short and ensure that data are acted
upon by employees and managers.
22
Talent development used to be synonymous with training, but no longer. Research shows that 70
percent of what we need to know to do our job, we learn on the job. Informal learning is more
powerful than formal learning through such activities as stretch assignments, cross-functional
teams, international assignments and flexible job design.
Talent deployment can be summarized as the right people are doing the right job at the right
time. Top talent is assigned to the most vital projects or roles. Alignment is a key aspect of talent
deployment, and it is most often achieved through performance management systems and
competency databases matching project needs to employee capabilities.
The ability to lead talent is also key. Great managers are like chess players who understand that
different pieces (employees) have unique strengths (Buckingham, 2004), and these managers
work hard to put employees in positions where they can shine. Great managers also understand
that their value to the organization is through the contributions of others, and it is their
responsibility to develop, guide and enhance the performance of the people that report to them.
Talent retention is the number one issue on the minds of global executives according to the
Accenture study (2005). Many CEOs doubt their company’s ability to retain top talent. Too little
and too much turnover can damage a business. It is interesting to observe that when managers of
departing employees are asked why a person left, money is the overwhelming answer. When the
employees themselves are asked, money doesn’t even make the top five.
These talent functions must work together and be part of a seamless system. Being excellent in
one or two areas is a start, but the whole system must be working effectively. It does little good,
for example, for a company to attract and hire great talent but then have few challenging
23
development opportunities. Similarly, for CEOs to focus compulsively on retention misses the
point that retention probably wouldn’t be a problem if talent engagement, development and
deployment functions were smoothly operating.
These talent functions are too important to be left to separate departments, silos or champions.
The essence of a company’s ability to compete rests with the optimization and integration of
these functions – it is the network, not the nodes that provide the value.
The tipping point
Talent management is ready to be tipped. First, there is the growing amount of empirical
evidence that shows a clear relationship between excellent talent practices and improved
shareholder returns. Among the providers of this research are McKinsey, Gallup, Collins, Bassi,
Watson & Wyatt, Becker and Huselid, and the Fortune Best Places to Work surveys.
Second, there are the best practices from companies that truly believe that talent is the essence of
their success. Among these companies are GE, Dell, P&G, HSBC, FedEx, Starbucks, Microsoft
and Capital One, to name just a few.
Third there is the growing realization that talent issues are board level issues. More investment
analysts and company directors are demanding to know about engagement levels, segmented
turnover data, and the types of developmental opportunities for top talent. CEOs are starting to
spend 30 percent or more of their time on talent issues, and are being held accountable for the
strength of their talent pools. For instance, all companies registered in Denmark will be required
to include in their annual reports information about customers, processes and human capital. A
minimum of five measures for each is required and comparisons with the previous two years
24
must be shown. Information for investors about intellectual capital both current and future should
occupy at least one-third of the report.
The confluence of both internal and external factors is causing a new science of talent
management to emerge and tip. This is very different from traditional human resources concerns.
While HR is more concerned with consistency, compliance and treating everyone in the same
fashion, talent management recognizes that different people make different contributions to the
enterprise, and that top talent is the key to competitive differentiation. The seamless and
integrated functioning of the talent management wheel is what will drive companies into a
leadership position in the new, post-knowledge economy.
25
Knowledge Management
As said earlier, culture binding and change management is the main domain of the talent
management. Knowledge management services are focuses on growing the talent of the
employees and also leveraging knowledge for the performers by creating an environment for
sharing by building trust. Knowledge management also focuses on connecting the people and the
technology to capture and harness the tacit knowledge of the organization. By trusting the
bandwidth of communication, knowledge management enhances sharing and not only that it also
creates an appropriate environment for the talent to translate into performance.
With its unique and comprehensive spectrum of
services for talent management and the methods that are being followed there, talent growth is
strongly positioned in the organizations and it helps the organizations to gain a competitive and
sustained talent advantage.
26
Recent trends in talent management and their challenges
Talent management is ready to be tipped. First, there is the growing amount of empirical
evidence that shows a clear relationship between excellent talent practices and improved
shareholder returns. Among the providers of this research are McKinsey, Gallup, Collins, Bassi,
Watson & Wyatt, Becker and Huselid, and the Fortune Best Places to Work surveys.
Second, there are the best practices from companies that truly believe that talent is the
essence of their success. Among these companies are GE, Dell, P&G, HSBC, FedEx, Starbucks,
Microsoft and Capital One, to name just a few.
Third there is the growing realization that talent issues are board level issues. More
investment analysts and company directors are demanding to know about engagement levels,
segmented turnover data, and the types of developmental opportunities for top talent. CEOs are
starting to spend 30 percent or more of their time on talent issues, and are being held accountable
for the strength of their talent pools. For instance, all companies registered in Denmark will be
required to include in their annual reports information about customers, processes and human
capital. A minimum of five measures for each is required and comparisons with the previous two
years must be shown. Information for investors about intellectual capital both current and future
should occupy at least one-third of the report.
The confluence of both internal and external factors is causing a new science of talent
management to emerge and tip. This is very different from traditional human resources concerns.
While HR is more concerned with consistency, compliance and treating everyone in the same
27
fashion, talent management recognizes that different people make different contributions to the
enterprise, and that top talent is the key to competitive differentiation. The seamless and
integrated functioning of the talent management wheel is what will drive companies into a
leadership position in the new, post-knowledge economy.
Increased focus on retaining talent: High performing employees are always in demand.
Good recruiting organizations focus equally on internal candidates and external
candidates. Companies have placed additional focus on building value and quality within the
recruitment function. HR leaders are gaining more influence over organizational direction and
value.
Continued convergence of organizational expertise for strategic HR processes: Recruitment,
compensation, performance and learning have been disparate HR (and even non-HR) functions
with distinct and unrelated business outcomes.
Renewed focus on acquiring and managing talent: CEOs and HR executives are recommitting
to talent management. Leading companies are deploying resources and capital to talent and
career development programs, including succession planning and management.
How global companies are changing
Corporations around the world are in the process of deploying the next generation of
enterprise technology. It is not a trivial transition. Enhanced functionality, dynamic global
28
influences and requirements, new solution delivery models and an infrastructure shift to services-
based architectures are changing the way companies upgrade and adopt new technology
solutions.
The success of the talent management market rests on:
• Integrated functionality and usability: Many vendors have invested heavily in the usability
and integrated functionality of their solutions. The ability to seamlessly integrate data and
streamline navigation and use enhances the user experience and encourages increased use of the
solutions. A single data model technology infrastructure is ideal to maximize performance and
simplify application management.
• Dynamic influences in shaping the global workforce: Companies are being forced to adjust
to ever-changing global regulatory and compliance issues that outline how companies can find,
recruit and manage their workforces. In addition to automating HR processes, companies are
now focusing internally to build a performance-based culture centered on metrics-based business
outcomes and driving additional value of the company by adapting and improving the way they
manage their global workforce.
• Rapid acceptance of the on-demand model: The majority of most vendors’ revenue comes
from an annuity-based hosted delivery mode. Indeed, many recognize 100 percent of their
revenue from their on-demand solutions. The general acceptance of the on-demand model owes
much to its proven success within other enterprise application categories such as CRM. In
addition, the diminished impact of security issues has helped build the on-demand model.
29
• Demand for service and support excellence: Service and support distinction has surpassed
security issues as the key concern for those adopting talent management applications. Although
security issues are still prevalent, especially if IT is involved in the decision-making process, key
stakeholders in the vendor selection process have shifted their focus toward ongoing service and
support issues as their key areas of interest. Many vendors continue to develop support options
that meet the needs of their customers and have become very sophisticated in the tools and
techniques used to measure service-level performance.
• Multinational capabilities: Global enterprises are demanding multi-language capabilities and
in-country domain expertise to support the ever-changing international laws. A changing global
landscape and an increasing assortment of compliance issues require vendors to maintain a
strong international presence.
The time is now to leverage talent management technologies. Today’s available talent
management solutions can not only support the changing dynamics of your workforce, but help
plan for the future in building both a high caliber workforce and performance-based culture.
30
Integrated talent management wheel
Talent is now a global game. It requires a much broader horizon than just a specific
company, city, region or country. And it requires a much broader vision even within a company.
The Talent Wheel highlights the key talent functions that need to be coordinated and integrated
within organizations.
Workforce planning looks at the supply and demand for talent over a two-year or longer
period of time for key jobs within the enterprise. Key issues are retirements, planned and
unplanned attrition, varying staffing options, competencies for superior performers and bench
strength for key talent.
Talent acquisition is the ability of a company to attract and hire key talent. This is one of
the two most pressing needs according to Accenture’s 2005 survey of global executives. Key
issues are compelling employment brand and value propositions, referral recruiting, and keeping
a gold standard for new talent entering the organization.
Talent engagement represents the extent to which the workforce identifies with the
company, is committed to it and provides discretionary effort so that it can be successful.
Engagement is a key leading indicator for high performance workplaces, improved employee
productivity and subsequent turnover. Keep engagement surveys relatively short and ensure that
data are acted upon by employees and managers.
Talent development used to be synonymous with training, but no longer. Research shows
that 70 percent of what we need to know to do our job, we learn on the job. Informal learning is
31
more powerful than formal learning through such activities as stretch assignments, cross-
functional teams, international assignments and flexible job design.
Talent deployment can be summarized as the right people are doing the right job at the
right time. Top talent is assigned to the most vital projects or roles. Alignment is a key aspect of
talent deployment, and it is most often achieved through performance management systems and
competency databases matching project needs to employee capabilities.
The ability to lead talent is also key. Great managers are like chess players who
understand that different pieces (employees) have unique strengths (Buckingham, 2004), and
these managers work hard to put employees in positions where they can shine. Great managers
also understand that their value to the organization is through the contributions of others, and it is
their responsibility to develop, guide and enhance the performance of the people that report to
them.
Talent retention is the number one issue on the minds of global executives according to
the Accenture study (2005). Many CEOs doubt their company’s ability to retain top talent. Too
little and too much turnover can damage a business. It is interesting to observe that when
managers of departing employees are asked why a person left, money is the overwhelming
answer. When the employees themselves are asked, money doesn’t even make the top five.
These talent functions must work together and be part of a seamless system. Being
excellent in one or two areas is a start, but the whole system must be working effectively. It does
little good, for example, for a company to attract and hire great talent but then have few
challenging development opportunities. Similarly, for CEOs to focus compulsively on retention
32
misses the point that retention probably wouldn’t be a problem if talent engagement,
development and deployment functions were smoothly operating.
These talent functions are too important to be left to separate departments, silos or
champions. The essence of a company’s ability to compete rests with the optimization and
integration of these functions – it is the network, not the nodes that provide the value.
33
LITERATURE REVIEW
A detailed survey of the concerned literature has been carried out based on various journals,
reviews concerned magazines and internet and presented below:
Any Organization needs to have a vision and a well defined strategy on hiring for the future. We
should have the right talent to attract and retain the best available talent for which a number of
measures for talent management are required. Emphasis has been paid on initiatives that can be
put in place to help organization to retain and nurture the talent. The fundamental aspects about
the definitions of human recourses have been discussed and planning of new models has been
discussed. The need to disband the conventional school of thoughts about organizational
behavior has been advocated and a new approach has been suggested for HR.
The Talent Management Handbook: Creating Organizational Excellence by Identifying,
Developing, and Promoting Your Best People by Lance A. Berger
"This is an outstanding reference work that succinctly explains a simple and practical approach
to the identification, assessment and management of talent in the current, dynamic operating
business environment. The book plainly gives advice on how to avoid high staff turnover, poor
morale, and poor performance."
34
The Strategic Development of Talent by William J. Roth well
"Roth well ignites the imagination, expands the possibilities, and offers practical strategies any
organization can use to effectively develop, retain and utilize talent for the benefit of an
organization and enter the fluid, flexible future. Managers at all levels will cheer the sanity Roth
well suggests."
NEWSLETTER
Sriiddar S Preetham (July 2007), Managing talent, HRD Newsletter, vol23 issue -4
Focusing on the challenge of attracting and retaining talent faced by Indian HR mangers, the
article outlines initiative that can be put in place to help organization retain nurture and retain the
talent…………
JOURNALS
PANDIT Y V L (May 2007), Talent retention strategies in a competitive environment,
NHRD journal, Hyderabad, p27-29
Focusing on the challenge of attracting and retaining talent faced by Indian HR mangers, the
article outlines initiative that can be put in place to help organization retain nurture and retain the
talet.
35
KARTHIKEYAN J (May 2007), Talent management strategies, NHRD journal,
Hyderabad, p23-26
Organization need to have a vision and a well defined strategy on hiring for the future. Do we
have the right talent within to attract and retain the best available talent? A number of measures
for talent management are suggested.
36
PROBLEM STATEMENT
It takes talent to spot the talent. Only an expert can know all that glitters is not gold and only
those who can recognize the worth of a talent can value it. In an organization there is nothing
more crucial than fitting the right employee in right position at right time. When an employee
does job that does not suit their liking or inclination, the result is obviously low. A conscious and
deliberate approach is taken to attract, develop and retain people with right ability to meet the
organizational current and future needs. In current economic conditions, many companies have
felt the need to cut expenses. This should be the ideal environment to execute a talent
management system as a means of optimizing the performance of each employee and the
organization. Only 5 percent of organizations say they have a clear talent management strategy
and operational programs in place today. Organizations need to have a vision and a well defined
strategy on hiring the right candidate for the future. In spite of having such a large population the
supply of right graduate cannot keep up with the sharply increasing demand. The emerging
trends in talent management not only helping in retention of the best employees but also helps
the average employee of the organization in their development and growth. The challenges in
Talent Management need to be tackled effectively and the impact of these new trends on
employee’s performance must be understood by the people and the organization for overall
growth and success of both. So, do the organizations have the right talent within to adapt and
address the challenges occurring due to these trends?
37
SPECIFIC OBJECTIVES :
1. To identify the recent trends and challenges in talent management.
2. To understand the impact of talent management on employees’ performance.
38
NEED OF THE STUDY:
The supply side discussed puts pressure on companies to attract the best talent and ensure that
employees join the company and choose to stay in the organization rather than look for
opportunities elsewhere. Present study is supposed to find out the existing Indian talent scenario
so as to analyze its emerging challenges and trends.
39
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY:
Primary Data:
For the successful completion of the project, primary data has been collected with the help of 2
web administered questionnaire from the different HR professionals and the related employees of
the Delhi/NCR region. One questionnaire is made for the HR professionals or the people who are
involved in the various management level works related to the HR force in the organization and
other is made for the employees of the organization. It is very important to make different
questionnaire for the managers and the employees because only managers can tell what are the
techniques that they follow in the talent management? And what are the problems that they face
in implementing those techniques?
QUESTIONNAIRE: HR Professional
The questionnaire is made in such a way that it focuses on a comprehensive set of workplace
practices that influence employee motivation, commitment and willingness and desire to achieve
at work. The idea is to identify the practices and a deep understanding of typical organizational
programs to ensure that the questionnaire covered the broadest spectrum of tangible and
intangible aspects of the work environment. As a result, the questionnaire included items about
the full range of rewards practices, leadership and management effectiveness, communication,
40
culture and attributes related to these tangible and intangible aspects. Respondents came from a
range of industries, including telecommunications and technology, financial services, education,
health care, energy, retail, transportation, consumer products and manufacturing.
QUESTIONNAIRE: EMPLOYEES
This questionnaire is made with the aim in the mind to compare the responses of the various
employees that has been obtained by filling this questionnaire. The idea is to know how much
the employees of the organization is aware of the talent management system in the organization
and how much they are satisfied with that. The talent management initiatives are taken by the
HR professionals but the implications of these initiatives is on the employees. By this
questionnaire I tried to find out the effectiveness of the different talent management programmes
in the organization as well as the satisfaction level of the employees.
41
SECONDARY DATA
Newspapers
HR websites and internet
STATISTICAL TOOLS
Pie chart
Bar Graphs
Averages
Correlation
SAMPLING TECHNIQUES
Judgmental Sampling
42
MAIN ANALYSIS
Graphical representation of the Interpretation of the questionnaire
HR Professionals.
Q. 1
82%
18%
Does your organization have any specific talent management initiatives in place? Response To-
tal
Yes No
43
Q. 2
86%
14%
Are talent management initiatives a top priority for your organization?
YES NO
44
Q. 3
30%
38%
32%
Chart Titleby competencies by result by potential
45
Q. 4
What are the areas your organization needs to improve in terms of talent management
initiatives?
Aligning employees with the mission and vision of your organization 40.91%
Creating a culture that makes employees want to stay with the
organization
40.91%
Creating a culture that values employees work 40.91%
Creating an environment where employees are excited to come to
work each day
50.00%
Identifying gaps in current employees and candidate competency
levels
59.09%
46
Q. 5
In your organization who is primarily responsible for …… (tick one per statement)
Department
head(excludes
employee
supervisor)
Hr
staff
Internal
coach(excludes
employee
supervisor)
Mentor
(excludes
employee
supervisor)
Others
Recruiting
individuals
63% (14) 63%
(14)
4% (1) 4% (1) 4% (1)
Further
developing
employees
54% (12) 31%
(7)
13% (3) 18% (4) 13%
(3)
Retaining
employees
63% (14) 50%
(11)
9% (2) 4% (1) 9% (2)
47
Q. 6
68%
32%
Does your organization have a staff member whose position is exclusively responsible for overseeing talent management initiatives?
Yes, at the management/ executive level No
48
Q. 7
27%
35%
38%
What are your talent retention ini-tiatives?
Acquiring new talents Leveraging existing talents Retaining the current potential
49
Q. 8
18%
9%
18%
14%
9%
10%
11%
11%
Within your organization what kinds of talent development activities are carried out?
Building class room workshops
Coaching
Mentoring
Education
Developmental experience
Short terms assignments
Action learning
Others
50
Q. 9
In the next three years how effective will the following elements of compensation be in
terms of attracting and retaining top performers?
1(most effective) 2 3 4 5(least effective)
Base pay 57% 33% 0% 9% 0%
Health care benefits 19% 42% 23% 14% 0%
Retirement/education benefits 33% 33% 19% 14% 0%
Share options/equity
participation
33% 14% 28% 14% 9%
Child care costs/arrangement 25% 10% 35% 30% 0%
Job security 52% 19% 23% 0% 4%
51
Q. 10
provid
ing trai
ning
Worki
ng with
employe
es to dev
elop in
dividual
caree
r path
Provid
ing the o
pportunity
to w
ork with
lead
ing edge
tech
nologies
Funding e
ducational
needs
Provid
ing more
facilit
y or t
angib
le rew
ards
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
Series1
52
Q. 11
sales marketin business development0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
Series1
53
Q. 12
How do you expect your budget for recruiting develop-ing and retaining employees to change over the next
three years?
Decrease Increase
No change
90%
5% 5%
54
ANALYSIS OF THE QUESTIONNAIRE FOR EMPLOYEES.
Q. 1
Less than a year
1-2 years
2-5 years
5-10 years
More than 10 years
55
Q. 2
Have you been made aware of the policies and procedures? And do you understand them?
Not at all aware Aware but need more
information
Know and understand
this
Mission statement 3% 7% 88%
Structure of the company 3% (1) 7% (2) 88% (23)
Aims of the company 0% (0) 15% (4) 84% (22)
Health and safety
procedures
3% (1) 26% (7) 69% (18)
Professional association
membership
19% (5) 23% (6) 57% (15)
Policy on handling any
legal problems?
16% (4) 44% (11) 40% (10)
56
handling customer
problems?
4% (1) 40% (10) 56% (14)
holiday entitlement? 4% (1) 28% (7) 68% (17)
Policy on absence? 8% (2) 4% (1) 88% (22)
maternity/ paternity
leave?
12% (3) 16% (4) 72% (18)
Q. 3
57
Do you know how can you help the organization in achieving its aim?
88%
5%7%
Chart Title
Yes No somewhat
Q. 4
58
What do you know about your job, and what would you like to know more about?
i know about this i know little, need to
know more
i need to know a lot
more about this
position in the
organization
84% (22) 3% (1) 11% (3)
to whom you are
responsible
87% (21) 0% (0) 12% (3)
people you are
directly responsible
for
83% (20) 12% (3) 4% (1)
people you are
indirectly responsible
for
64% (16) 20% (5) 16% (4)
hours of work 88% (22) 4% (1) 8% (2)
your pay 84% (21) 12% (3) 4% (1)
benefits you are
entitled to
76% (19) 8% (2) 16% (4)
organization directors 50% (12) 41% (10) 8% (2)
team you work within 88% (22) 0% (0) 12% (3)
59
machinery you will
operate
83% (20) 8% (2) 8% (2)
Q. 5 Please rate your satisfaction with the employee benefits and policies.
60
Extremely
dissatisfied
Dissatisfied
Neither satisfied
nor
dissatisfied Satisfied Extremely
satisfied
Accuracy of job
description
0% (0) 0% (0) 4% (1) 72%
(18)
24% (6)
Salary review 0% (0) 8% (2) 20% (5) 60%
(15)
12% (3)
job changes /
promotion
0% (0) 4% (1) 16% (4) 60%
(15)
20% (5)
Leave of
absence
0% (0) 4% (1) 12% (3) 58%
(14)
25% (6)
Health care
benefits
0% (0) 8% (2) 0% (0) 68%
(17)
24% (6)
Retirement
benefits
0% (0) 20% (5) 8% (2) 52%
(13)
20% (5)
Q. 6. In the next three years how effective will the following elements of compensation be in
terms of attracting and retaining top performers?
61
1(most
effective)
2 3 4 5(least
effective)
Base pay 60% (15) 24%
(6)
12%
(3)
4% (1) 0% (0)
Health care benefits 24% (6) 44%
(11)
24%
(6)
8% (2) 0% (0)
Retirement/education benefits 25% (6) 25%
(6)
25%
(6)
25%
(6)
0% (0)
Share options/equity
participation
36% (9) 32%
(8)
16%
(4)
12%
(3)
4% (1)
Job security 44% (11) 36%
(9)
8% (2) 4% (1) 8% (2)
Q. 7
62
Yes92%
No8%
Would you benefit from further training in any of the items specified in your job description?
Q. 8
63
36%
64%
Overall, how satisfied are you with your company's personnel policies?
Extremely Dissatisfied
Very Dissatisfied
Neither Satisfied nor Dissatisfied
Very Satisfied
Extremely Satisfied
Q. 9
64
8%4%
4%
52%
32%
Overall, how satisfied are you with this company as a place to work compared to other places you have worked?
Extremely dissatisfied
Dissatisfied
Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied
Satisfied
Extremely satisfied
OBSERVATIONS AND FINDINGS
HR PROFESSIONALS
65
Questionnaire is made in such a way to know the trends and effects of the talent management.
If we look at the results of the questionnaire we will find that most of the companies have
specific talent management initiatives in the organization. That most of the organization agreed
to the face that talent management is very important and realize its importance in the today’s
scenario and therefore implementing their organizations. Even the interpretation of the
questionnaire shoes that it is a top priority in the organization where it is being implemented.
If we talk about identifying the talent in the organizations, most of
companies accept the face that their way of recognizing the talent is by the result of the work the
employees do. If their result is good their considered good employee, but that is not the only way
to identify the talent in the organization. Even by evaluating the competencies and the potential
of employees. But finding the talent in the company by potential of the candidate is least
considered or applied in the organization. Most of the company has to say that most of the people
in today’s world has the potential to carry out the task but that is not the way to identify the real
talent in the in organization.
If we talk about the area of improvement in the talent management
initiatives the around 60% of the companies agreed to the fact that they need to identify the gaps
between the current employees and the candidate competency level. While 50% of the
companies think that improvement is required in creating an environment where employees feel
excited to come and work. But only 40% of the respondents think that improvement in the area
of alignment of employee’s vision and mission of the organization is required.
66
Since most of the organization has realized the importance of the talent management
in today’s scenario so they give value to this system and therefore they have hired specialist for
this. 68% of the respondent organization confirm the fact that they have a specialists hired in the
organization who is exclusively responsible for overseeing talent management initiatives.
Employees in today’s world not only work for the money and living but also work for the future
growth and knowledge. So the companies are constantly working motivating the employee
Looking at the different roles of the different people in the organization, the job is
being evenly distributed. Asking about the responsibility of recruiting the employees, maximum
organization has hr department to handle this. Apart from this not only recruitment but also the
development of employees and their, in all these three around 60% organization has
departmental head responsible for this.
Asking about the talent retention initiatives by the various companies, 38% of them have the
strategy to retain their current employees and almost same number of companies (37%) of them
believes in leveraging existing talents. And only 24% of those feel in acquiring new employees
for the organization.
When it was asked about the importance of the components in the salary after
three years, 57% of them agreed that base pay will be most important and after that job security
has been rated the most effective.
OBSERVATIONS AND FINDINGS
67
EMPLOYEES OF THE ORGANIZATION
For talent management to work most effectively, it is very important that employees must be
aware of their job responsibility and what is being expected from them. So when we ask the
employees about their understanding about the job that they are working, 88% of them agreed
that they understand their responsibility and job very well. They also agreed that they have been
made aware of the different policies of the organization and that agreed percentage is 88 approx.
When asked about the knowledge about how they can help the organization, most
of the employees (88%) said yes they are aware of the fact. When employees where asked what
else they want to know about their job, then maximum number of employees (16%) of them said
they want to know more about the profits associated with the title
When we ask them to rate their satisfaction level with that of the policies and
benefits that the organization is providing, 8% employees are satisfied with their salary review
while only 52% are satisfied with the retirement benefits that the organization is providing.
Talking about the future perspectives and strategy or the how much the
organization is ready and prepared, we asked them in the next three years which will be the most
important and vital component in the compensation, maximum number of employees agreed to
the fact that base pay is going to be most important.
Employees are very much knowledgeable and understandable in today’s
scenario. They know and want to know each and every aspect that affects their life in some way
or the other. Asking about the benefits that they will get on training on any of factors that are
68
specified in their job description, 92% of employees say yes to this fact while 8% feels that even
training on the items in their job description will not help them in anyway.
In spite of the fact most of the employees agree and some disagree,
maximum number of employees is satisfied with the different personal policies that the
organization is providing.
Some of the more findings from the research are as follows:
Most of the covered companies have talent specific initiative in place (81%) and they
give them top priority in their organization (86%).They also have exclusive staff member
for managing talent initiatives (68%)
In most of the companies the talent is identified by competencies (42%) and the HR
professional view to increase career growth opportunity.
HR staffs as well as the department heads are responsible for recruiting individuals (64%)
Retaining the current talent is top priority for the organization(38%)
Sales and business development are the two areas where retaining talent is most difficult
Class room workshop, mentoring and coaching are usually used by the organization to
carry out talent development activities.
More than 60% of the respondent view organizational culture as a main driving force for
the new talent and for the existing talent. Even rewarding plays a important role (48%)
Base pay (57%) and Job security (52%) are the two main areas for retaining talent in
coming years. Other than this, training plays an important role in motivating the
employee.
Organizations are using certification for improving the training programs.
69
In more than 90% of the organizations budget for recruiting developing and retaining
employees is going to increase over the next three years.
Most the employees have a clear knowledge about the company’s vision, mission and
objectives. And they know how to achieve these objectives (76%)
They are clear about their role and responsibility (85%) and they know about other staff
members also.
Most of the respondent are satisfied by job description, salary review, health care benefits
etc.
Base pay (60%) and Job security (44%) are in top priority for the employees in coming
years.
Apart from financial benefits, employee emphasis more on career growth, work culture
and international opportunities.
91% of the employees want more training in their specified job.
The employees have a mix response on benefits like Medical insurance package,
Company savings plan, Retirement plan, Holiday Entitlement, Job market etc.
64% of the employees are satisfied with the company's personnel policies where as
36% are neither satisfied nor dissatisfied
Overall 32 % employee are extremely satisfied where as 52% are just satisfied with
their organization.
70
RECOMMENDATIONS
Organizations must have meaningful descriptions of the capabilities (skills, behaviors,
abilities and knowledge) required throughout the organization.
Organizations must be able to relate those skills and capabilities to a role or a center of
demand, such as a job position, project or leadership role.
Talent management processes must create a comprehensive profile of their talent. They
must be able to track meaningful talent related information about all of their people -
employees, contractors, or candidates.
The working culture of the organization should be improved and maintained to retain
talent in long run.
More certified training should be given to the employee to boost their effectiveness and
efficiency. It should be used as a tool of motivation.
The organization should identify the crucial talent initiative to attract and retain the
employee. They should know which talent management elements can have the greatest
impact on the business and therefore provide a better basis for prioritization and
implementation.
To create a sophisticated talent management environment, organizations must:
• Define a clear vision for talent management
• Develop a roadmap for technology and process integration
• Integrate and optimize processes
• Apply robust technology to enable processes
• Prepare the workforce for changes associated with the new environment
71
A number of recommendations can be drawn from looking at the interpretations and research
results holistically. These seem to be true for every organization and every talent management
process.
1. Every organization needs to align their talent management system to their specific business
requirements. There is no one way to do talent management.
2. When considering the right talent management system for your organisation, you first need to
decide which perspective is most relevant to your business goals. It is then important to look at
the most relevant dimensions to help shape the way you define, develop and structure your talent
management system.
3. Designing and implementing a talent management system can be shaped by the dimensions.
All the case study organizations could be mapped against these dimensions demonstrating that
they are common to all talent management systems.
4. Talent management requires a talent culture to be developed so that talent conversations
become acceptable throughout the organization and individuals are encouraged to expand their
networks.
5. Care needs to be taken with disseminating talent management practices as talent management
inevitably leads to segmentation and this can conflict with diversity and inclusion initiatives.
Talent management systems can complement diversity initiatives by ensuring equality of
opportunity to enter the talent pool and transparency over selection criteria.
6. When designing appropriate routes for developing talent within your organization, it is
important to consider the prevailing culture within your organization and the appetite for risk.
72
7. Offering differentiated and tailored development routes that can meet individual needs and
strengths can help to improve the engagement of those identified as talent and avoid perceptions
of under-utilization.
8. Measures of return on investment (ROI) should be appropriate, measurable and economical.
There is no point collecting costly data that is not feeding back in the right areas. Equally, failing
to collect data leaves organizations with a blind spot and they will not be able to tell if their
talent management system is meeting its strategic objectives or not. Measures of ROI are best
considered when the system is being designed, so that the evaluation process is designed into the
system itself.
9. Central ownership for talent management is important to achieve alignment with the
organization’s strategic objectives and to help diminish the potential for silo mentalities.
10. It is important that any talent management system is integrated across all aspects of human
resource management. There are clear inter-dependencies between talent management and
recruitment, development, diversity, retention and succession planning practices.
73
CONCLUSION
As organizations continue to pursue high performance and improved results through TM
practices, they are taking a holistic approach to talent management—from attracting and
selecting wisely, to retaining and developing leaders, to placing employees in positions of
greatest impact. The mandate is clear: for organizations to succeed in today’s rapidly changing
and increasingly competitive marketplace, intense focus must be applied to aligning human
capital with corporate strategy and objectives. It starts with recruiting and retaining talented
people and continues by sustaining the knowledge and competencies across the entire workforce.
With rapidly changing skill sets and job requirements, this becomes an increasingly difficult
challenge for organizations. Meeting this organizational supply and demand requires the right
“Talent DNA” and supporting technology solutions. By implementing an effective talent
management strategy, including integrated data, processes, and analytics, organizations can help
ensure that the right people are in the right place at the right time, as well as organizational
readiness for the future.
74
LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY
It is important to critically evaluate the results and the whole study. The present study has certain
limitations that need to be taken into account when considering the study and its contributions.
However, some of these limitations can be seen as fruitful avenues for future research under the
same theme.This study has focused on a phenomenon that is not a very extensive and major one,
i.e. the market. Clearly, this represents a challenging task for research regardless of the more
specific interests that the study may have. In this study, this extensive and complex phenomenon
has been studied from a rather narrow empirical perspective. The selection of the small region
naturally brings forth many limitations as far as the generalization of the results of the study is
concerned. This study only covers the region in Delhi and NCR region, which has very limited
company as compared to the whole India. So the response given by employees and HR
professionals will be manipulated upto some extent. Again the response given by the persons
may not guarantee that they have given the right response. It may be biased and some people
may not be aware about other companies. By understanding something about this, we might
eventually also learn something about more general phenomena. The empirical analysis of
markets conducted in this study represents therefore only a single case and what is more, from
the perspective of this single actor. To study the Talent acquisition and management in market
through different or various questionnaires, for example, is clearly one of the future research
challenges in this topic. Multiple questionnaires design would enable us to test the conceptual
framework of the study further. However, as the theme of this study has been related to emerging
market, it can of course be seen that eventually the Talent pool in the market are likely to
develop so that their emergence, even through multiple case studies becomes different, i.e. the
emergence needs to be studied retrospective.
75
Some of more limitations of this report are
1. Limited Applicability – Finding data to suit a specific project is very cumbersome. Collection
and use of secondary data requires a lot of hard work on the part of researcher. The secondary
data may have three types of variations, which may hinder their use for the project at hand (i)
units of measurement may be different (ii) definitions and data classes may be different (iii) lack
of currency, i.e. data may be outdated.
2. Accuracy: It is difficult to find data of needed accuracy. Often the available data are distantly
related with the research problem at hand. It is difficult to determine their accuracy for the
present study.
76
APPENDICES
Questionnaire for HR professionals
QUESTIONNAIRE BY: Ravi Shanker Pandey
this questionnaire is meant for the hr professionals and this is being done for educational purpose and your privacy will
be maintained and it is necessary for the successful completion of my PGDM
1. Organization
2. Name
3. Designation
4. Does your organization have any specific talent management initiatives in place?
Yes No
5. Are talent management initiatives a top priority for your organization?
Yes No
77
6. How does your organization identify talent?
By competencies
By results
By potential
7. What are the areas your organization needs to improve in terms of talent management initiatives?
Aligning employees with the mission and vision of your organization
Creating a culture that makes employees want to stay with the organization
Creating a culture that values employees work
Creating an environment where employees are excited to come to work each day
Identifying gaps in current employees and candidate competency levels
8. In your organization who is primarily responsible for
Head of the department
mentor Hr staff Internal coach Other
Recruiting individuals
Further developing employees
78
Retaining employees
9. Does your organization have a staff member whose position is exclusively responsible for
Overseeing talent management initiatives?
Yes No
Reset
10. What are your talent retention initiatives?
Acquiring new talents
Leveraging existing talents
Retaining the current potential
11. Within your organization what kinds of talent development activities are carried out?
Building class room workshops
Coaching
Mentoring
Short terms assignments
Developmental experience
others
79
12. In the next three years how effective will the following elements of compensation be in terms of
attracting and retaining top performers?
1 (very critical) 2 3 4 5(less critical)
Base pay
health care benefits
retirement benefits
job security
share options
13. Excluding financial compensation which of the following do u believe are your organization’s most
Effective means of rewarding, motivating and retaining talent?
Providing training
Working with employees to develop individual career path
Providing the opportunity to work with leading edge technologies
Funding educational needs
80
Providing more facility or tangible rewards
14. Which broadly defined job description are the most critical in terms of attracting and retaining employees?
sales
marketing
business development
15. How do you expect your budget for recruiting developing and retaining employees to change over the
next three years?
increase
decrease
no change
Questionnaire for employees
81
1. Organization
2.Name
3. Designation
4. How long you have been working in this organization?
Less than a year
1-2 years
2-5 years
5-10 years
more than 10 years
5. Have you been made aware of the policies and procedures? Do you know and understand them?
Not at all aware Aware but need more information
Know and understand this
mission statement? structure of the company?
aims of the company?
health and safety procedures? Professional association membership? Policy on handling any legal problems? Handling customer problems?
82
Holiday entitlement?
Policy on absence?
Maternity/ paternity leave?
Performance payments?
other entitlement
6. Do you know how can you help the organization in achieving its aim?
yes
no
somewhat
7. What do you know about your job, and what would you like to know more about?
i know about this i know little, need to know more
i need to know a lot more about this
position in the organization to whom you are responsible people you are directly responsible for people you are indirectly responsible for
hours of work
your pay
benefits you are entitled to
organization directors
team you work within
machinery you will
83
operate
8. Please rate your satisfaction with the employee benefits and policies.
Very Dissatisfied
Not Satisfied Neutral Satisfied Very Satisfied
Accuracy of job description
Salary review
job changes / promotion
Leave of absence
Health care benefits Retirement benefits
9. In the next three years how effective will the following elements of compensation be in terms of attracting and retaining top performers?
1(most effective)
2 3 4 5(least effective)
Base pay
Health care benefits
Retirement/education benefits Share options/equity participation
Job security
10. Would you benefit from further training in any of the items specified in your job description?
Yes
No
84
11. Overall, how satisfied are you with your company's personnel policies?
Very Dissatisfied
Not Satisfied
Neutral
Satisfied
Very Satisfied
12. Overall, how satisfied are you with this company as a place to work compared to other places you have worked?
Very Dissatisfied
Not Satisfied
Neutral
Satisfied
Very Satisfied
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. Six Ways to Mine Teen Talent," Andrea C. Poe, Society for Human Resource
Management, March 2001
85
2. Winning the Best and Brightest: Increasing the Attraction of Public Service," Carol
Chetkovich, The PricewaterhouseCoopers Endowment for The Business of Government,
July 2001.
3. Attracting and Keeping The Best and the Brightest: Survey Results From Council for
Excellence in Government Principals on How to Get, Develop and Retain Excellent
People in Government Service," Council for Excellence in Government, 2002
4. Spherion® Emerging Workforce® Study," Spherion Pacific Enterprises LLC,2002-
2003
5. Flexible Work Arrangements: The Demand Will Only Strengthen," Donna J. Bear,
Human Resource Institute, September 2004
6. "Attracting and Retaining the Mature Workforce," Barbara McIntosh, Ph.D., Society
2004
7. Development, And Work Motivation," Ruth Kanfer, Phillip L. Ackerman, Academy Of
Management Review, 2004.
8. Staying Ahead of the Curve 2004: Employer Best Practices for Mature Workers," Study
Conducted for AARP by Mercer Human Resource Consulting, September 2004
9. Talent Management: Overview: Talent Management Series Part I," Nancy R. Lockwood,
SPHR, GPHR, Society for Human Resource Management, July 2005.
10. Talent Management: Employee Engagement: Talent Management Series Part III," Nancy
R. Lockwood, SPHR, GPHR, Society for Human Resource Management, July 2005.
WEBSITES
86
http://www.articlesbase.com/human-resources-articles/emerging-trends-of-talent-
management-and-challenges-of-hrm-957837.html
http://www.articlesbase.com/human-resources-articles/emerging-trends-of-talent-
management-and-challenges-of-hrm-957837.html
http://www.managementstudyguide.com/talent-management-process.htm
http://article.singhisking.net/TALENT%20MANAGEMENT%20ARTICLE.html
http://humancapitalleague.com/Home/11168
http://www.entrepreneur.com/tradejournals/article/115036710.html
87
