Dear Prof.Mahfuz: Exactly as you said: systematic attraction, identification, development, and retention of individuals...

I would say the following:

1. Recruiting talent through rigorous testing of competencies, including attitudes through psychometric testing

2. Talent management strategy should be part of the strategy to develop a high performance work system that will creative interest of the talent

3. Realistic employee engagement initiatives so that people feel enthusiastic to work in the organization

4. Meet all reasonable aspirations of people that are possible within the budget

5. Empowerment & involvement in decision-making

6. Flexibility in rules and no rule-centricity; but having the rules changed if they come in the way of efficient working

7. Respecting individual diversity so as to accommodate people's unique preferences, like it is done in Google

8. Opportunity for growth through challenging work

9. Effective communication

10. Positivity, celebration and fun culture

I agree fully with Debi. It beautifully summarizes the various practices followed to retain talented workforce to match organizational goals.

The task of developing a talent management strategy often falls to human resources (HR) professionals working in consultation with the business functions. But HR also carries out the more traditional administrative functions such as handling employee benefits, delivering payrolls, ensuring compliance with government regulations, and recruiting and interviewing new staff. To become truly value-added partners in any business, HR needs the resources, tools and management buy-in to get the administrative tasks under control and move up to a position of strategic adviser. From talent mapping and planning to performance evaluation, recruitment, retention and even benefits administration, today’s human capital professionals are constantly seeking new ways to streamline, integrate and align human capital functions with broader corporate objectives.

To be effective in human capital management today, you need very pre¬cise and timely information about individuals—and you also need to be able to analyze this information collectively in order to make informed decisions. The more integration between activities as diverse as recruitment, payroll and benefits management, train¬ing/development and performance measurement, “the better you’ll be at overall workforce planning, the better you’ll be at managing and motivating individual workers, and so the more effective you’ll become as an organization”.

The Institute of Employment Studies has observed five action areas which are often the weak spots in implementing an effective talent management strategy.

■ Talent management interventions should be clearly focused on groups of jobs or people which, without pro‐active attention, will put the business at risk. So the key first question is not ‘who is talent?’ but rather ‘where does the business need to focus its talent management effort?’ This may need to be on people with executive potential in early career, mid‐career or near the top. It can also be on particular groups of jobs or people, defined by their level or function or geography.

Sometimes individual critical posts may need attention. An organization will often need several target areas for talent management activity. Such focused interventions must complement active development of the whole workforce, not substitute for it.

■ Individuals need dialogue about their careers and development. The conversation needs to be two‐way and about future direction, not just a potential rating. Talent and succession processes need to be woven in with the normal processes for managing individual performance and development.

■ Managers need to act collectively in identifying and developing talent. To do this they need a clear and regular choreography for their collective information‐sharing, decision‐making and action. Discussions between managers need to link up down through the organisation, reaching down into talent pipelines, and facilitating action across divisional and geographical boundaries.

■ People are developed through both career and skill development activities. Active career development is essential to developing and deploying talent. ‘Talent programmes’ are too often just short bursts of skill training or coaching. Getting access to the right range of work experiences is the key to generating credible successors at any level.

■ HR needs to give sustained attention to supporting talent management, including managing information, facilitating and training the line. Central teams need to help local business partners work with the business to identify and develop potential at lower levels and in early career.

Great points from Debi, Abdallah and Jorge.

The demand for implementing talent management strategy is escalating as organisations face pressure such as shortage of critical skills, overload of resume and flight risk. To counter this companies are focusing on talent management solution and their biggest challenge is to implement it effectively and efficiently.

To implement this strategy successfully the following should be considered.

1) Involve the entire project team in the kick-off meeting.

2) Communicate the strategy and goals of a project clearly.

3) Engage a committed project team by selecting the right resources.

4)Document your requirements.

5)Plan your data design to reflect your goals.

6) Learn the system inside & out.

7) Complete a detail project plan to keep a track of all tasks, deliverable's and time line commitments.

8) Communicate weekly by organizing status meetings.

9)Plan & perform through testing of the system using formal user acceptance testing.

10) Don't delay.............the sooner you go LIVE, the sooner you begin to realize the benefits.

11)Communicate to the organization about the benefits you expect to realize from the system both for the company & for them professionally and personally.

12) Remember to communicate the solution to the entire organization. Projects success can't be measured by "launching it on time" or "came in on budget". It must be measured by whether it helps your company meet its strategic talent management goals & whether its employees are actively using it.

The first step to implenting a talent management strategy is to identify a career model that fits well within the expectations of both the recruitinf company and the candidate. With generation Y, highly talented employees tend to have their own career plans. This is often referred to as the Protean career. The job of a company is to identify such plan and offer incentives to its talented employees. Such incentives can range from a profit sharing shceme to partnership.

External and internal strategic factors

External factors

Political pressures (e.g. influence of Cabinet Office, other departments and relationships with external stakeholders; Machinery of Government changes); Social and demographic changes (e.g. Diversity, including the impact of aging population, generational and cultural differences; Rise of consumerism and personalization; Changing workplace expectations; Increasing complexity); Economic pressures (e.g. smaller budgets, more for less, recession, recovery); Technological developments (e.g. IT, medical advances); Legal requirements (e.g. duties for public authorities around race, disability, gender); Environmental/ecological changes (e.g. green agenda)

Internal factors

Organisation history; Staff attitudes; (e.g. staff survey); Common purpose, vision, values; (e.g. Board level statements on values) Cultural norms: (e.g. against internal organisational values, which are often aspirational: who are the heroes and the villains? What behaviours are common & which do people struggle with?) Leadership behaviours: (e.g. statements about what behaviours are valued) Staff movements: (e.g. details of leavers and reasons for leaving; joiners and their experience; Career paths: (e.g. career profiles, development paths, professional schemes) Processes: (e.g. governance & decisions) Geography: (e.g. where people are based, the regional split and the barriers or challenges)

Mahfuz,

These papers may offer some other perspectives on talent management.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/299747565_Towards_a_talent-driven_outward-oriented_globally-competitive_SME_framework_Discussion_Paper

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260638458_Strategies_for_enhancing_Jamaican_competitiveness_in_the_global_knowledge_economy

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/299604127_Human_Factors_Affecting_Productivity_in_Jamaica_Technical_Report_on_Preliminary_Findings

Technical Report Towards a talent-driven outward-oriented globally-competitiv...

Conference Paper Strategies for enhancing Jamaican competitiveness in the glo...

Technical Report Human Factors Affecting Productivity in Jamaica: Technical R...

In the domain of sport there is a talent management/development framework called FTEM:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259369048_Strategies_to_Support_Developing_Talent

Article Strategies to Support Developing Talent

Talent management starts from talent attraction. For this purpose companies don't adopt routine recruitment strategies or sources. the specialists are given this job known as head hunters.

Talent identification includes rigorous tests that are capable of 100% predictive validity, which results in selecting highly talented employees, who provide sustainable competitive advantage to the organisation.

Talent engagement and succession planning succeeds talent identification. Companies invest a lot on talent engagement and succession planning so that every position is occupied by highly capable employees.

Development interventions and career paths are designed to retain talented employees in the organisation.

I have attached our paper titled Exploring Talent Management its antecedents and consequences. Hope it is useful to you.

Regards