Mohammed Shafiq Hanif100134260Global talent management assignment 2 Talent 6HR502Word count 2070

ContentsIntroduction3Part 1 - Cultural perspectives on talent and talent management3Part 2 - Managing and developing talent in global businesses6Conclusion7References9

Introduction This report will focus on the influence of social culture on talent and talent management, there are two further objectives to this report, the first being to analyse how different cultures view, develop and manage talent. Specifically, a critical evaluation of different cultural perspectives on talent and talent management; secondly to evaluate the approaches and strategies global businesses use to manage and develop talent. The first issue concerning an organisation talent strategy is the business strategy, Campbell (2002) states the business strategy should be the primary focus for a business. He also describes business strategy as an ongoing process that consists of three elements, these are organising the businesses purpose, the basic long term goals and the adaptation and allocation of resources to achieve these goals which have been taken from Chandler (1962). A research paper published by HR.com (2012) states that executives still maintain that there are three key elements to a successful business, these are the right business strategy, operations for the execution of the strategy and the best talent to execute the operations. This supports the previous statement made by Campbell (2002) and shows were the talent strategy is linked to an organisations business strategy.Moving on from this wages account for the expenditure of 55% of US gross domestic product and as HR.com (2012) says, talent is critical for a businesss success and therefore talent needs to be managed effectively with a clearly defined talent strategy. Part 1 - Cultural perspectives on talent and talent managementThe first issue concerning the talent strategy if the definition of talent, this varies across cultures and their perception of what talent is, is the foundation of their talent strategies (Hansen, 2007). Defining talent is important as the human resource is one of the biggest costs to a business (HR.com, 2012). Webster (2013) describes talent as a special ability to do something well, but this is a wide ranging description. Hansen (2007) adds some clarification to this by pointing out that workers are plentiful but talent is in a dangerous short supply. She also mentions that some commentators continue to use the word talent to address a companys entire workforce, but others use the term to acknowledge the core group of leaders and contributors that a company has. Hansen (2007) defines this group as the talent pool and it has been identified that they make up on average no more that 15% of a companys workforce. Ulrich (2013) expands on defining talent with the formula talent = competence x commitment x contribution. Therefore the views of Hansen (2007) and Ulrich (2013) on talent are that it is a select group of people instead of the conventional workforces. Al Ariss (2014) supports the information concerning talent above with his research on what talent means for five different cultural clusters, specifically the views of Hansen (2007) and Ulrich (2013). These clusters are Anglo, Eastern European, Germanic, Latin American and Latin European. From his research he expresses the opinion that these five clusters all associate ability, skill, knowledge and potential with talent. From this he says that the research shows the difference between the clusters on what they think talent is, was small but there were some culture specific aspects such as; the Anglo cluster emphasised the exceptional nature of talent with more instrumental approach of associating talent with performance, potential and view talent as being a resource. Eastern Europeans associate talent with willpower, effort and the willingness and ability to learn. The Germanic cluster emphasised natural abilities that lead to excellence but still maintain passion as an aspect talent. Latin American relate talent to the belief of a persons calling or vocation which leads to career success and the ability to do tasks with ease. The last clusters of Latin European relate talent to innovation, art, creativity and learning. In addition to this Al Ariss (2014) identifies no significant difference between the cluster in consideration to having a fixed or growth related mindset about talent, he points out that for every cluster over 50% of them hold the view that talent can be developed; and especially in the Anglo and Germanic clusters, whereas Latin America and European have a lower percentage of this belief. Viaman (2008) states talented people are a source for knowledge, expertise, and competitive advantage for a company. He indicates that they need to be managed effectively by the hrm department and if they are not, problems such as the one mentioned below will occur. Tulgan (2001) gives the argument that talented people have less commitment and defends his statement with the reason for this as being, talented people are thinking as free agents. He states the cause for this is employers not being able to monopolise talent through long term employment relationships anymore. This puts pressure on the hr departments to recruit, develop and manage people more efficiently. Consistent with this there has also been a growing trend for talent management; Scullion & Collins (2011) draw attention to a growing interest for talent management by chief executive officers. Talent management is the hrm processes that have been put in place for the attraction, development, motivation, engagement and retention of employees to create a high performance workforce to meet the requirements of the business strategy. A big aspect concerning talented people is psychological and implied contracts; Rousseau (1989) mentions that psychological can be based off culture and are as important as their implied physical counterpart and need to be managed as effectively. Hofstede (1993) declares that the talent management concept is an American invention; he reveals that in other cultures the practices and basic concepts of talent management may differ. He gives the reason for this as being differing cultural influences, some of these will be discussed below. Because of these differences he comes to the conclusion that there is no such thing as universal talent management theories. The American perspective of talent management relates to the hrm processes and to managers as a class of people who are held in high esteem by their population. This class is seen as heroes even though they do not own businesses but rather sell their skills and act on behalf of the owner, also they do not produce anything but are seen as indispensible for production because they motivate the talent to do so (Hofstede, 1993). Bournois (2002) has identified three stages of American talent management, stage one is the identification and selection stage. This involves selecting high performance individuals with three to eight years of experience. Stage two is the training and development stage, people who perform well in their initial assignments are seen as solid prospects or comers and are then groomed for a further ten to fifteen years for important positions in the organisation. Stage three is when the individual has been given the high position. Within western talent management an individual is expected to relocate every two to four years, experience unrelenting stress, work long hours and partaking in lengthy travel times. Hofstedes (1993) research shows Germanys concept of management revolves around setting tasks, knowledge and expertise to solve technical problems; not motivation. This reflects Al Ariss (2014) research of organisational talent management program being lower in Germanic counties. His research also shows Germanic countries have strong apprenticeships for office and shop floor program imbedded in their society with strong classroom and work based alternatives. This has lead to an estimated two thirds holding a certificate which is universally recognised in Germanic cultures. Japan has the PM theory of leadership, PM stands for performance and maintenance. They have two classes of talent; the permanent workers group and non permanent employees, Hofstede (1993) highlights that talent is seen as seniority rather than position and rely on internal graduate development schemes to develop talent.

Part 2 - Managing and developing talent in global businessesAs culture plays a big part in business and people in general, it is important to understand how culturally diverse people manage their talent. The best place to do this would be global businesses as they employ many different people of varying cultures. Al Ariss (2014) identifies that global businesses use two differing perspectives to manage and develop talent; these are exclusive and inclusive. Both methods have been seen to be used in global business but, Al Ariss (2014) has stated that no definitive method has come about to accurately represent what global businesses use to date. The inclusive approach is known to further promote more relaxed working environments which have an emphasis on trust and wellbeing whereas the exclusive approach is more focused on higher returns to profit and production. These two methods can also be linked to the hard / soft and theory x / y approach to hrm, inclusive being more in line with the soft approach and theory y and vice versa, Gratton (1997).The exclusive method refers to the activities and processes of the management and development of employees who are seen to have value within an organisation and setting up internal organisational structures maintain and exploit a companys competitive advantage. For example the creation a talent management team whose goal is to identify key positions which are a source of competitive advantage that need to be filled, finding the right people and developing them to fit the roles needed and creating incentives to keep these people retained in long term employment contracts. The second is the inclusive method which refers to recognising and identifying where an employees natural talent and potential lies, and creating development programs that develop this potential into job specific skills and knowledge. This is in effort to turn the employees imbedded talents into real world performance for specific jobs roles on an individual basis. An example of this would be the further training and development of an employee; who has shown potential in sales or management etc, for them to better fit into and be more effective within the role. Al Ariss (2014) also identifies a further two different methods of talent management used by global businesses, these are selection or development of talent. These two methods of talent development are extensions of the exclusive and inclusive methods mentioned previously. These two factors refer to whether the management team believe that talent can be taught and learned; Tulgan (2001) refers to these two methods as making or buying talent. The selection approach refers to talent being natural and inborn and is an exclusive approach to talent management. This factor relies on processes such as identification, assessments and selection to recruit talent. This method of talent development relies heavily on aggressive searching, recruiting and selecting of the highly sought after resource of talent as Hansen (2007) as mentioned previously. Whereas the development method is linked to inclusive approach to talent management, this method relies on the education, training and experience as tools for talent development. Al Ariss (2014) brings some clarity to these two methods, he states that even though both methods are prevalent in global businesses the people in charge of this business process largely hold the personal belief that talent is inborn and cannot be gained through the development method.

(Chart taken from Paauwe, 2012)The chart below taken from Paauwe (2012) shows the generalised various aspects of talent management in global business, as can be seen above there are finer details that this chart is missing. The centre is how an organisation views talent; from there the middle ring are six guiding principles of strategy and finally the outer ring is the actual implementation. This existence of this chart from Paauwe (2012) conflicts with Hofstedes (1993) view, that there can be no universal talent management strategy.

Conclusion This report has looked at how social culture affects the views of talent and talent management, also how global businesses develop and management talent. With the information contained within this report its shows that the influence of social culture within organisations and how it affects their talent strategy. From the information gained it shows that the basis of their talent strategies, whether it is based on exclusive or inclusive is derived from the staff members in charge of the talent management department and their initial definition of talent. From this the majority of the other methods fall in line. Finally it is important to treat each company individually with regards to their talent strategy as they have their own organisational culture as well which might incorporate hybrid methods of talent management.

References Al Ariss, A (2014) Global Talent Management: Challenges, Strategies, and Opportunities, Belgium: Springer International Publishing. Bournois, B (2002) Cross-cultural Approaches to Leadership Development, USA: Greenwood Publishing Group Campbell, D (2002). Business strategy, an introduction . 2nd ed. Oxford: Butterworth and Heinemann . 7-9.Gratton, L, 1997. Soft and Hard Models of Human Resource Management: A Reappraisal. Journal of managment studies , [Online]. 1/34, 53-73. Available at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1467-6486.00042/full [Accessed 17 November 2014].Hofstede, G, 1993. Cultural constraints in management theories. Academy of Management , [Online]. 1/7, 81-89. Available at: http://users.ipfw.edu/todorovz/teaching/401/readings/Cultural%20constraints%20in%20mgmt%20theories%20Hofstede.pdf [Accessed 30 December 2014].HR.com. 2012. Driving Successful HR Leadership: Talent Managements Role in Core Business Strategy. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.oracle.com/us/products/applications/human-capital-management/talent-mgmt-role-bus-strategy-1915947.pdf. [Accessed 24 November 14].Paauwe, J, 2012. Six Principles of Effective Global Talent Management. MITSloan management review , [Online]. 2/53, 27. Available at: http://www.altocapital.co.nz/resources/Global%20Talent%20Management%206%20Principles.pdf [Accessed 04 January 2015].Webster. 2013. A definition of talent. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/talent. [Accessed 17 November 14].Ulrich, D, 2011. What is talent? Business & Management, [Online]. 63/2012, 55-61. Available at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ltl.20011/abstract [Accessed 17 November 2014].Hansen, F. (2007). What Is Talent? Workforce management. 86 (1), 15-17.Rousseau, D.M. (1989). Psychological and implied contracts in organizations. Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal. 2 (2), 121-139.Scullion, H & Collins, D (2011). Global Talent Managment . New York: Routledge. 3-11. Tulgan, B, 2001. Winning the Talent Wars. Employment relations today, [Online]. 2/28, 37-51. Available at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ert.1013/abstract [Accessed 24 November 2014].Viaman, V, 2008. Retention management as a means of protecting tacit knowledge in an organisation: a conceptual framework for professional services firms. International Journal of Learning and Intellectual Capital , 5/2/2008, 172-185