Examining Talent Pools As A Core Talent Management Practice in Multinational Corporations 2

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Examining talent pools as a core talent

management practice in multinational
corporations
Stefan Jooss, Ralf Burbach & Huub Ruël
To cite this article: Stefan Jooss, Ralf Burbach & Huub Ruël (2021) Examining talent pools as
a core talent management practice in multinational corporations, The International Journal of
Human Resource Management, 32:11, 2321-2352, DOI: 10.1080/09585192.2019.1579748
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2019.1579748
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THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
2021, VOL. 32, NO. 11, 2321–2352
https://doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2019.1579748
Examining talent pools as a core talent management

practice in multinational corporations
Stefan Joossa , Ralf Burbachb and Huub Rue€lc
a
University College Cork, Cork, Ireland; bTechnological University Dublin, Dublin, Ireland;
c
Hotelschool The Hague, Den Haag, The Netherlands
ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

Many organisations view talent management (TM) as per- Received 18 December 2017
haps the most critical challenge of this century. Accepted 28 January 2019
Consequently, it would seem vital that multinational corpo-
rations essayed to employ talent pools (TPs) to identify and KEYWORDS
manage talent more strategically. This paper examines crit- Talent pools; talent
identification; talent
ically the use of TPs as a core TM practice in multinational
management; multinational
corporations. Through a multilevel case study of three corporations; multilevel
organisations, we draw on 73 in-depth interviews with case study
human resources and operational leaders at corporate and
business unit levels to ascertain how TPs contribute to TM
effectiveness. Findings show that TPs can provide a plat-
form for the development of a strong internal talent pipe-
line if an appropriate TM framework is in place. The results
imply that TPs need to be actively managed and under-
pinned by a rigorous and strategic decision-making process
to establish the necessary depth and breadth of talent
within TPs, which, in turn, will ensure the overall effective-
ness of the TM process. This research responds to the call
for much needed empirical evidence on TP practices and
suggests a more nuanced view on TP management.
Furthermore, this paper offers a model that conceptualises
a systematic approach to TP management.
Introduction
The identification, development, retention and deployment of talent has
been a critical topic on the agenda of scholars and practitioners alike in
recent years (Morley, Scullion, Collings, & Schuler, 2015). Talent man-
agement (TM), in this article, is defined as ‘the strategic management of
the flow of talent through an organisation’ (Iles, Preece, & Chuai, 2010,
p. 127). To manage this flow effectively, organisations have introduced
the concept of talent pools (TPs) which are leveraged through a talent
pipeline. This ensures the continuity of talent at all levels of an organisa-
tion (Bhattacharyya, 2014).
CONTACT Stefan Jooss stefan.jooss@ucc.ie University College Cork, Cork, Ireland

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content
of the article.
ß 2019 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
2322 S. JOOSS ET AL.
TPs have been described mostly as a pool of employees that display

high potential and/or high performance (M€akel€a, Bj€ orkman, &
Ehrnrooth, 2010). In addition, McDonnell, Hickey, and Gunnigle (2011)
emphasise the pivotal nature of these employees for key strategic posi-
tions. It is important to note that those key positions could be found at
all levels of an organisation (Collings & Mellahi, 2009). In contrast to
succession planning, which refers to a process of planning the replace-
ment of particular employees by identifying their successor (Cappelli,
2011), TPs represent more flexible and larger groups of talent. In line
with Tansley and Tietze (2013), we define a TP as a collective of employ-
ees with a set of specific characteristics identified by the company. In
order to fill TPs, Cappelli (2008) suggests the use of both internal devel-
opment as well as external recruitment. According to Sparrow (2007, p.
856), TPs allow recruitment ‘ahead of the curve’ rather than demand-led
recruitment, thus, implying a long-term strategic view to managing tal-
ent. In addition to a proactive approach to TM, TPs help to project staff-
ing needs and to manage the career development of employees towards
leading roles as part of a talent pipeline (Lewis & Heckman, 2006). The
size of a TP can depend on the scale of an organisation and the number
of positions available (Beheshtifar & Nekoie-Moghadam, 2011). Their
establishment and management is complex, as TPs are impacted by vari-
ous external factors such as changing business needs (which may require
different talent needs), shifting individual circumstances (which may
result in joining or leaving a TP) and development opportunities pro-
vided by organisations (Yarnall, 2011). Consequently, TPs have been
described as dynamic in nature (McDonnell et al., 2011). As such, the
ongoing maintenance of established TPs and the support of the senior
leadership team for the TP process are critical success factors (Yarnall,
2011). Firms that do not manage their TPs might fail to identify and
develop key talent for their organisation (Hartmann, Feisel, &
Schober, 2010).
While the extant literature refers to TPs as part of a broader TM con-
struct (Collings & Mellahi, 2009; Sparrow, Farndale, & Scullion, 2013),
there appears to be a lack of conceptualisation of talent and TPs as well as
a lack of empirical evidence to substantiate the link between TPs and
other talent practices (Lewis & Heckman, 2006). Evidently, the effective-
ness of a broader TM system depends on a bundle of practices, not just
one component (Sparrow & Makram, 2015). Clarifying the boundaries of
these concepts is an important step in differentiating TM from human
resource management (HRM). While the latter generally focuses on all
employees, the former focuses on incumbents included in an organisa-
tion’s TPs (Collings & Mellahi, 2009). The talent identification process
and therefore the outcome of who is included in a TP is seldom
THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT 2323
problematised (M€akel€a et al., 2010). Poor conceptualisation and the lack of

consistent guidelines in organisations will hinder a systematic approach to
talent which will negatively affect the TM process (Wiblen, 2016).
Thus, this paper examines critically TPs as a core TM practice in
multinational corporations (MNCs) and aims to assess how TPs can con-
tribute to effective TM by comparing and contrasting the views of key
stakeholders at the corporate and business unit levels. In so doing, the
study responds to the call for much needed empirical evidence on how
TPs are operationalised in practice (McDonnell, Collings, Mellahi, &
Schuler, 2017). The evidence presented here suggests that a multiplicity
of TPs can contribute effectively to the overall success of the TM process
of an organisation and as such lends support to the differentiated per-
spective of TM advocated by several authors (Collings, 2017; Huselid &
Becker, 2011). However, the study also shows that the success of the TM
process depends significantly on the alignment of the TM strategy across
all organisational levels and the commitment to TM by all stakeholders
involved (leadership and top management, supervisors and line managers
and human resource (HR) managers). From a theory-building perspec-
tive, the paper further demonstrates the importance of a more nuanced
view on how TPs contribute to the overall TM system. While human
capital is a critical component to identify individual talent, organisational
capital is required to establish a rigorous TM architecture. Consequently,
we offer a model that conceptualises a systematic approach to TP man-
agement. Moreover, the paper will provide guidance to practitioners in
formulating and implementing TPs.
Literature review
Talent pools and talent management
TPs ought to be viewed as one key piece of the TM jigsaw that needs to
be integrated in a broader TM architecture which encompasses several
high performing work practices (e.g. identifying and recruiting talent,
attracting talent to the organisation, minimising attrition through
engagement and retention, identifying key internal talent, managing tal-
ent flows, developing employees and delivering performance) (Sparrow &
Makram, 2015). The establishment and management of TPs are the cor-
nerstones of the successful identification, engagement and retention of
key internal talent (Sparrow, Scullion, & Tarique, 2014). The compos-
ition of a TP depends largely on the definition of talent by an organisa-
tion (Tansley, 2011). For the purpose of this paper, we define talent as
‘those individuals who are currently or have the potential to contribute
differentially to firm performance’ (adapted from Cappelli & Keller,
2017, p. 28).
The importance of TPs as part of the TM process has also been high-
lighted by Collings and Mellahi (2009, p. 304) who define TM as
‘activities and processes that involve the systematic identification of key
positions which differentially contribute to the organisation’s sustainable
competitive advantage, the development of a talent pool of high potential
and high performing incumbents to fill these roles and the development
of a differentiated architecture to facilitate filling these positions with
competent incumbents and to ensure their continued commitment to the
organisation’. Similarly, Boudreau and Ramstad (2007) support a talent
segmentation. However, they focus on the identification of ‘pivotal talent
pools’ which refers to pools with high return on investment and centre
on the changes in the value of talent as opposed to the average value of
talent (Boudreau & Ramstad, 2006). ‘Talent pool "pivotalness" is the dif-
ference in competitive success that would be achieved by improving the
quality or availability of that talent pool’ (Boudreau & Ramstad, 2005, p.
22). Thus, we can conclude that a TM architecture which supports work-
force differentiation based on the strategic importance and the potential
contribution of a selection of employees arguably seems appropriate
(Collings, 2017; McDonnell, Gunnigle, Lavelle, & Lamare, 2016;
Yanadori & Kang, 2011).
To date, no single theory or framework that captures the scope of the
entire TM construct has been advanced (Collings, Mellahi, & Cascio,
2017; Dries, Cotton, Bagdadli, & Oliveira, 2014). However, the TM litera-
ture often refers to human capital theory. At its core is the belief that an
investment in human capital leads to organisational benefits such as eco-
nomic growth (Wright, Coff, & Moliterno, 2014). Collings (2014, p.256)
defines human capital as ‘the value-generating potential of employee
knowledge, skills and abilities’. In an organisational context, human cap-
ital could generally be operationalised as talent (Lewis & Heckman,
2006). To determine talent, a set of cognitive (knowledge), functional
(skills) and social (attitudes and behaviours) competencies may be
assessed (Le Deist & Winterton, 2005). However, with regard to the
inclusion or non-inclusion of employees in a specific TP, each organisa-
tion needs to develop a set of TP inclusion criteria which must be spe-
cific to that organisation and to a particular TP. Firms may utilise
different TPs for different roles within the organisation. Thus, these
inclusion criteria will depend on the nature of the TP. Examples of
established TPs found in the literature are presented in Table 1.
In addition to human capital, we highlight organisational capital as
another form of capital. Envisioning a firm’s TM architecture as part of
its organisational capital acknowledges its critical role in the TM process
and the value creation process (Sparrow & Makram, 2015).
Table 1. Examples of talent pools in the literature.

Author(s) Talent pools
Cappelli (2008) Laid-off talent
Graduates
Garrow and Hirsh (2008) Leadership pipelines
Professional groups
Critical roles
Williams-Lee (2008) High potential ‘ready now’ talent
M€akel€a et al. (2010) Leadership team potentials
Top potentials
Potentials
McDonnell et al. (2011) Technical resource pool
Top talent pool
Executive resource pool
Yarnall (2011) Acceleration pool
High potential group
Bj€orkman, Ehrnrooth, M€akel€a, Smale, and Sumelius (2013) Rising stars
Emerging leaders
Executives
Local talent
Tansley and Tietze (2013) Rising talent
Emerging leaders
Corporate next generation leaders
Cappelli and Keller (2014) Internal pool
Applicant pool
Swailes and Blackburn (2016) Emerging talent
Scientists
Leadership group
Source: Authors.
Organisational capital derives from investment in systems, processes and

brands (Burton-Jones & Spender, 2011) as well as ‘institutionalized
knowledge and codified experience stored in databases, routines, patents,
manuals, structures and the like’ (Youndt, Subramaniam, & Snell, 2004,
p. 338). Organisational capital allows the development of a rigorous TM
architecture which ultimately contributes to the efficacy of the overall
TM approach. Therefore, we argue that both the talent (the human cap-
ital) as well as the TM architecture (the organisational capital) are vital
components of the TM equation. In practice, the management of TPs
may be based on both formal and informal approaches.
Approaches to managing talent pools in practice

The literature distinguishes between three types of approaches to manag-
ing TPs found in practice: intuitive, individualised and systematic
(Wiblen, 2016). Following an intuitive approach, decisions about talent
are made based on observation and the subjective evaluation by execu-
tives and managers who appear to rely on their experience and on gut
feeling (Dries, 2013). However, Highhouse (2008, p. 333) asserts that tal-
ent cannot be predicted based on the notion of intuitive experience and
criticises this approach for its ‘stubborn reliance on intuition and sub-
jectivity’. Moreover, Dries (2013) contends that this approach may favour
Systematic approach
Strategic, integrated, and proactive
Human capital Organisational capital

Knowledge skills, and abilities Structures, processes, and systems
Operationalised as Operationalised as
Talent TM architecture
Leads to a
Depth and breadth of talent in TPs
Figure 1. Effective talent pool management.
some employees, for instance, those who are similar to the assessor
(M€akel€a et al., 2010). The individualised approach focuses on individuals
with certain competencies or traits without necessarily having a defin-
ition of talent or any formal assessment (Wiblen, 2016). Talent is
described as employees who possess the ‘X-factor’ or ‘right stuff’ (Dries,
2013, p. 280). Finally, a systematic approach includes a strategic, inte-
grated and proactive view on identifying talent which includes specific
criteria (Vaiman, Scullion, & Collings, 2012).
M€akel€a et al. (2010) assert that the TP inclusion process encompasses
two steps: First, an experience-based on-line search and choice should be
carried out accompanied by additional performance appraisals. Second, a
cognition-based off-line search should be conducted which includes
interviews and reviews, and a final decision as to whether an employee
will be part of a TP. Another popular approach to identifying key talent
for TPs is a nine-box grid with potential and performance as the two
main indicators (Schuler, 2015; Schuler, Jackson, & Tarique, 2011).
Having summarised various approaches to the inclusion decision process,
it is evident that the final selection is frequently based on a combination
of objective and subjective criteria and includes a series of processes that
create value (Sparrow & Makram, 2015).
This paper is based on the assumption that the effective management
of TPs as part of a broader TM system requires a systematic approach
(i.e. strategic, integrated and proactive) to managing both the human
and the organisational capital, which will arguably lead to a greater
breadth and depth of talent in an organisation. This relationship is illus-
trated in Figure 1. In contrast, less structured and intuitive approaches
may not render the desired results. Given the relative importance of TPs
within an organisation’s TM structure, it is critical to examine their
effectiveness as part of a multilevel and multi-firm analysis.
Methodology
The findings of this paper are based on a larger-scale qualitative talent
identification project which encompassed 73 interviews in 15 countries in
three MNCs in the hotel sector. The chosen approach corresponds with
Kiessling and Harvey’s (2005) argument that strategic HRM research
needs to move away from predominantly quantitative studies. This is
necessary to capture the complexity of global phenomena such as TM that
encompass diverse cultures, institutions, social structures and governmen-
tal regulations. The project examined the identification process of talent
in MNCs across various regions and levels. Studying such a complex pro-
cess in a social context requires a holistic view which a qualitative
approach can offer. The comparative case study approach allowed an in-
depth understanding of the organisations, their talent identification pro-
cess and its interactional dynamics. This approach helped to understand
both uniquely individual aspects to the cases as well as their commonal-
ities (Bartlett & Vavrus, 2017; Lodico, Spaulding, & Voegtle, 2010).
The participating organisations are headquartered in the Americas,
Asia Pacific (APAC) and Europe-Middle-East-Africa (EMEA), hereinafter
referred to as American Hotel Group (A), APAC Hotel Group (B) and
EMEA Hotel Group (C). They have a minimum of ten hotels with a glo-
bal presence (defined as operating across continents) and are present in
the TOP 30 of the World Luxury Index of the most sought-after luxury
hotel brands in 2014 (Digital Luxury Group & Laaroussi, 2014). As part
of the sampling process, it was assured that the participating organisa-
tions had a TM process in place. A first round of interviews was com-
pleted with senior leaders in HR and operations at a corporate level. A
second round of interviews was carried out at a business unit level of the
participating MNCs including cluster HR directors, general managers
(GMs), operations managers, HR directors, talent managers and learning
and development (L&D) managers.
This study applied purposive sampling, a form of non-probability sam-
pling. The researchers identified key positions for this study ensuring a
balance of interviewees from HR and operations at various levels, from
all regions and across all three organisations. Based on these positions,
the main contact person at each organisation, a senior HR leader at cor-
porate level acted as a gatekeeper and proposed the other interviewees.
Most interviewees were based in Europe (27; France, Germany, Russia,
Spain, Switzerland and UK), followed by APAC (20; Australia, China,
Hong Kong, India, Macao and Thailand) and the Americas (18; Brazil
and USA). Eight interviewees were based in the Middle East (Kuwait and
UAE). Tables 2–5 present a summary of the interviewees. The anonym-
ous codes applied for the individual participants identify the organisation
Table 2. Overview of interviewees.

Function American Hotel Group APAC Hotel Group EMEA Hotel Group
Operates in þ50 countries Operates in þ20 coun- Operates in þ10 countries
Operates across 6 conti- tries Operates across 5 Operates across 2 conti-
nents continents nents
Employs þ100,000 people Employs þ10,000 people Employs þ10,000 people
Corporate leadership team 3 Heads of HR (A1, A9, 1 Chief HR Officer (B17) 2 1 Head of TM (C15) 1
A22) 4 Regional Heads of Heads of HR (B11, B22) 1 Group Talent
HR (A2, A8, A11, A26) 1 Head of TM (B3) 1 Group Manager (C16)
Head of TM (A20) L&D Manager (B16) 3
Heads of Operations (B4,
B6, B18)
Business unit, HR 8 Cluster HR Directors 5 HR Directors (B5, B10, 1 Regional Head of HR
(A4, A6, A10, A15, A17, B12, B19, B24) 1 L&D (C5) 1 Regional Head of
A19, A28, A30) 1 HR Director (B1) 2 L&D Talent (C3) 1 Talent
Director (A21) Managers (B8, B25) Manager (C4) 6 HR
Directors (C1, C6, C10,
C11, C14, C18) 1 HR
Manager (C7)
Business unit, operations 1 Cluster GM (A3) 4 GMs 4 GMs (B14, B15, B21, 1 Cluster GM (C8) 4 GMs
(A13, A14, A23, A29) 3 B23) 3 Hotel Managers (C2, C9, C13, C17) 1 Hotel
Hotel Managers (A7, A16, (B7, B9, B20) 2 F&B Manager (C12)
A24) 2 Rooms-Division Directors (B2, B13)
Directors (A12, A25) 1
F&B Director (A18) 1 F&B
Manager (A28) 1 Front
Office Manager (A5)
Total no. of interviewees 30 25 18
Source: Authors.
and the order in which the interviews were conducted; for example, A1
stands for the first participant at American Hotel Group, B2 refers to the
second participant at APAC Hotel Group and C3 relates to the third
participant at EMEA Hotel Group.
Semi-structured in-depth interviews with an average duration of
52 min were held to analyse the talent identification process from both a
strategic, corporate level as well as an operational, business unit level.
The interviews focused on four areas. First, the interviewees’ understand-
ing of the concept of TM was examined by asking the participants to
define talent and to describe the role of TM in their organisation.
Second, talent strategies were explored including their development,
implementation and evaluation. Then, criteria to identify talent and TPs,
and tools, systems and technology that supported the identification pro-
cess were analysed. Finally, the fourth area covered the operationalisation
of the TM strategy and the global TP implementation. The four areas of
focus were developed based on an extant literature review which high-
lighted gaps around talent identification.
All interviews were recorded and transcribed. Interviews were coded
following thematic interview analysis by Braun and Clarke (2006) using
the NVivo qualitative data analysis software. A within-case analysis
(which included the identification of themes) and a cross-case analysis
Table 3. Participants at American Hotel Group.
Code Position Location Date Type Length

A1 Head of HR EMEA Switzerland 03 August 2016 F2F 90
A2 Regional Head of HR Switzerland 03 August 2016 F2F 59
A3 Cluster GM Switzerland 03 August 2016 F2F 42
A4 Cluster HR Director Switzerland 03 August 2016 F2F 50
A5 Front Office Manager Switzerland 03 August 2016 F2F 43
A6 Cluster HR Director Russia 24 August 2016 Skype 62
A7 Hotel Manager Russia 24 August 2016 Skype 48
A8 Regional Head of HR China 26 August 2016 Phone 61
A9 Head of HR APAC Hong Kong 26 August 2016 Skype 62
A10 Cluster HR Director China 31 August 2016 Skype 59
A11 Regional Head of HR UAE 31 August 2016 Skype 61
A12 Rooms-Division Director China 02 September 2016 Skype 37
A13 GM Brazil 02 September 2016 Skype 40
A14 GM Australia 05 September 2016 Skype 40
A15 Cluster HR Director Thailand 05 September 2016 Skype 48
A16 Hotel Manager Brazil 05 September 2016 Phone 39
A17 Cluster HR Director Australia 06 September 2016 Skype 62
A18 F&B Director Australia 06 September 2016 Skype 37
A19 Cluster HR Director Brazil 06 September 2016 Skype 64
A20 Head of TM USA 12 September 2016 F2F 121
A21 HR Director USA 12 September 2016 F2F 63
A22 Head of HR the Americas USA 13 September 2016 F2F 51
A23 GM USA 14 September 2016 F2F 44
A24 Hotel Manager USA 14 September 2016 F2F 40
A25 Rooms-Division Director USA 14 September 2016 F2F 35
A26 Regional Head of HR USA 21 September 2016 Phone 46
A27 F&B Manager Germany 23 September 2016 F2F 37
A28 Cluster HR Director Germany 29 September 2016 Skype 69
A29 GM Germany 30 September 2016 Phone 47
A30 Cluster HR Director France 13 October 2016 Phone 45
Source: Authors.
(which illustrated the similarities and differences between the cases) were
conducted. The first phase of thematic analysis was the familiarisation of
the data. This included the listening of the recordings, transcribing,
repeated reading of the data and taking notes of initial ideas. During the
second stage, initial open codes were manually generated. This initial
coding was viewed as a ‘start list’ (Miles & Huberman, 1984, p. 58),
which allowed the authors to organise extracts and break down the tran-
scripts for further analysis. The third phase re-focused the analysis at the
broader level to create themes. This included creating categories that
combined themes with similar meanings. Subsequently, these themes
were reviewed and data reduction process took place (Braun & Clarke,
2006). All themes relevant and linked to the practice of TPs were consid-
ered as part of the further analysis. As part of this process, we identified
alignment and misalignment across the two units of analysis (corporate
and business unit) within each organisation. We also examined similar-
ities and differences across the three firms. The use of NVivo allowed
managing data and ideas, search and set queries, visualise data and track
the process with a codebook (Bazeley & Jackson, 2013).
Table 4. Participants at APAC Hotel Group.

B1 L&D Director USA 02 September 2016 Skype 61
B2 F&B Director UK 07 September 2016 F2F 60
B3 Head of TM UK 08 September 2016 F2F 89
B4 Head of Operations the Americas USA 20 September 2016 Skype 52
B5 HR Director Macau 21 September 2016 Skype 50
B6 Head of Operations EMEA UK 29 September 2016 Skype 45
B7 Hotel Manager USA 06 October 2016 Skype 39
B8 L&D Manager USA 12 October 2016 Skype 38
B9 Hotel Manager USA 13 October 2016 Skype 36
B10 HR Director USA 14 October 2016 Skype 57
B11 Head of HR the Americas USA 19 October 2016 Skype 56
B12 HR Director USA 20 October 2016 Skype 28
B13 F&B Director Hong Kong 03 November 2016 F2F 52
B14 GM Hong Kong 03 November 2016 F2F 39
B15 GM Hong Kong 03 November 2016 F2F 60
B16 Group L&D Manager Hong Kong 04 November 2016 F2F 52
B17 Chief HR Officer Hong Kong 04 November 2016 F2F 52
B18 Head of Operations APAC Hong Kong 04 November 2016 F2F 39
B19 HR Director Hong Kong 04 November 2016 F2F 54
B20 Hotel Manager Hong Kong 04 November 2016 F2F 43
B21 GM Macau 05 November 2016 F2F 62
B22 Head of HR EMEA Switzerland 17 November 2016 F2F 81
B23 GM Switzerland 17 November 2016 F2F 39
B24 HR Director Switzerland 17 November 2016 F2F 58
B25 L&D Manager Switzerland 18 November 2016 Skype 38
Source: Authors.
Table 5. Participants at EMEA Hotel Group.

C1 HR Director Spain 30 November 2016 Skype 49
C2 GM Germany 30 November 2016 Skype 50
C3 Regional Head of TM UK 07 December 2016 F2F 66
C4 Talent Manager UK 07 December 2016 F2F 52
C5 Regional Head of HR UK 07 December 2016 F2F 55
C6 HR Director UK 07 December 2016 F2F 41
C7 HR Manager Germany 09 December 2016 Skype 50
C8 Cluster GM China 15 January 2017 Skype 39
C9 GM Kuwait 15 January 2017 Skype 65
C10 HR Director Kuwait 16 January 2017 Skype 41
C11 HR Director China 17 January 2017 Skype 47
C12 Hotel Manager Spain 23 January 2017 Skype 40
C13 GM UAE 07 February 2017 F2F 20
C14 HR Director UAE 07 February 2017 F2F 45
C15 Head of TM UAE 08 February 2017 F2F 69
C16 Group Talent Manager UAE 08 February 2017 F2F 68
C17 GM UAE 08 February 2017 F2F 56
C18 HR Director UAE 08 February 2017 F2F 35
Source: Authors.
Findings
All three case study organisations utilise TPs as part of their broader
TM process. This section presents first an overview of the TP compo-
sitions (see Table 6) and then reviews each case individually. At a cor-
porate level, TPs are not employed at any of the three organisations.
At this level, traditional succession planning is the dominant practice
Table 6. Talent pool composition.

American Hotel Group APAC Hotel Group EMEA Hotel Group
In the Americas: position-specific Position-specific for assistant Position-specific for most direc-
for assistant heads of depart- heads of departments and above tors and GMs
ments and above in three categories:
In EMEA and APAC: five catego- Ready now
ries for top talent: Ready in 1–2 years
Future strategic leaders Ready in 3–5 years
Functional experts A fourth category for leavers
Subject matter experts (people who left the company
Emerging talent voluntarily)
Well-placed talent
Source: Authors.
used to identify successors for particular roles at the global or regional

offices. In contrast, at a business unit level, TPs seem to be preferred
over succession planning as they can be easier to be managed. This
approach confirms Boudreau and Ramstad’s (2007) view that flexibil-
ity is best obtained by using TPs as opposed to succession planning,
considering the uncertain environment and a long-term developmental
time horizon.
Case 1: American Hotel Group
At American Hotel Group, a corporate-driven approach towards the
management of TPs is applied. For the implementation, no difference
between hotel brands in the portfolio of the corporation has been made,
meaning individual brands do not have their own TPs (Head of HR A1).
However, due to the legal set up of the firm, the organisation uses two
different HR systems for TM and also has two distinct processes in place,
which the Head of HR A22 describes as a key challenge:
We use different systems and because of that our talent pools are not necessarily
global in nature. We share that very manually and that is a problem as we are
trying to move forward as an organisation so that we are all within the system
and with the same pools.
The Head of HR A22 explains the corporate approach in the

Americas region:
We have talent pools for all functions, and almost every position has a talent pool.
So, if you are looking for a front office manager, assistant front office manager,
sales manager, HR manager, there is a pool available.
On the contrary, in Europe and APAC, TPs have not been established
for all functions. The Regional Head of HR A2 argues:
Not according to function, this is something that we would maybe … I do not
know if you want to formalise something like that, to say, ‘This is a talent pool
for front office’, you know, not departmental related. We do have talent pools for
certain levels.
Table 7. Talent reviews at American Hotel Group.

Level Frequency, type Committee Review focus
Corporate, global Annual, formal HR and operational leader- Cluster HR directors, GMs
ship team and future GMs
Corporate, regional Biannual, formal Head of HR, regional head GMs and future GMs
of HR, regional head of
operations and cluster
HR directors
Business unit Every month, every quarter GM and execu- Heads of departments
or biannual, informal tive committee
Source: Authors.
In Europe and APAC, the organisation identified the following five TP

categories at a corporate level: future strategic leaders, functional experts,
subject matter experts, emerging talent, and well-placed talent. The Head
of HR A9 justifies this approach:
There is not a position where somebody says, ‘Talent starts at this position.’
Talent starts with leadership capabilities. That can be anybody. Typically, people
are identified as top talent when they are going into a first-time supervisor, team
leader, or corporate leadership trainee position.
To identify talent for the TPs, a formal talent review process has been
established for all heads of departments and above (see Table 7). Some add-
itional talent starting at supervisory level might be added to a TP if
requested. As a result of this calibration session, employees will be placed
in a standard nine-box grid with the two axes indicating performance and
potential. While employees with high performance and low potential will be
considered well-placed talent, employees with high or medium performance
and potential could be part of any other TPs. The Head of TM A20
criticises the two-dimensionality of this approach and seeks alternatives:
The Neuroscience Institute in New York is trying to come up with a variety of
alternatives to the nine box because the nine box is basically two dimensional and
people are not two dimensional. In a way, we experimented with just taking that
away and not doing the nine box at all and just have a suitable calibration session,
have a conversation at a functional level about people. The nine box is now
approximately thirty years old. Not just because it is thirty years old but because
it is so two dimensional, there has got to be something else. One of the things
that this guy, David, talked about is talent scenarios. So, this guy came up with
those different scenarios of talent and to use those and say, ‘Does Stefan fit this
scenario or that scenario?’ There are nine scenarios. So, I am like, ‘So really, it is
the nine box all over again.’ But you know, it is an intent.
At a corporate level, TPs are seen as a crucial tool for TM effective-

ness. The Head of HR A22 explains:
The size of the organisation that we are, we must have some mechanisms in
which to identify who is available. If we had no system, people would be putting
emails out every day of the week saying, ‘I need a banquet manager, I need a
front office manager.’ It would be chaos.
Similarly, the Head of HR A1 highlights the importance of a strong

TP process, but also indicates technological challenges when managing
these pools:
For me the talent pools are the talent pipeline. If I say, ‘Let me have a look at
my department head’, I can then actually filter my talent pools by levels. That
sort of gives me an indication how strong my talent pipeline is. That is how we
assess it at the moment. I think the technology that we have at the moment is
good but from a talent management perspective not overly performing. I think
we have got good processes in place but not necessarily all the systems in place,
which is a good problem to have. It is worse if you have it the other
way around.
While the Head of HR A22 believes that ‘all hotels go through the
same process to identify that talent and upload that talent into the sys-
tem’, this was negated by the interviewees at a business unit level. In
fact, the awareness of TPs was very limited at the individual business
units across regions. Cluster HR Directors A28 and A30 argue that there
is ‘no formal system’ at a hotel level. The only exceptions were a pool of
general managers (Cluster GM A3) and corporate leadership trainees, i.e.
emerging talent (Cluster HR Director A28).
At a business unit level, the effectiveness of the TP system has been
questioned. Although the organisation now applies more systems (GM
A14), informal communication about talent dominates (GM A23).
Someone may be selected because he or she is well connected without
consideration of the TP (Hotel Manager A7). Cluster HR Director A28
describes a scenario of filling a managerial position:
What actually happens is that for general managers, as well as for leadership
committee [members], people are calling, ‘Do you know somebody?’ ‘I know a
general manager.’ At the end, you depend on your general manager being well
connected in the company.
Case 2: APAC Hotel Group

APAC Hotel Group has developed three TP categories with different
readiness levels. TPs are centrally managed at a corporate level by the
Head of TM B3, who has a global overview of which employee will be
ready for a certain position at a specific point in time. ‘Succession plan-
ning’ meetings take place to discuss all current employees at a heads of
department level or higher, regardless of their position in the nine-box
grid (see Table 8) (Head of HR B22). According to the Head of TM B3,
TPs are used for long-term planning, whereas the nine-box grid is an
evaluation at a specific moment in time and changes annually. Having
said this, the TPs are also dynamic and employees may move from one
TP to another when their readiness increases in the subsequent year. In
addition, the Head of TM B3 further provides insight to an alternative
Table 8. Talent reviews at APAC Hotel Group.

Level Frequency, type Committee Review focus
Corporate, global Annual, formal Chief executive officer, chief Company-wide global talent
HR officer, head of TM, heads
of HR, heads of operations
Corporate, regional Annual, formal Head of HR, head of opera- Executive committee and
tions, GMs and HR directors ‘high potentials’
of business units
Business unit Biannual or GM and executive committee Heads of departments and
annual, informal ‘high potentials’
Source: Authors.
approach of letting current employees go and then hiring them back at a

later stage. These employees are part of a fourth TP called leavers:
I know when I was starting in the industry, if you have left, you were blackened,
and you would never go back to work in that company, whereas I think that is
out of date. If you leave as a supervisor, you could well come back as a restaurant
manager three years later and probably be a better restaurant manager because
you have had different experiences and you got a different view point.
The Head of TM B3 explains the key contribution of the TP system

when managing talent:
The way we do the talent pools: It is divided into sort of four areas, and when we
get to the end of the year and we are reviewing this or through the succession
planning meetings that we have, we say, ‘Who is ready for another move?’ In the
system I could actually see if they are ready now, or in one to two years, or in
three to five years.
While a formal corporate approach was established, a lack of conform-

ity as to what the concept of TPs means remains at the corporate level
across the operating regions. The Head of HR B22 alluded to ‘up and
coming’ talent and management trainees. In contrast, Head of HR B11
spoke about four TPs, namely, line colleagues, management programme
trainees, further management trainees (who are not part of the global
programme) and interns without mentioning the formal concept of
readiness and actual position-specific TPs as described by the Head of
TM B3.
In addition, the Head of HR B22 admits particular challenges at a
business unit level:
We have over the last two years really focused on the hotels so that the same
process is happening for the colleagues in the hotel. The hotels will be held much
more accountable and we start to include them in our conversations just to make
sure that it is happening at the hotel level.
However, a lack of awareness of and accountability for TPs still dom-

inate at a business unit level. As a result, there is a very limited use of
and a lack of depth in the pools. The GM B15 criticises:
Every single person I am having to recruit this year is not from within the
company because we do not have anybody so that tells you that the talent
development is weak, that we do not have someone within the hotels who could
be the food and beverage director here. I am shocked that the company does not
have that depth.
In addition, the Food and Beverage Director B13 argues that managing
large numbers of talent in TPs is complex, and consequently, the organ-
isation appears to only focus on higher-level talent:
I think corporate is quite frankly only interested in managers at this stage. I think
there are too many talents to manage; they are very interested in managers and
assistant managers.
Case 3: EMEA Hotel Group

EMEA Hotel Group has established position-specific TPs which are
decentralised to a considerable extent and the inclusion decision is made
at a business unit level. According to Group Talent Manager B16, the
core contribution of TPs to effective TM is the ability to ‘identify key tal-
ent’ internally. The Head of TM C15 explains the corporate approach
to TPs:
We started that last year (2015) and we are doing it this year a bit more, the
identification of people, of talent pools for different potential in the key critical
positions [directors and above]. We tell people what the critical roles are and how
can we make sure that we assign or define or agree on who are the people who
are ready to be in this particular role.
At a business unit level, however, the majority of interviewees were

not able to identify a TP process. As a result, TPs were linked to a var-
iety of groups: on-line applicants and local talent (HR Director C11),
country-specific pools due to language requirements (Cluster GM C8), or
management trainees whose talent could be used for pre-openings and
leading positions in the future (Regional Head of HR C5 based at a busi-
ness unit).
According to Group Talent Manager C16, TPs can be named and
added by each property. It appears that there are no objective measures
involved to date and the inclusion decision is based on the evaluation by
the direct line manager (Hotel Manager C12). HR Director C18 argues
that there is no formal TP process at this level because of insufficient
communication between corporate and business unit levels and a lack of
accountability. The Regional Head of TM C3 who is also based at a busi-
ness unit concludes:
There has been some of an effort from the group and corporate side to ask the
HR directors at every unit to identify their talent and put them in talent pools,
and that is using the talent management system. It has not really been done to a
robust effect, some people probably have, some have not – there was not much
communication, and again, when you get caught up in the day-to-day you may
not do it, and there is no consequence. And then alongside that, what happens
with those people once we put them in there? There is not a process.
HR Manager C7 also tries to explain the informal approach:

I guess the atmosphere in this hotel is really close and familiar. The GM is
walking through the hotel most of the times, most of the people can go to HR,
people can go to him, and that is why HR and he are really connected to the
employees and I guess that is the reason why there is no summary of some special
people because if there is an open vacancy, he is going through every employee
and checks whether there is somebody.
Discussion and conclusions

This paper critically examines the use of TPs as a core TM practice in
MNCs. Findings confirm our assumption that a systematic approach
which incorporates both the consideration of human capital and organ-
isational capital is essential for effective TP management. From a human
capital perspective (i.e. knowledge, skills and abilities), it is evident that
all MNCs in this research lack clarity in expressing their criteria for
inclusion in a TP. This became particularly evident when the views of
the business unit level managers were assessed. Considerable differences
between corporate and business unit levels were identified around the
understanding of TPs and the inclusion decision criteria. This seems
inherently flawed as the identification of talent for TPs is the starting
point of further critical talent decisions (McDonnell et al., 2017), for
instance, with regard to promotions and development opportunities and
the allocation of valuable resources. The criteria mentioned comprised
broad clusters of standards around the performance, potential and readi-
ness of employees; however, the individual factors making up those three
clusters and the rigour of the application of these criteria in the three
organisations remain unclear, especially at the business unit level. It
appears that a lack of inclusion criteria limits the contribution of TPs
towards the global TM effectiveness of an organisation. The management
of TPs at a business unit level creates a challenge when attempting to
identify what actually represents the ‘global talent pool’ (Farndale,
Scullion, & Sparrow, 2010, p. 163) of the entire organisation, which
would be one of the key purposes of an integrated TM framework.
Without standardised criteria across business units, it arguably seems dif-
ficult to identify global talent that could act as potential incumbents for
leadership positions across the various subsidiaries of an organisation.
Regardless of whether a more centralised or decentralised approach to
managing TPs was chosen in the case study organisations, findings show
that a lack of communication and a lack of accountability around the TP

concept led to a divergence among stakeholders, particularly between
corporate and business unit levels.
From an organisational capital perspective (i.e. structures, processes
and systems), four key themes emerged upon which we further elaborate
below: the segmentation of the workforce, a focus on internal talent, the
development of multiple TPs within each organisation and a focus on
managerial level TPs across the firms.
In the case study organisations, TPs contribute to the segmentation of
their respective workforce, which corroborates the literature that views
TM as the management of star performers, the identification of succes-
sors and a differentiation of the workforce (Collings, 2014; Meyers, Van
Woerkom, & Dries, 2013). In these organisations, TPs are designed for
current or future key talent needs which make up a relatively small num-
ber of the entire workforce. From a practical point of view, the inclusion
of all employees in TPs in the case study organisations appears to be less
desirable because of limited financial resources and time (Huselid &
Becker, 2011). From a strategic perspective, TPs contribute to the overall
TM approach by aiding the identification and retention of key talent.
All three organisations predominantly designed TPs for their internal
workforce. This provides support to Tansley and Tietze’s (2013) concept
of an internal staged talent advancement system. Such a TP system
allows the identification of talent at an early stage and their development
and progression through various TPs. In return, engagement and reten-
tion rates will increase. Interestingly, APAC Hotel Group also maintains
one TP for former employees that may return to the organisation (leav-
ers). Maintaining a close relationship with talent that voluntarily left the
organisation allows companies to considerably broaden their TPs
(Bughin, Chui, & Manyika, 2010).
The study confirms Tansley and Tietze’s (2013) observation of the
existence of a multiplicity of TPs even within a single organisation. HR
leaders in the case study organisations group employees into specific TPs
and their labels provide an insight into the talent that is included in
these TPs; for example, talent within the future strategic leaders TP ful-
fils a set of criteria and are predesignated for leadership roles. Thus, TPs
provide some concrete information about the receiver (the talent) which,
according to Meyers et al. (2013), is a key characteristic of TM. While
HRM is a general term which does not provide information about the
receiver of the HR practice, TPs potentially offer additional insights into
a set of employees. This allows a more detailed and targeted planning of
the talent flow in an organisation.
The case study organisations clearly focus on TPs for managerial posi-
tions with a strategic impact. Thus, results of this study highlight the
importance of TPs for identifying and fostering pivotal talent designed to

fill leadership roles in the future, which lend further support to Collings
and Mellahi (2009), who argue that TM should focus on strategic posi-
tions which allow an employee to directly impact organisational perform-
ance. These TPs generally include managers in strategic positions and
exclude line employees. These strategic positions ought to be filled with
talent – people who are high potentials and/or high performers (Collings
& Mellahi, 2009; Huselid, Beatty, & Becker, 2005). Despite the acknowl-
edged importance of management trainees, none of the case study organ-
isations have established a dedicated TP for this group of talent. With
one exception, line employees are not considered for the TP practice in
the case study firms. Considering the population of up-and-coming tal-
ent in organisations and the potential that the development of this talent
presents to maximise their capabilities at an early stage of their career, it
seems remarkable that firms do not avail of this opportunity to improve
the effectiveness of their overall TM construct.
The three organisations must overcome different barriers that prevent
an effective approach to managing TPs. American Hotel Group is a well-
established corporation, which identifies most of their pivotal talent
internally. The key challenges for this firm, it appears, are to find suffi-
cient and appropriate vacancies for their talent and to manage their glo-
bal TM technology. In order to utilise a global TP, a single integrated
information system seems to be the solution. APAC Hotel Group and
EMEA Hotel Group – the two smaller organisations in this case study –
encountered a lack of breadth of talent within existing TPs. These two
organisations continue to rely on the employment of external talent,
which is not surprising given the high levels of staff turnover in
hotels worldwide.
Theoretical implications
This paper examined TPs as a core TM practice in MNCs and assessed
the contribution of TPs to effective TM. A detailed analysis of the views
of 73 key stakeholders provides the empirical underpinning of our find-
ings. The diversity of established TPs lends support to the theoretical
concepts of workforce differentiation (Collings, 2017) and contextualisa-
tion (Vaiman, Collings, & Scullion, 2017). ‘Talent for what?’ (Alziari,
2017) is a critical question that must be addressed when establishing
TPs. The study has shown that TPs allow the identification of internal
key talent, that is, talent with high human capital. However, TPs are
only effective if they are integrated in a broader TM architecture. When
systems and processes are not in place, as seen in some of the case study
organisations, the organisational capital is limited, which can have a con-

siderable negative impact on the overall TM effectiveness. Such a TM
architecture appears to be particularly important in a global MNC with
operations across regions and levels in order to have a consistent
approach that enables the identification of global talent. While human
capital theory is a valuable concept for identifying talent for TP inclu-
sion, it does not fully explain the global implementation and integration
of TPs into a broader TM architecture which requires a focus on proc-
esses and systems, that is, a firm’s organisational capital. From a theory-
building perspective, the paper provides a solid basis for how TPs can
contribute to the overall TM system. It demonstrates the importance of a
systematic approach which incorporates both individual talent and a TM
architecture, and consequently suggests a more nuanced view on manag-
ing TPs (see Figure 1).
Practical implications
A key emerging theme regarding the management of TPs has been the
lack of awareness of the corporate TP approach at a business unit level.
None of the interviewees at this level could describe fully the corporate
approach to TPs and many participants stated that they have either not
defined any TPs or are not actively using them. Therefore, the effective-
ness of TPs, that is, the ability to generate and ensure a sufficient
breadth and depth of talent in these TPs is a concern among partici-
pants. The study highlights that the shortcomings of the talent identifica-
tion process are not owing to the lack of tools available to the firms, but
their apparent inconsistent (across the various subunits), ineffective or
inappropriate use. Organisations ought to develop a strategy and frame-
work outlining the various stages of the talent identification process and
the corresponding tools available at each stage of the process. This paper
has shown that corporate leaders must reinforce communication and
hold business units accountable for the talent identification process to
foster continuous engagement with the TPs in order to ensure their
effectiveness and relevance as part of the global TM approach.
Limitations
Research projects are not without their limitations. This study concen-
trated on the hospitality industry, more specifically on hotel corpora-
tions. Conclusions were drawn based on findings from three
organisations. The generalisation and theorisation of such a case study
approach, therefore, may be somewhat limited. Moreover, the limitation
of the sampling procedure and the final sample in this research must be
noted. Following a process of referral sampling, the researchers relied on
the judgement of the gatekeepers of the study to identify suitable partici-
pants. To address this limitation and to avoid under- or over-representa-
tion of any groups, the gatekeepers were provided with a participant
framework which distinguished between two levels (i.e. corporate and
business unit) and two functions (i.e. HR and operations). Finally, this
study benefited from the richness and volume of the chosen qualitative
method, but did not include any quantitative measures to validate the
effectiveness of TPs.
Future research
This study focused on the TP practice from the perspective of both cor-
porate and business unit HR and operational leaders in three organisa-
tions. A natural progression of this research is to analyse the
development, retention and deployment of the talent in these TPs.
Organisations must consider all stages of the TM process to implement a
comprehensive TM construct (King, 2015). An analysis of those stages
would be valuable in assessing whether the TM strategy is applied con-
sistently. The evidence presented here has shown that this is not neces-
sarily the case. Moreover, whether decisions on development, retention
and deployment are a logical consequence of the talent identification
process and TP inclusion could be assessed. Longitudinal studies would
provide a more holistic picture of the effectiveness of the TP constructs.
These could include tracking the progress of key talent over time to bet-
ter understand how successful such individuals are at different junctures
in the future. In addition, the inclusion of other staff members (i.e. line
employees) would be valuable in comparing their perceptions of the
identification process and the TM system with the observations of the
HR and operational managers (Khoreva, Vaiman, & Van Zalk, 2017;
Sonnenberg, Van Zijderveld, & Brinks, 2014). After all, TPs are only one
piece of the bigger TM process.
Disclosure statement
I have no potential conflict of interest pertaining to this submission to The International
Journal of Human Resource Management. This research did not receive any specific
grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sector.
ORCID
Stefan Jooss http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9054-4738
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Appendix A
Development of focus areas – Larger talent identification project
Research gaps Research question (RQ)

How is TM different from HRM? (Iles et al., 2010) RQ 1: How do multinational
How is talent defined in practice? (McDonnell et al., 2017; Meyers hotel corporations conceptualise
et al., 2013) pivotal talent?
How do organisations link their TM strategy to their business strat- RQ 2: What strategies do multi-
egy? (Sparrow et al., 2013) national hotel corporations use
How do organisations apply an inclusive or exclusive approach to to identify pivotal talent?
GTM? (McDonnell et al., 2011)
What strategies (internal/external talent) do firms use to identify
talent? (Cappelli & Keller, 2014)
Do organisations apply differentiated HR practices between differ-
ent key groups? (McDonnell et al., 2016)
How do firms formally identify TPs and key groups? (Cappelli &
Keller, 2014; McDonnell et al., 2016)
What is the reliability and validity of various approaches to identify RQ 3: What criteria do multi-
talent? (Silzer & Church, 2009) national hotel corporations
What determines performance (McDonnell et al., 2017) and poten- apply to identify pivotal talent?
tial? (Cappelli & Keller, 2014)
What human capital attributes are needed for strategic positions?
(Minbaeva & Collings, 2013)
How is talent identified in practice? (McDonnell et al., 2017)
How do firms integrate key elements of their talent management RQ 4: How effective are multi-
system (TMS)? ( Minbaeva & Collings, 2013) national hotel corporations in
How do organisations implement TM across departments, sectors implementing their talent iden-
and countries? (Sparrow et al., 2013) tification process?
What is the impact of contextual factors on talent identification in
organisations? (McDonnell et al., 2016; Vaiman et al., 2017;
Wiblen, 2016)
How do organisations measure talent and TM outcomes? (Collings,
2014; Sparrow & Makram, 2015)
Appendix B
Interview questions – Larger talent identification project
Introduction to HR
1. Could you tell me about your role and responsibilities in the company?
2. In your view, what role does the HR department play in the organisation as a whole?
Introduction to Talent
3. Does your organisation currently have a formal definition of talent in place? If so,
how has it been communicated within the organisation?
4. How would you define talent and how would you define pivotal talent?
5. What role does talent management play in your organisation?
6. In your view, what impact does pivotal talent have on your organisation?
Talent Strategies
7. Could you describe the talent management strategy of the organisation?

8. How do you develop talent management strategies and by whom are

they developed?
9. Could you take me through the recruitment and selection process with a particular
focus on how you would attract and select pivotal talent?
10. What strategies and criteria do you use to identify pivotal talent in different levels
and departments of the organisation?
11. How do you evaluate your talent management strategy and processes? What criteria
do you use to measure the effectiveness and quality of your talent manage-
ment strategy?
Talent Criteria
12. In your opinion, what specific talent pools are mission critical in your organisation,
how are these identified (based on what criteria) and how are they developed?
13. Looking into the future, what new kinds of talent and competencies will be needed?
14. Can you take me through the steps of your talent pipeline, perhaps giv-
ing examples?
15. What is the most critical element of the talent pipeline and how does the organisa-
tion ensure that this element receives the attention it deserves? What type(s) of suc-
cession plans do you have?
16. How often and on what basis do you review pivotal talent?
17. Could you describe any programmes your organisation may offer to enhance pivotal
talent identification?
Systems and Tools
18. What systems and tools do you use to identify, track and analyse talent and what
were the key drivers to invest in these tools?
19. Could you describe how you use the talent management system and for what pur-
poses? What do you think does the organisation want to get out of using
the system?
20. In your opinion, how digitalised is the talent management implementation?
Global Implementation
21. What future trends will shape the talent management of your organisation?
22. Could you describe how your talent management strategy is rolled out globally/
from a property point of view? What is your role in operationalising the talent
management strategy?
23. Could you identify any potential challenges and barriers (if they exist)?
Appendix C
Codebook – Larger talent identification project
The coding framework in Figure C.1 presents the links between the four research ques-
tions and the seven colour codes applied for the analysis.
Figure C1. Coding framework.
Table C1. List of initial codes.

Initial codes Sources References
Company Growth and Openings 13 19
Continuous Growth of People 3 3
Corporate Culture 26 36
Employee Grades 5 5
Guiding Principles I 8 8
Guiding Principles II 7 10
Role of Human Resources 34 39
Values 18 30
Analytics 8 12
Critical Positions 22 35
Cultural Exchange Ambassadors 3 3
Definition of Pivotal Talent 47 65
Definition of Talent 58 89
Development of Talent Management Strategy 15 19
External Talent 18 22
Hotel Schools and Higher Education 21 36
Internal Talent 20 29
Niche Talent 5 5
Promotion 15 21
Sourcing Channels 9 15
Talent from Outside Hospitality 9 13
Talent Management 29 47
Talent Management Leadership Team 12 19
Talent Management Strategy 37 53
Young, Emerging or Up-and-Coming Talent 9 13
Accomplishments 1 1
Age 1 1
Appearance 7 9
Aspiration to Grow and Learn 33 46
Asset Management Skills 1 1
Behaviour, Personality and Attitude 31 42
Business and Commercial Acumen 3 6
Capability 4 4
Care 12 14
Chemistry 3 4
Communication Skills 16 18
Competencies Set 28 58
Completed Projects or Training 7 10
Core Hospitality Skills 5 8
(continued)
Table C1. Continued.

Cultural Fit 19 25
Customer Focus 23 30
Decision-Making Skills 6 6
Education 11 12
Emotional Intelligence 9 17
Empathy 2 4
Engagement or Commitment 18 22
Entrepreneurial Skills 2 3
Experience 16 18
Financial Skills 9 10
Flexibility and Agility 16 19
Global Mindset 3 4
Going the Extra Mile 9 11
Gut Feeling 9 11
Happiness 1 1
Higher or More Complex Role 16 21
Humility 5 6
Identification Criteria (General Comments) 29 46
Individual Goals and Objectives 20 47
Initiative 21 26
Innovation and Creativity Skills 14 15
Integrity 4 4
Intuition 1 1
Key Performance Indicators 13 18
Language Skills 14 18
Leadership Skills 25 37
Local Knowledge 3 3
Maturity 7 10
Mobility and Transferability 23 37
Operational Skills 9 10
Organising Skills 1 1
Passion 23 26
People Skills 7 11
Performance 22 42
Positive Attitude 3 3
Potential 24 41
Proactive Attitude 4 5
Problem-Solving Skills 4 4
Readiness 9 10
Revenue Contributor 1 1
Selling and Upselling Skills 6 6
Seniority 2 4
Service Quality and Productivity 6 6
Social Skills 7 12
Strategic Thinking Skills 2 2
Strategic Value 6 6
Team Fit 9 11
Teamwork Skills 8 8
Technical Skills 7 8
Understanding of Luxury 6 6
15 Factor Questionnaire Plus by Psytech International (Test) 1 2
20 I 20 Skills by Aethos Consulting Group (Test) 2 2
360 Assessment or Feedback 24 31
360 Survey by TalentQuest (360) 2 2
ASSESS by Outmatch (Test) 2 4
Assessment Centres 6 8
Background and Reference Check 4 4
Caliper Profile by Caliper Corporation (Test) 3 3
Conversations 22 33
Culture-Fit Assessment in Development (Test) 1 1
Customer Feedback & Score 21 28
(continued)

Curriculum Vitae 14 18
DISC by DISC Profile (Test) 2 3
Emotional and Social Competency Inventory by Flay Group (360) 1 1
Executive Development Assessment Centres 3 6
Hogan Personality Inventory by Hogan Assessments Systems (Test) 1 1
Interviews 32 56
Leadership Impact by Human Synergistics International (360) 1 1
Leadership Profile 12 25
Myer-Briggs Type Indicator by The Myer-Briggs Foundation (Test) 1 1
Nine-Box Grid 30 68
Oracle Peoplesoft (Software) 14 26
PageUp (Software) 2 2
PDI Assessment by Kom Ferry (Test) 5 8
People Answers by Infor People Answers Talent Science (Test) 3 6
Performance Appraisal 46 102
Personality and Preference Inventory by Cubiks Group Limited (Test) 3 5
Psychometric Tests 15 27
SAP SuccessFactors - Profile (Software) 12 24
Situational Leadership by The Ken Blanchard Companies (Test) 2 2
Sniperhire (Software) 3 3
Social Media 1 1
STAR Programme 3 3
SumTotal - TMS (Software) 12 33
Supporting Documents 1 1
Survey including Leadership Indexby Gallup 2 4
Talent Reviews and Calibration 24 59
Talent Scenarios 2 2
TalentHub (Software) 3 5
Taleo (Software) 8 11
Ten-Question Potential Assessment 2 3
Trial Work 1 1
Workday - At Proposal Stage (Software) 2 2
Apprenticeships 4 4
Corporate High Potential Programme 13 35
Corporate Management Trainee Programme I 15 30
Corporate Management Trainee Programme II 7 17
Future GM Programme 1 2
Heads of Departments Development Programme I 1 1
Heads of Departments Development Programme II 8 15
Internships 7 9
Master of Business Administration with RMIT University 5 10
Mentoring 11 16
National Leaders Programme 2 2
National Management Trainee Programme 3 4
Rotation, Exposure and Task Force 20 26
Segmentation 17 26
Succession Planning 39 82
Supervisor Development Programme I 7 11
Supervisor Development Programme II 1 1
Supervisor Development Programme III 2 2
Talent Pools 37 65
Australia (Country) 2 2
Brand and Branding 12 16
Brazil (Country) 2 7
China (Country) 11 22
Expatriates 17 29
France (Country) 1 1
Generations 1 1
Germany (Country) 5 7
Global Implementation 46 114
Hong Kong - China (Country) 3 5
(continued)

Hotel Property 7 7
Identification Challenges 44 83
Image of the Industry 3 3
India (Country) 1 1
Indonesia (Country) 1 1
Japan (Country) 2 2
Kuwait (Country) 1 2
Macau - China (Country) 2 5
Mexico (Country) 3 3
Relationships and Networks 43 89
Resources 1 2
Russia (Country) 2 5
Saudi Arabia (Country) 2 2
Seasonality 4 7
Shareholders 5 6
Spain (Country) 1 1
Thailand (Country) 2 3
Transparency 28 44
Turkey (Country) 1 1
UAE (Country) 6 7
UK (Country) 1 1
Unions 8 10
USA (Country) 8 12
Business Results 9 10
Employee or Engagement Survey 23 27
External Forums 2 2
Feedback or Observation 15 18
Improvement of Moral 1 1
Internal versus External Ratio 7 7
Number of Lateral Moves or Transfers 9 10
Number of Placements 1 1
Number of Promotions versus External Hire 17 17
Number of Successors 3 3
Process Evaluation by People 3 3
Recruitment Cost and Business Profit 1 1
Referrals 2 2
Retention and Turnover Rate 22 25
Talent Gaps 4 4
Talent Pipeline 8 10
Table C2. List of initial themes.

Initial themes Sources References
Corporate Culture 43 87
Human Resources 41 63
Approach to Talent Management 64 238
Critical Positions 22 35
Definition of Talent and Pivotal Talent 64 159
Sourcing Channels and Strategic Partnerships 33 64
Performance (Outcome) 44 131
Aspirations (Impact Factor) 63 157
Black Box (Subjective Decision) 17 21
Cognitive Competence - Knowledge (Frame) 12 15
Competencies Set (General Comments) 28 58
Education (Impact Factor) 11 12
Experience (Impact Factor) 16 21
Functional Competence - Skills (Frame) 51 110
Identification Criteria (General Comments) 29 46
(continued)

Initial themes Sources References
Intellectual Abilities - Intelligence (Pre-Condition) 12 21
Potential (Outcome) 31 62
Social Competence - Attitudes and Behaviours (Frame) 66 271
Psychometric Testing 27 65
360 Assessment or Feedback 24 35
Classic Selection Tools 36 83
Performance and Potential Evaluation Tools 68 339
Software 44 106
Development Programmes 48 130
Apprenticeships 4 4
Internships 7 9
Mentoring 11 16
Rotation, Exposure and Task Force 20 26
Segmentation 17 26
Succession Planning 39 82
Talent Pools 37 66
Country Perspective 44 90
Global Implementation 46 114
Identification Challenges 44 83
Influential Factors 65 214
Engagement 24 28
Business Results 9 11
Feedback and Observation 20 23
Internal versus External Hire 37 59
Talent Pipeline 14 20
Table C3. List of reviewed themes.

Reviewed themes Sources References
Role of corporate culture 42 84
Role of human resources 43 66
Approach to talent management 71 423
Critical positions 22 35
Definition of talent 64 159
Talent management leadership team 12 19
Competency framework 67 314
Education 11 12
Experience 17 25
Intellectual abilities 12 21
Performance 45 144
Potential 31 62
Readiness 9 10
Assessments 61 219
Documentation 14 18
Interviews 32 56
Software support 44 106
Talent reviews 62 223
Succession planning 39 82
Talent pools 37 66
Talent programmes 51 159
Communication 28 44
Relationships and networks 47 108
Supply and demand 62 156
Talent management culture 44 90
Feedback 33 47
Key performance indicators 9 11
Talent pipeline 42 78
Table C4. List of defined themes.

Defined themes Sources References
Business strategy 58 145
Global talent management strategy 73 600
Talent identification criteria 71 588
Talent identification tools 72 622
Talent identification initiatives 64 274
Global implementation impact factors 72 434
Evaluation of talent identification process 55 136

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The International Journal of Human Resource

ISSN: (Print) (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rijh20

Examining talent pools as a core talent

Stefan Jooss, Ralf Burbach & Huub Ruël

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2019.1579748

Published online: 25 Mar 2019.

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Examining talent pools as a core talent management

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

CONTACT Stefan Jooss stefan.jooss@ucc.ie University College Cork, Cork, Ireland

TPs have been described mostly as a pool of employees that display

problematised (M€akel€a et al., 2010). Poor conceptualisation and the lack of

Table 1. Examples of talent pools in the literature.

Organisational capital derives from investment in systems, processes and

Approaches to managing talent pools in practice

Human capital Organisational capital

Figure 1. Effective talent pool management.

Table 2. Overview of interviewees.

Table 3. Participants at American Hotel Group.

Code Position Location Date Type Length

Table 4. Participants at APAC Hotel Group.

Table 5. Participants at EMEA Hotel Group.

Code Position Location Date Type Length

Table 6. Talent pool composition.

used to identify successors for particular roles at the global or regional

The Head of HR A22 explains the corporate approach in the

Table 7. Talent reviews at American Hotel Group.

In Europe and APAC, the organisation identified the following five TP

At a corporate level, TPs are seen as a crucial tool for TM effective-

Similarly, the Head of HR A1 highlights the importance of a strong

Case 2: APAC Hotel Group

Table 8. Talent reviews at APAC Hotel Group.

approach of letting current employees go and then hiring them back at a

The Head of TM B3 explains the key contribution of the TP system

While a formal corporate approach was established, a lack of conform-

However, a lack of awareness of and accountability for TPs still dom-

Case 3: EMEA Hotel Group

At a business unit level, however, the majority of interviewees were

HR Manager C7 also tries to explain the informal approach:

Discussion and conclusions

that a lack of communication and a lack of accountability around the TP

importance of TPs for identifying and fostering pivotal talent designed to

organisations, the organisational capital is limited, which can have a con-

Tansley, C. (2011). What do we mean by the term ’talent’ in talent management?.

Research gaps Research question (RQ)

7. Could you describe the talent management strategy of the organisation?

8. How do you develop talent management strategies and by whom are

Systems and Tools

Figure C1. Coding framework.

Table C1. List of initial codes.

Table C1. Continued.

Table C1. Continued.

Table C1. Continued.