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OUTLINE 1.0 Executive summary .................................................................................... 2 2.0 Introduction ................................................................................................. 2 3.0 Talent management transition ................................................................... 3 3.

1 The difference between HRM and talent management ......................... 4 3.2 The latest concept of talent management ............................................. 5 4.0 Understanding the talent management ..................................................... 6 4.1 Acquisition ............................................................................................... 6 4.1.1 The segmentation of employee ........................................................ 6 4.2 Team and Individual Development ......................................................... 6 4.2.1 Core Competency .............................................................................. 6 4.3 Retention .................................................................................................. 7 4.3.1 Talent mindset ................................................................................... 7 4.3.2 Employer branding ............................................................................ 8 4.3.3 Succession Planning ........................................................................ 8 5.0 The impact of the talent management on business strategy .................. 9 5.1 What is the business strategy? .............................................................. 9 5.2 Talent management is business strategy ............................................ 10 5.2.1 To create a wide range of effects ................................................... 10 5.2.1 The differentiation of the product or service ................................ 10 5.2.3 The firm consist of human capital ................................................. 10 5.3 Talent management is not business strategy ..................................... 11 5.3.1 Mistake of understanding ............................................................... 11 5.3.2 The organization structure ............................................................. 11 5.3.3 Wrong direction of the company .................................................... 12 6.0 Conclusion ................................................................................................ 13 7.0 References ................................................................................................ 13

1.0 Executive summary This report will look at whether talent management is business strategy. The answer is talent management is business strategy under the right circumstances. The essential requirement for talent management is three conditions. Firstly, the organization should be flat hierarchies such as Human-capital centric. For example, a retail industry that focuses on supply chain management is not suitable for talent management because the efficiency of supply chain is more important than talent management. Secondly the firms should define what talent management is. Basically talent management meaning is confusion. Talent management that is confusion makes even executive confused. Talent management is unable to function normally without understanding the meaning of talent management. Finally the company have to keep motivation of the rest people who does not meet the companys condition. Talented people will have the opportunity of special training. Therefore, untalented people who have no special training will decrease their motivation. The company have to care about that people. If the company meet the above condition, talent management will be business strategy beyond human resource management.

2.0 Introduction It is important for the company to focus on human asset because it is the foundation of competitiveness for the company. A corporate activity has to be concerned with human resources from planning to sales. There is little doubt but that the skills of human lead to a heightening of productivity. However the way of facilitating the use of human resources is different in successive periods.
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Moreover the internal and external environment of the company makes them changed. For example Japanese company was based on the seniority system and lifetime employment during the years high economic growth (Takeuchi, 2009). The purpose of the company required a long-term employees commitment. On the other hand, America has been transformed by mass immigration therefore their basis of employment is liberalization of the movement of persons such as at will employment. In this way, there is much different style of employment than other company or country was used to. We need to consider what the modern concept of human resource is.

Talent management has received attention in the modern era of expanding globalization. The company have to focus on the person of ability and train the employee. The reason is that it is important to cope with the problem of globalization. This report will look at the effect of Talent management on business strategy.

3.0 Talent management transition Talent management is developed by the McKinsey Group in the late 1990s. Behind this concept background, many American companies suffered from suffer a talent shortage of executive management (Chambers, Foulon, Handfield-Jones, Hankin & Michaels, 1998). There are three reasons for this problem. Firstly, a modern economy's needs were changing such as technological literacy, cross-cultural understanding and entrepreneur spirit. Secondly, the effective capital economy has produced many small-to-midsize
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firms so that the labour market has had a shortage of qualified personnel. Thirdly, there is social mobility of human resources. A talent employee usually considers going to work in another company. According to the survey that an executive management answered, they work for the five different companies on average (Tomas, 2009). For these reasons, the company started to focus on the talent management for acquiring and retain the talented people.

However, regardless of these backgrounds, generally the meaning of talent management remains ambiguity. Talent management means that the people who can develop high level of academic achievement and maintain high standards at all times (CIPD, 2006). In addition, it means the identification, selection, development, and retention of Super-keepers. The identification and development of high quality replacements for a small number of positions designated as key to current and future organization success. The classification of and investment in each employee based on his/her actual and/or potential for adding value to the organization (Berger, 2004). On the other hand, the purpose of talent management is that the company should keep the talent in mind as a human capital (Armstrong, 2006). Although there is a slight difference of the meaning, the main future of talent management seems to be the flow of acquisition, retain, encourage and development of talent employee.

3.1 The difference between HRM and talent management We need to consider the difference of human resource management. According to the Chuai, Preece and Iles (2008), there are two similarities between talent
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management and human resource management. Firstly, many companies can recognise that placing the right people in the right jobs lead to their goal. Secondly, the main function of human management is common characteristic such as acquisition, retain and development. On the other hand, there are three functional differentiate. To begin with, although HRM focus on managing all of their employees, talent management focus on one particular aspect such as talent people. A further point of view is that HRM need to be required for reception of manager of personal department and management level employees. However Talent management needs to be approved of senior executive. Finally, HRM stress the egalitarianism while talent management emphasize the segmentation.

3.2 The latest concept of talent management According to ASAD, they tried to define talent management in terms of business organization. Given the current trend occurring around the human management, talent management basic component is below. This report will explain the point of the difference with conventional method.

Figure 1 a new definition of Talent management Organization Development


Team & Individual Development Succession Planning Acquisition Performance Management Career planning Retention Assessment

Source: ASTD the new face of Talent management


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4.0 Understanding the talent management 4.1 Acquisition 4.1.1 The segmentation of employee We need to consider how the company employ the talented people. In the past, a company could have no trouble finding good people. However, the current situation that battle fiercely for talented people makes a company persuades the talented people. This means that the company have to support the employee after acquisition.

The company that adopt talent management flow in the first place segment the skilled people. This is a quite characteristic implementation that looks for talent people. This is divided into 4 parts: super-keepers, keepers, solid citizens and misfits (Berger, 2004). In addition, super-keepers have three characteristics such as history of superior work, to influence other employee for a fairly long time and exceed expectations (Berger, 2004). This is why the company can maintain the high profitable capability without waste of human development cost. According to economist survey, the company focus on the three capabilities that are the most important skills to successful innovation (Tomas, 2009).

4.2 Team and Individual Development 4.2.1 Core Competency It is essential to assess the capability of individual on the talent management. The representative example is core competency. This is to focus on the people
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who can solve the specific problem and has skills. This is an evaluation method that can check the capability of resolving a specific task and focusing on skilled people. According to Berger, There are four steps in the competency method. Firstly, it is important to define what type of employee the company acquire. Secondly, the company need to provide them for appropriate training programs. In addition, the company need to assess the competency of employee at the same time. Finally, the company has to prepare for their action plan. For example, in the major-league baseball, to know the competency of player is directly connected to the talent management of the team. Therefore they have to develop a multidisciplinary and comprehensive competency such as manager, coach, scout and front (Berger, 2004). This assessment is one of talent management.

4.3 Retention 4.3.1 Talent mindset Talent mindset is defined as "fundamental belief in the importance of talent"(Cindy McCauley and Michael Wakefield). Talent mindset contributes to the employee who is expected to be a leader because they can learn what they should learn in their workplace. Talent mindset is essential component in talent management because talent mindset can instill the thought of the company to talented people. AlliedSignal CEO Larry Bossidy's conviction that "At the end of the day, we bet on people, not strategies."(talent war)

4.3.2 Employer branding It is said that the term of employer brand is originally put forward by Minchington (2005). For example, the firms from diversity industry such as Coca-Cola, Roche and Johnson and Johnson is cultivating employer branding because of maintaining their brand image and securing their profitability (LARA). Although the definition of employer branding is to create the attractive workplace like occurring to existing employee, applicants, supplier and stakeholder, it is important for the company to enhance the employer branding more than focusing on the product and service branding. When American people had faced on decreasing a large number of labours in 2008, they thought about employer branding to sustain their profitable growth.

4.3.3 Succession Planning Succession planning is to enhance the employee skills and to ensure top talent at all level of the company (successfactor). In the past, succession planning was viewed as unimportant such as senior executive retirement. However, recently succession planning can contribute to manage talent depth at the executive level. Also it is helpful to retain talent employee because of providing the career development with employee because 40% of the US workforce will retire by 2020. The sustainability of every firm will be directly impacted (success factor). The example of succession planning Company : CDW Situation: the company had many ready-candidates for promotion. However
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there is luck of the process of leadership. Solution: CDW tried to develop the individual talent using competencies and certification. Result: they built organizational depth that identified potential successors.

Company : Arrow Situation: the company deprecate talent management so that talented people retreated. Solution: they evaluate their all of employee at all levels. Result: they could meet their talent gaps. Also their executive class can create their succession planning easily. Source: Success Factors

5.0 The impact of the talent management on business strategy As previously described, this report attempted to explain talent management and the difference between talent management and human resource management. From this part, it will examine to what extent talent management affect on the business strategy.

5.1 What is the business strategy? Business strategy is defined as the direction that business enterprise creates competitive advantage. Moreover the strategy of individual business is the framework for competing with other competitor in a particular environment. In other words, a long-term approach to implementing a firm's business plans to
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achieve its business objectives.

5.2 Talent management is business strategy It is said that talent management is business strategy. The firms competitive advantages are supported by the capability of talented individuals (Cheese, tomas). There are three reasons for this.

5.2.1 To create a wide range of effects Talent management have effect on the other employees. In other words, super-keepers is relationship based on respect with other employees. Therefore the firm can sustain a company's competitive advantage from other company. For example, Marx and Spencer had a lack of communication problem after founder leaving the firm. This problem might be solved by talent management during the process of cultivating the corporate culture.

5.2.1 The differentiation of the product or service A company have to produce different product or service so that a company must prepare for the talented people. If the company cannot have the talented people, competitor increases their sales turnover and branding image. According to the survey of economist, the importance of talent management has been increasing. 75 % of senior executive recognised that talent management is very important (economist).

5.2.3 The firm consist of human capital

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Talent mindset and employer branding is connected to the business strategy because a firm consist of human capital. Even if someone create a good analysis report and planning, eventually the difference of human capital make a competitive advantage. Moreover when the firm acquire the talented people and keep developing their talent, talent management will be understood as a business strategy. AlliedSignal CEO Larry Bossidy's conviction that "At the end of the day, we bet on people, not strategies."(talent war)

5.3 Talent management is not business strategy However some of a company may not adapt to talent management system as a strategy. There are three reasons for this.

5.3.1 Mistake of understanding Some of company does not recognise talent management as business strategy because there is a different employment culture. For example, Japanese people have loyalty to the organization. Therefore compared to global survey, talent management for the innovation are conducted by lower level of organization in Japan. In other word, a senior executive do not focus on talent management system because they emphasize on the corporate culture. In fact, although 56% of Japanese company recognised talent management is very important, the rate of very important is 75% of a senior executive.

5.3.2 The organization structure Some of company give priority to organising structure. Talent management is affected on the organising structure such as structure-centric and human-capital
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centric. Structure-centric is bureaucratic structure that flow work is dominated by the company. On the other hand, human-capital centric is flat hierarchies such as Google and Sony. The key success factor of talent management might depend on the organisation structure because the organization may exclude their radical idea. Even if the company grow up their employee through the talent management process, skilled employee may not make a powerful statement in organization (talent management). For example, if Apple adopts the structure-centric structure, their competency could be decreasing.

5.3.3 Wrong direction of the company The company may miss the chance to utilize the human asset. Talent management is the way of selecting the talent people and develop their skills using the career education. This effective and efficiency way will face a risk with the shortage of diversity. Moreover the company may miss the chance to gain the idea from the people who have no talent. In addition, talent management may not smoothly respond to economic change because even if the company have a pool of talent people, another people have no skills to deal with this problem. Therefore some of companies adopt basic human resource management in the company. For example, TOYOTA has an original system TOYOTA WAY. The purpose of this system is for all of employee to understand how to create the Toyota value and principle. For instilling this notion to employee, Toyota combines human resource with employer-employee relationship. All of employee has to contribute to management.

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6.0 Conclusion Although talent management is a new approach to human resource management, this is not business strategy. There are three reasons for this. First of all, it is important to utilise the human asset to make a profit. With such a perspective, human resource management may be almost same meaning with business strategy. The company should not only focus on the talent management but also terms and conditions such as company principle and economic trend. Toyota could construct the system that all of employment could contribute to the management. As a result of fact, Toyota could accomplish high sales turnover. In addition, it is valuable to control the talent people from acquirement to development, however, the purpose of business strategy such as differentiation is not connected to talent management. Secondly, there are the industry that employee should obey the decision of organization. Talent management is the system of controlling talent people. If company have already made a decision, talent management is not needed as a business strategy. Finally, it is difficult to access the evaluation of talent management. It can be obviously for business strategy to assess the evaluation. However, even if talent management can attempt to start as a business strategy, it may be impossible to evaluate the performance of talent management. In conclude, talent management may not assume a role of business strategy.

7.0 References Takeuchi, N. (2009) How Japanese manufacturing firms align their human resource policies with business strategies: testing a contingency performance
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prediction in a Japanese context. International Journal of Human Resource Management [Online], 20 (1): 34-56

Thomas, K. (2009) Talent strategy for innovation Available from: http://graphics.eiu.com/marketing/pdf/Ontario_Innovation.pdf [Accessed on 8th November 2010]

Chambers, G., Foulton, M., Handfield-Jones, H., Hankin, M.& Michaels Ill, G.(1998) The war for talent. McKinsey Quarterly [Online], 3: 44-57.

CIPD (2006) Talent management: Understanding the Dimensions. Available from: http://www.cipd.co.uk/NR/rdonlyres/6101AA06-F0C7-4073-98DA-758E91C718F C/0/3832Talentmanagement.pdf [Accessed on 8 November 2010]

Berger, L (ed) (2004) The talent management handbook. New York: The McGraw-Hill Companies

Armstrong, M. (2006) A Handbook of Human Resource Management Practice, Available from: http://storage.worldispnetwork.com/books/Handbook.of.Human.Resource.Mana gement.Practice.pdf [Accessed on 8 November 2010] Chuai, X., D. Preece and P. Iles (2008) new bottles'?:
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Is talent management just `old wine in

The case of multinational companies in Beijing," Management Research News, 31: 901-911.

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