Excellence in Talent Management 2013

Talent has been a key talking point for HR, and a key plank in the function's efforts to engage senior leadership, for the last 20 years or so. Over this period, enormous effort and cost has been expended in trying to find ever more effective ways to attract, retain and reward those we describe as "talent". HR's work has been valuable in adding some structure to the way in which we identify, recruit and develop talent over the years, but truly effective talent management arguably remains an elusive quantity. The turmoil of recent years has only made the talent focus of business more acute, and this has left HR's traditional approaches rather high and dry, and has raised questions about how value in the talent arena can be delivered quicker and more cost-effectively, as well as questioning the way in which talent in organisations is considered. At the same time, talented people themselves are wanting different things from employers, have different approaches to career and life, and have increasingly different workplace needs. The prospect of four simultaneous work generations co-existing in employment is about to become a reality, and this raises many challenges for employers.