Strategic Talent Planning (Essay Sample)

Name:
Instructor:
Course:
Date:
Introduction
Talent planning can be defined as an integrated approach involving the use of various human resource tools used by organizations to assess their capabilities as well as potentials in a bid to prepare and manage the current and future needs of the business (Armstrong & Armstrong, 2012). Talent management process involves an array of activities which mainly involve recruitment, performance management, compensation, succession planning, career planning as well as learning and leadership development. Organizations utilize various tools and management concepts in these areas to identify talent in the organization, promote as well as retain the talents and to induce an increase in performance with regards to the overall employee contribution in the organization.
Talent planning focuses on current or short-term business needs as much as it focuses on the long-term ones. While serving the interests of short-term requirements, organizations utilize talent planning to enhance or maximise the existing talent’s effectiveness. Future talent planning considerations on the other hand emphasises on improving bench strength as well as creating an environment that would promote future movements or change. In the contemporary business environment, it is necessary for business organizations to prepare and manage future business challenges through enhancing their capabilities as well as stimulating continuous growth and development so as to ensure acquisition and retention of better talent.
Talent planning is a practice involved in the wider talent management process which not only focuses on hiring, retaining as well as developing talent for purposes of future benefits for the organization but also focuses on other critical management functions such as strategy, change management and organizational culture. Faced by challenges of competitiveness and rapid technological advancements, organizations are forced to ensure they acquire and retain a workforce characterized by brilliance and diversity so as to stimulate continuous innovation (Hatum, 2010). To ensure support for talent, organizations are required to ensure provision of appropriate resources needed to spur innovation. Among other requirements talent management must provide in an organization to support talent are; an environment that promotes communication and teamwork, a learning environment that promotes change and welcomes positive challenge, a diversified environment that promotes new ideas, new and flexible multidimensional approaches to problem solving and an organizational culture that leverage that influences talent.
Strategic talent planning
To create sustainability as well as ensure high performance in organizations, many businesses in public and private sectors have adopted strategic talent planning models to handle talent management challenges both currently and in the future. The common model utilized by organizations involves a consideration of various organizational factors among them; organizational objectives, resources as well as competencies required to achieve the objectives, current labour force competencies, resources and workload assessment as well as their possible future requirements, assessment of current and desired future states, formulation as well as implementation of a necessary plan to create a future labour force, and implementation of an evaluation framework used to measure and monitor the projected success of the plan.
Strategic talent planning must therefore address various factors within the organization to ensure all staffing challenges are effectively managed. The most common staffing challenges faced by organizations which require strategic planning include; diminishing pools of highly qualified job seekers, succession planning, organizational knowledge retention, talent retention, performance and productivity management and employee engagement as well as morale. Other challenges affecting strategic talent planning arise in the business environment in which an organizations operates in (Caplan, 2013). External and internal pressures in a business environment affect strategic talent planning hence the need for a more robust talent planning (Silzer & Ben, 2009). Internal influences include organizational culture; inefficiencies, changing organizational priorities and an aging labour force et al. External influence include factors like socio-economic as well as political influences and changes in technology, demographics and market needs among others (Deb 2005).
Talent planning involves a process of four steps which include talent assessment and forecast, identification of supply and demand, talent status analysis and development and implementation. The first step involves a review of the organization’s situational analysis. The review identifies and assists in explaining the current organizational situation as well as the desired future based on internal as well as external business environment considerations. The review process however comes after the organization has defined its strategic direction based on its vision, mission and goals (Talent Planning, n.d). A SWOT analysis is a reliable tool used in assessing the organization’s current and future desires state (Ulrich & Edward, 2013). The tool is therefore helpful in talent planning as much as it is helpful in strategic planning since an organization is able to identify strengths and weakness while also assessing potential opportunities as well as threats in the internal and external mix.
The second step which involves supply and demand precedes the review process and it identifies existing and the future requirements of the organizational talent resources required to achieve organizational objectives both in the long-run and short-term. The talent resources include the nature of jobs, the current workforce and its competencies (Berger & Dorothy, 2004). Supply analysis generates information regarding the existing as well as future human capital supply based on gathered data involving recruitment, employee competencies, capacity, workload and projected jobs. Demand analysis involves an analysis of the future organizational activities, employees, workloads and competencies required to achieve the desired mission. Future competency needs and projected changes in workloads and labour force requirements are determined through analysis of factors such as change in technology, turnover, organizational priorities, and work-force demographics et al.
Talent status analysis which is the third step involves a gap and surplus analysis. This step involves weighing the supply projections of talent in the organization against the demand forecasts. This analysis includes the assessment of the talent resources and including employee competencies in form of skills and demographic characteristics among others. A gap is created if the talent demand exceeds supply while a surplus stems from a situation which an increased supply exceeds the demand (Pilbeam & Marjorie, 2010). A gap therefore signifies a shortage in talent resources while a surplus signifies the contrary. The analysis therefore assists an organization to assess the differences in the current as well as future human capital requirements. The talent plan requires measurable goals and specified objectives necessary in ensuaring the talent gap and surplus challenges are effectively managed.
This step involves an implementation of the selected human capital strategy. After the gap and surplus analysis, the organization’s management is able to identify the best approach to manage the differences and also address future requirements and opportunities in the form of technological needs and structural needs among others. The selected strategy must also influence the productivity of the labour-force by increasing its performance to help improve the organization’s competitive advantage as well as sustainability both in the contemporary and in the long-run. While short-term goals must be identified to handle current requirements, objectives which are long-term in nature are also a necessity in this step to ensure the talent plan compliments the overall organizational strategy. The plan must also be monitored on a constant basis to ensure the requirements are met and the success is measured. Adjustments to the plan due to new emerging influences must be made whenever necessary to eliminate any challenges the planning might face. Evaluation methods are also necessary in the final step to ensure the desired outcome...