Strategic Human Resource Management (Research Paper Sample)

Talent Recruitment and Management in Saudi Firms Student Name Institution Abstract The objective of this paper is to reconnoiter the talent recruitment and management as a strategic human resource approach taking the Saudi Investment Bank SAIB as a case study. Talent acquisition and management are examined from the "hard" HRM perspective. After interrogation of talent acquisition, the paper seeks to bring forth a set of recommendations that the case organization can adopt for better performance. Talent acquisition and management are viewed through the various stages and processes involved in the recruitment of skilled personnel. The argument brought forth here is that the qualification and skill based approach taken by the bank though practical can still be improved. I will seek to bring in the talent factor as an improvement on skill and qualification. Table of Contents TOC \o "1-3" \h \z \u Abstract PAGEREF _Toc454264529 \h 2Introduction PAGEREF _Toc454264530 \h 2Literature review PAGEREF _Toc454264531 \h 3Talent acquisition PAGEREF _Toc454264532 \h 4Talent management PAGEREF _Toc454264533 \h 5Strategic recruitment PAGEREF _Toc454264534 \h 7Engaged performance PAGEREF _Toc454264535 \h 7Compensation alignment PAGEREF _Toc454264536 \h 8Career development PAGEREF _Toc454264537 \h 8Succession planning PAGEREF _Toc454264538 \h 9Competitive advantage PAGEREF _Toc454264539 \h 9The case study PAGEREF _Toc454264540 \h 10Soft Human resource perspective PAGEREF _Toc454264541 \h 14Conclusions and recommendations PAGEREF _Toc454264542 \h 15References PAGEREF _Toc454264543 \h 17 Introduction Talent recruitment and management has become a leading business front in the 21st century. The move for a talented workforce is informed by both the hard and soft perspectives of HR. Through a sufficiently skilled workforce, the organization can run their result oriented programs as they seek to attain their objectives. The current labor market presents ample challenges for identification and selection of suitably skilled staff. In this view, it is imperative that a reliable talent recruitment and development strategy is adopted. This paper sets out to explore talent recruitment as a strategic human resource management approach. The paper will take the Saudi Investment Bank as the case study. The objective of this paper to view human resource as a primary administrative function with the capacity to dictate organizational direction. The paper will explore how to approach talent recruitment as a strategic HRM practice. The first section of the paper is the literature review. In this section, I will engage and explore theoretical work and perspectives from strategic HRM experts. The hard HRM perspective will define this part as the paper seek to highlight the important HRM issues to consider through the talent acquisition and management process. In the second section, the paper looks at the case study of the Saudi Investment Bank. This section is a critical analysis of the views brought forth in the literature review section. A descriptive analysis approach will enable a descriptive analysis of the issues affecting the banks HR as well as the solution brought by strategic talent acquisition. The perspectives brought forth in the literature review will be applied in this section as the paper seeks to highlight how the bank can benefit from the adoption of a strategic recruitment strategy that is particularly inclined to talent acquisition. In this section, the paper will also view talent acquisition from the soft HRM perspective. The contrasting view ill highlight the fundamental issues ignored by the hard view and state why the anticipated outcomes of taking the soft perspective on talent acquisition. After the descriptive analysis, the paper will move to the conclusions and recommendations section as the last part. In this part. I will look to draw relevant conclusions from the case study. The derived conclusions will inform the strategic recommendations brought forth in the recommendations. The recommendations are principles and practices that may be useful for the Saudi Investment Bank in handling their current and future human resource challenges. Organizations are often faced by the challenge of recruiting and managing the right skills for their operational needs. In fact, labor market inefficiencies often force employers to recruit people with only the academic qualifications hoping to develop and fine tune their skills and abilities to the desired standards. This recruitment approach exposes the organization to academically qualified but poorly skilled workers who affect the production efficiency adversely. Additionally, the organizations that manage to recruit the few talented individuals do not have reliable talent identification and utilization procedures. As a result of this resource disconnect, talent ends up deployed in areas where it is difficult to develop and realize its full potential. Under the highlighted circumstances, it is critical that enterprises understand the value of a talented workforce and deploy their employees in areas of their utmost efficiency. The next section indulges into talent acquisition and management. Literature review A discussion by CITATION Jen13 \l 2057 (Jenkins & Delbridge, 2013) explains "hard" HR to be an emphasis on the "resource" characteristics of HRM that seeks to attain competitive advantage through increased employee efforts. This approach focuses on individual employee productivity against the organizational performance objectives. This view is similar to other assets of the organization like vehicles and machinery. Hard HR is strongly related to corporate planning where the management seeks to establish the required resources, how to get the resources and the cost implication of the resource acquisition. The inherent features of hard HR are the identification of the organization’s labor needs, recruitment of matching skills and the efficient management of the labor to attain optimal productivity. Additionally, the hard HR approach is characterized by other elements such as; short-term changes in workforce numbers, average pay rates, marginal staff empowerment and employee-focused appraisal systems. In the increasingly competitive global business environment, the critical potential for a business to innovate and grow intrinsically lies in its ability to attract the right set of skills that work to realize the organization’s future CITATION Col16 \l 2057 (Day, 2016). Day further argues that talent acquisition ought to be part of the larger organizational strategic plan to enable the team to win the talent struggles with competitors. In this view, getting the right skilled personnel to innovate and grow the business is ranked as a more critical element in the attainment of achievement of organizational goals than all other parts of the organization’s business plan. The author thus sees human resource as the most important investment of the organization arguing that employee inefficiencies such as mediocre hires and the resultant high turnover rates caused by a poorly designed recruitment strategy cost the team considerable amounts of time, finances, and resources. Talent acquisition Effective talent acquisition is driven by a well-calibrated recruitment strategy that allows the human resources manager to identify and hire individuals with the capacity to meet their organizational expectations and bring in an element of creativity in their work. According to CITATION Rey09 \l 2057 (Reynolds & Weiner, 2009), talent assessment programs ought to be aligned to organizational goals to reap optimal benefits. As such the design of these tools starts with the question; what labor needs is the program set to address? In this perspective elements, the critical factors to be considered are productivity, quality of service, retention, and workforce diversity. Answering these questions equips the HR with a clear description of the desirable features and the basic requirements for the recruitment program. In agreement with Reynolds and Weiner’s view CITATION Mic001 \l 2057 (O'Malley, 2000) adds that the use of assessment metrics to evaluate the output value of the program allows the organization to employ the recruitment strategy efficiently and gain reasonable returns on their investment. The implemented assessment approach ought to be aligned with the organizational needs and meet its foundational requirements. Talented employees are a notch higher in productivity than their regular counterparts. The regular employee seeks to do what is required of them as a means of making ends meet and planning for retirement. This crop of employees only sets out to deliver on what is necessary for their positions, and it is hard to get extra effort from them. On the other hand, the talented individuals are out to do their best and progress their careers. This set of employees have a greater commitment to the cause and are willing to put in the necessary work to attain success. Balchin, Hymer, and Matthews, (2009) define talent transformation as the development of natural abilities into systematically developed skills that fit into an industrial segment. Talent can be defined through the following features * Cognitive ability. An individual’s intellectual ability is essential in the determination of the capacity to handle complex duties. Personal effectiveness in duty execution is greatly influenced by the employee’s ability to learn and contextualize problem-solving within the organization. Emotional intelligence defines the ability of the employee to make rational decisions even when under stressful conditions. * Leadership ability. A succession strategy identifies individuals with an innate potential to be effective leaders. People with special skills and abilities easily stand...