Diagramas de Dependencia de Trabajo para el Rol Gerente de Proyecto

Both the RPSM and the ROM inferred about the need for having a diverse talent pool and ‘fishing from the wider pool’ (RSPM) and though this was already happening at the executive level, the ROM said there was still deficiency in this area.

“So it’s not just about having the right program but having a really good diverse team and right program as well. So it is really important. We know statistically that we do not have enough women except in role. Actually on the exec, we have been doing pretty well. We have a few women on our exec team. But as store managers, regional managers, we do not have enough women” (ROM). “And we do then monitor that as we have a target that we should meet for development as we have a percentage of people that we should be spotting through and we should be working through that and then that gets recorded monthly so we track that monthly to see how people are doing against that target but then also how people are progressing and we also look at that down to ethnicity and gender. So we break down to see if we are truly fishing from the wider pool which is really important to us” (RPSM).

188 Organisationally, Retco demonstrated instructive proactiveness in the conceptualisation and operationalization of their TM practice which also impacted individual proactiveness in career management. For example they had formal and informal career conversations all year round which promoted excellent employee engagement and motivation while also minimising challenges and crisis management as these could be resolved as they arose. This

proactiveness was also evidenced in a bi-annual (rather than annual as found in the other three cases) appraisal of employee performance and assessments of potential which drove employee and organisational performance. Provision of individual development plan to talent pool members facilitated individual proactivity in driving career progress. Retco also

responded to problems such as the challenges of excluding hourly paid staff from appraisals by introducing careers conversations for them to minimise antagonisms amongst staff.

8.10 SUMMARY

This chapter presented findings from a case study of a private sector retailer. A key but surprising finding was Retco’s adoption of an inclusive talent approach, which going by scholarly discussions about talent practices in private sector organisations, contradicts the assumed shareholder profit making approach of TM associated with private sector

organisations. As some authors (Christensen et al., 2010; Ford et al, 2010) argue that the inclusive talent approach is found in public sector organisations. Another key finding which is prescriptive for successful TM programs was Retco’s alignment of their organisational values to their performance management processes through a comprehensive ‘leadership

framework’ tailored to fit different categories of employees and which assessed

demonstration of leadership behaviours ( the ‘HOW’) alongside employee performance (the ‘WHAT’). This innovative practice, enabled organisational awareness of Retco’s corporate ethos and demonstration of expected behaviours whilst promoting employee accountability and driving a positive organisation behaviour and culture/environment for the success of TM initiatives.

TM in Retco was therefore focused on succession planning, seeking high potential and high performance from employees at all levels while developing organisational competence through competency development of all employees whether classified as high potential or not to ensure maximum performance in their roles. Innovative practices firstly comprised proactive management of underperformance through identifying their top three and bottom three performers so that there were always successors for critical roles, whilst managing

189 risks from underperforming employees through coaching for those struggling in their roles or re-assignment to other roles that were most suitable to them to ensure optimum

performance alongside development. Another innovative practice included talent sharing processes which facilitated speedy coverage of vacancies across regions through hi-tech digitalised systems. There were challenges with succession planning, careers conversation job rotations and having quality assessments. Having hi-tech digitised functional systems for monitoring and tracking employee progress, managing employee engagement and providing speedy response to problems enabled a more reliable TM process in comparison to Civico, Locgov and PHServ whose technology was not as advanced or functional. Retco’s inclusive talent approach advances the debates for shifting approaches from exclusive to more inclusive talent and also indicates that an innovative inclusive talent practice as found in Retco, negates scholarly perceptions of inclusive talent as just another label for HRM. Further discussions of Retco’s contribution to advancing knowledge and practice of the TM field are addressed in the next chapter which provides a cross-case discussion of findings and cross-case analysis.

190

CHAPTER 9: DISCUSSION AND CROSS-CASE ANALYSIS OF

FINDINGS

9.1 INTRODUCTION

Chapters’ five to eight presented a within-case analysis of the four case studies. This chapter presents a discussion and cross-case analysis of the findings in comparison to arguments within the extant literature and dominant theoretical frameworks on TM. A cross- case summary of the findings showing similarities and differences in findings is presented in Tables 15 (see Appendix 5, pp. 301-308). Discussions and cross-case analysis will be based on the research questions (see section 1.4):

 How do organisations define talent and TM in public and private sectors?

 What factors affect the processes of identification and employee differentiation?  What challenges and barriers to reliable talent occur and how are they managed?  How similar or different are the talent identification practices and why do these

differences exist?