THE TALENT-BASED ORGANISATION

THE TALENT-BASED ORGANISATION

HOW TO GET THERE?

Master thesis, MScBA, specialization Change Management University of Groningen, Faculty of Economics and Business

June 2012

MILOU ENGELAER

Studentnumber: 1637509 Korenstraat 1 9712 LX Groningen Tel.: +316-52460155 e-mail: m.engelaer@hotmail.com Supervisor/ university dr. K.S. Prins & drs. H.P. van Peet

Supervisor/ field of study: G. Mehciz & E. Waanders

ABSTRACT

Over the last decades, the world of work and organisations has been changing. In reaction, organisations are looking for a new organisational form. This study was commissioned by Adviesbureau de Sleutel, Stichting Werklust and Noorderlink, which propose talent-based organisation to become that new organisational form. Talent-based organisation is based on the idea that talents should define the boundaries of jobs and that organisations should organise work around the available talents. The goal of the study is to discover the cultural and leadership prerequisites for successfully implementing talent-based organisation, thereby contributing to the development of talent-based organisations.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. INTRODUCTION ... 4

2. THE CONCEPTUAL MODEL... 11

2.1 The Talent-Based Organisation... 11

2.2 Expected Implementation Success ... 13

2.3 Organisational Culture ... 13 2.4 Leadership... 15 3. METHOD ... 17 3.1 Data Collection... 17 3.2 Participant Characteristics ... 18 3.3 Data Analysis ... 19 4. RESULTS ... 21 4.1 Organisational Culture ... 21

4.1.1 Organisational culture dimensions from the conceptual model... 21

4.1.2 Organisational culture dimensions not mentioned in the conceptual model ... 24

4.2 Leadership... 26

4.2.1 Leadership skills from the conceptual model... 26

4.2.2 Leadership skills not mentioned in the conceptual model... 29

4.3 Additional Findings... 30

5. DISCUSSION ... 32

5.1 Theoretical Implications... 34

5.2 Practical Implications ... 35

5.3 Limitations and Further Research... 37

REFERENCES ... 40

1. INTRODUCTION

Since a group of McKinsey consultants published their report on “the war for talent” in 1998, the subject of talent management has received a great amount of attention (Collings and Mellahi, 2009; Beechler and Woodward, 2009) and it has been growing in popularity over the last decades (Yarnall, 2011; Visser, 2009; Lewis and Heckman, 2006). Research has shown that almost nine out of ten organisations perceive talent management as one of their business priorities (Visser, 2009). Several factors have contributed to the rising interest in talent management. First of all, global demographic trends are influencing the labour pool. The disproportionate size of the baby boom generation leads to a shift in age distribution, thereby affecting the characteristics of talent (Beechler and Woodward, 2009; Visser, 2009) and employee expectations (Guthridge et al., 2008). Second, globalization has intensified competition amongst organisations in their search for personnel (Beechler and Woodward, 2009; Visser, 2009). Third, the business environment has changed drastically, whereby a move took place from product-based to knowledge-based economies. This has led to a greater need for human capital as well as increased importance of these human assets (Guthridge et al., 2008; Beechler and Woodward, 2009; Visser, 2009). Lastly, the relationship between employer and employee has changed. Employees are currently acting as free agents, giving their talent in exchange for opportunity (Paine, 2006) and they should be enthused as if they were volunteers in order to yield the best returns from their talent (Visser, 2009).

Many organisations seem to believe talent management is a complex subject (Visser, 2008). Even though almost 90% of organisations recognize the importance of talent management, only 25% of the organisations has been able to create a coherent talent management policy (Visser and Van der Sluis, 2008). Several problems are related to the failure to create such a policy:

1. Organisations tend to see talent as being static (Visser and Van der Sluis, 2008). However, due to learning as well as internal organisational developments, new talented employees can come to light and those anointed as talents can be discovered to be less excellent (Visser and Van der Sluis, 2008; Beechler and Woordward, 2009);

2. Organisations need to have a clear view of their strategic perspective on talent management, in order to streamline decisions made on the operational level (Visser and Van der Sluis, 2008);

Another problem with the concept of talent management is the lack of clarity regarding the definition of talent management and the goals that come from it (Lewis and Heckman, 2006). According to Lewis and Heckman (2006), many organisations and authors define “talent management as a collection of typical human resource department practices, functions, activities or specialist areas such as recruiting, selection, development, and career and succession management” (p.140). However, they also found a perspective that focuses on talent generically. This perspective can be subdivided in two different views on the concept. The first stream focuses on talent as a person and a resource (Lewis and Heckman, 2006) and the other on talent as a characteristic (Visser, 2009) or –phrased differently- as an undifferentiated good that emerges from both the “humanistic and demographic perspectives” (Lewis and Heckman, 2006, p.141).

In the first stream, talent management is about the extra effort done for those people organisations believe to be talented. Seeking, hiring, developing and differentially rewarding competent performers is central in this view of generic talent (Lewis and Heckman, 2006; Visser, 2009). Within this stream, several criteria exist in order to decide which employees can be classified as talents:

- Some authors classify employees by comparing their performance against that of their peers, resulting in categorization of A-, B- and C-players (Lewis and Heckman, 2006; Beechler and Woodward, 2009; Visser, 2009);

- Others believe that talents are those employees of which variations in achievements have a disproportionate impact on organisational success (Boudreau and Ramstad, 2007);

- Lastly, some believe that talents are those (high) potentials that will be holding the most strategically important positions in the future (Huselid et al., 2005).

In the second stream, talent management is about building on the dispositions and talents inherent in each person (Lewis and Heckman, 2006; Visser, 2009). The assumption is that everyone has a talent, but not everyone is a talent (yet) (Visser, 2009). It is the role of the organisation to manage everyone to high performance (Lewis and Heckman, 2006) and to enable employees to excel, allowing them to further develop their talents by creating a context that facilitates all employees to fully realize their potential (Visser and Van der Sluis, 2007; Van der Sluis, 2008). Talents are seen to be “gifts that everyone receives at birth” which are meant to be deployed in order to fulfil a personal vocation (Van der Sluis, 2008). The role of organisations is to unpack those gifts and deploy them to achieve strategic goals – “and most preferably to achieve the personal vocation as well” (Van der Sluis, 2008, p.39).

conditions to better correspond with the employees aspirations and ambitions (Visser, 2009). Advocates of talent-based organisation believe that talent should define the boundaries of jobs and that organisations should organise their work around the available talents. However, traditional paradigms of work design inhibit this type of development (Visser, 2009).

This research was commissioned by Adviesbureau de Sleutel, Stichting Werklust and Noorderlink in order to explore the subject of talent-based organisation. These organisations aim to expand the amount of talent-based organisations, and therefore the goal of this study is to discover how to implement talent-based organisation. Their reason to support organisations in becoming more talent-based is because it is believed that this new type of organisation will be better suited to meet the wishes of today’s employee. It enables employees to fully realize their potential, give them a stronger sense of meaning and to increase their happiness. On the other side, it will allow organisations to fully utilize all available talents, increase productivity and enlarge their competitive advantage. First, the historical developments that led to the concept of talent-based organisation will be analysed. Then, the characteristics of talent-based organisation will be examined. The main part of this article will concentrate on determining how to turn organisations into talent-based ones, i.e. to assess which factors foster or impede the implementation of talent-based organisation.

Historical Background

Currently, the world of work and organisations is changing. During the last few decades, several developments have occurred in great succession. Together, these developments (further described below) have resulted in a decrease in value of the twentieth century organisational models, which are based on hierarchy, power, control and a monopoly of knowledge (Aslander and Witteveen, 2010). In order to cope with this devaluation, the world is looking for different forms of organisation. One of these forms is talent-based organisation (Hoogendoorn and Vos, 2006).

organisations are becoming more talent-intensive (Schoemaker, 2003a; Schoemaker, 2006a). Employees no longer function as extensions of machines, performing standardised tasks, irrespective of their skills, talents and interests. Employee talents have become the capital with which to create competitive advantage (Schoemaker, 2006a; Schoemaker, 2006b; Visser and Van der Sluis, 2007).

Next to organisations becoming more talent-intensive, information and communication technology (ICT) has become part of every employee’s daily job. ICT enables employees to work independently from time and place, which paved the way for a new form of organisations: so-called network organisations (Castells, 2000; Schoemaker 2006a). Currently, this type of organisation is complemented with a different type of networking, namely in the form of social capital (Schoemaker, 2003b; Schoemaker, 2006b). Theories of social capital describe personal networks to be the means with which to achieve goals that otherwise cannot be achieved. Social capital consists of “the number of people in a network, their willingness to lend support, and their ability to do so” (Flap and Völker, 2001, p.300). This social capital is of value to the organisation, as it enables employees to provide better, and faster service to clients (Schoemaker, 2003a). In sum, the formula for success in service-providing organisations is: talents + social capital = competitive advantage (Schoemaker, 2003a). Therefore, it becomes more important to retain employees: if they leave not only their talents, but also their social capital, will be lost (Schoemaker, 2003a).

The fact that organisations are becoming more talent-intensive has its effects on the relationship between the employer and the employees. In the industrial organisation, employees were easily replaceable, which made the relationship with employers an unbalanced one (Schoemaker, 2003b; Schoemaker, 2006a). In the talent-intensive organisation, employers depend on their employees, as talents are in possession of the employee. On the other hand, the employee depends on the organisation as well, to enable development of talents. The relationship between employer and employee therefore has changed to one of mutual dependency (Schoemaker, 2006a; Schoemaker, 2006b). This also affects the relationship between the employee and its supervisor, who should now take on the role of coach and facilitator instead of focussing on getting things done (Schoemaker, 2006a).

Holmes, 2006). Furthermore, a culture of consumerism is arising in which commercial values are dominating and business scandals are challenging the trust which employees have in their organisations and business leaders (Cartwright and Holmes, 2006). In this climate of change, the traditional contract of long-term job security in return for hard work and loyalty no longer seems to be valid and the likelihood of psychological contract breach has increased (Robinson, 1996). At the same time, due to downsizing and outsourcing, employees have started to recognize the ineffectiveness of trying to build a career with one employer (Feldman, 2000). Eventually, this situation has led to a new employee contract (Chalofsky, 2003) whereby employees are expected to “work longer hours, take on greater responsibility, be more flexible and tolerate continual change and ambiguity” in exchange for higher pay, rewards linked to performance and simply a job (Cartwright and Holmes, 2006, p.200). It can be said that the employment contract has become more transactional.

Dissatisfaction with these circumstances, together with concern over the prospect of longer working lives and uncertainty over pensions as well as broader anxiety about a more materialistic society (Holbeche, 2004), are believed to have provoked a significant rise in employee cynicism (Feldman, 2000; Pate, 2000). Employee cynicism is defined by Dean et al. (1998, p.345) as: “a negative attitude toward one's employing organisation, comprising of three dimensions:

1. a belief that the organisation lacks integrity; 2. negative affect towards the organisation; and

3. tendencies to exhibit disparaging and critical behaviours towards the organisation that are consistent with these beliefs and affect.”

Cynicism is closely related to the problem of burnout and leads to poor job performance and poor mental health (Cartwright and Holmes, 2006).

2006, p.200). Moreover, every individual has a sense of belonging, as described by Weick (1995 – in: Schoemaker, 2006a). With the decline of institutions such as churches, civic groups and extended families, the workplace is more and more becoming an important source of community and a place to feel connected (Cartwright and Holmes, 2006). From this perspective, individuals become members of an organisation in order to develop their personal identity (Schoemaker, 2006a; Schoemaker, 2006b), which is allowed now the relationship between employer and employee has changed to one of mutual dependency. So the process of engaging individuals to an organisation and convincing them to fully use their talents depends on that individual’s free will. This turns organisations into places where emotions, a sense of belonging, interpersonal relationships, personal values, and commitment overrule rational processes (Schoemaker, 2006a).

In order to regain employee satisfaction, trust and commitment, and retention, it is believed that organisations must provide employees with meaningful work (Holbeche, 2004; Milliman et al., 2003), stability and a sense of community (Schoemaker, 2003a). An important issue in the search for meaning is that individuals need their work to be more aligned with their personal values (Miller and Skidmore, 2004). Organisations often fail to provide employees with a reliable and convincing set of values (Chalofsky, 2003). Furthermore, in order to provide employees with meaningful work, jobs must be designed in which employees are encouraged to take on their tasks (Turner et al., 2002); work environments must be developed that are humane, challenging and rewarding and where relationships are supportive and inspiring (Cross et al., 2003); and leadership must regain employee trust (Holbeche, 2004) and make room for emotions in the workplace (Cartwright and Holmes, 2006).

Adapting to the new employee attitude to work and the so-called new paradigm of talent-intensive organisational life has several benefits for the organisation:

1. Employees that are allowed to work from their talents are supposed to be more productive (Schoemaker, 2003a; Milliman et al., 2003; Hoogendoorn and Vos, 2006).

2. It reduces turnover and absenteeism for several reasons:

- Employees that work from their talents will be more satisfied and motivated, have less intentions to quit and feel more meaningful (Cartwright and Holmes, 2006; Hoogendoorn and Vos, 2006; Milliman et al., 2003; Schoemaker, 2003a);

- Meaningful and talent-based work will lead to less stress, cynicism and burn-outs (Cartwright and Holmes, 2006);

- Such organisations develop a positive corporate image and reputation that enables them to attract new talents in the war for talent (Beechler and Woodward, 2009) and a higher calibre of job applicants (Lemmink et al., 2003);

3. Awareness of the in-house talents enables organisations to react faster to changing (HRM) needs (Leary-Joyce, 2010).

Altogether, this enables organisations to attract and retain the talents and social capital that can provide them with a competitive advantage (Schoemaker, 2003a; Schoemaker 2006a).

The need for talent-based organisations Introduction of ICT into every job Changed employee attitude towards work Change to knowlegde-based economy Change in services market Changed relationship employee-employer

Figure 1: Overview of developments that led to the need for talent-based organisations

2. THE CONCEPTUAL MODEL

Before attempting to answer the question on how to get to the talent-based organisation, it is important to have a view of what assumptions underlie this type of organisation. Quite a clear view exists. As the concept of the talent-based organisation is quite novel, the depiction presented below is both based on existing literature as well as on the findings of the preliminary interviews performed with the commissioning companies.

2.1 The Talent-Based Organisation

In their book about the ideal organisation in which employees can fully develop themselves, Hoogendoorn and Vos (2006) describe several characteristics of such an organisation. These characteristics are also applicable in the case of talent-based organisation and are described below:

- Employees must feel committed to the organisation. Schoemaker (2006a) describes this as a sense of belonging;

- Employees must share the organisation’s values, and being part of the organisation must give meaning to their life;

- Employees should receive a great amount of autonomy.;

- Processes are meant to support employees, which means they should be flexible; - Employees must be coached by their managers in order to develop their talents; - Trust plays an important role.

As stated before, the concept of talent-based organisation is based on the idea that talent should define the boundaries of jobs and that organisations should organise their work around the available talents. This corresponds with the perspective of some authors that talent management is not about filling vacancies or finding job applicants that fit job descriptions, but that it should be about identifying talents that can contribute to the strategic goals of the organisation (Visser and van der Sluis, 2008).

“the way in which individuals define themselves at work, which describes the attributes and the more holistic conception that people have of themselves at work” (Wrzesniewski and Dutton, 2001, p. 180). So, job crafting allows employees to have more autonomy. Moreover, it can contribute to a stronger sense of belonging and more meaning at work, all described by Hoogendoorn and Vos (2006) as important facets of the talent-based organisation. It is also associated with personal development and more pleasure at work (Visser, 2009) and a more positive self-image, increased readiness to change and increased perceptions of control (Lyons, 2008).

However, job crafting is seen to be pro-active behaviour, so employees make changes on their own initiative, and proactive behaviours at work are most likely performed by employees who have a proactive nature (Tims et al., 2012). Management does not have a direct influence on the process of job crafting (Visser, 2009). Therefore, with only pro-active employees crafting their jobs, the organisation will not become talent-based. Furthermore, the changes that job crafters make are mainly focussed on improving the person–job fit (Tims et al, 2012). Thus, job crafting originates from a job description. Talent-based organisation aims to obliterate job descriptions in the first place. So, talent-based organisation aims to organise work around employee talents (Visser and van der Sluis, 2008). It starts from people’s drives, strengths and natural inclinations. Talent-based organisations aspires to remove possible obstacles in order to release people’s energy and to add meaning to what people are going through. It calls upon people’s strengths, self-confidence and authenticity. Moreover, people are encouraged to discover the limits of their competences and to involve in learning. Feedback, coaching and empathy help facilitating people’s ownership of their own learning process and to direct it towards their own learning goals.

Furthermore, the concept of the network organisation can become important. In this type of organisation, employees are enabled to form temporary teams based on the talents that are needed to perform the job. Employees in this way create their own jobs, based on their talents, ambitions and personal values and it is the job of leaders to direct, stimulate and coach their employees.

Furthermore, it can be deduced from the description that leadership also holds a significant position in the case of implementing talent-based organisation. This style of organising requires some specific leadership behaviours and a people-oriented mindset. Therefore, leadership is expected to have a major impact on the implementation of this organisational style.

2.2 Expected Implementation Success

Implementation success can be defined as the impact of the new “system” on the organisation (e.g. Wang et al., 2008; Egeland, 2009). In this case, implementation success means that tasks are assigned based on employee talents. It means increased job satisfaction, higher productivity and less turnover and absenteeism. However, as only very few organisation have attempted to implement the talent-based design yet, it will be impossible to measure implementation success. Therefore, the term expected implementation success will be used, as it emphasizes the exploratory nature of the study.

2.3 Organisational Culture

Organisational culture has been defined by a wide range of authors. Most of them share a focus on shared beliefs, values and assumptions. In this paper, the definition as provided by Desphbande and Webster (1989) will be followed: “The pattern of shared values and beliefs that help individuals understand organisational functions and thus provide them norms for behaviour in the organisation” (p.4). Several authors have created dimensions of organisational culture (e.g. Hofstede et al., 1990; O’Reilly et al., 1991; Gordon and DiTomaso, 1992; Denison and Mishra, 1995; Hurley and Hult, 1998; Van Muijen et al., 1999; Van den Berg and Wilderom, 2004). Considerable overlap between these dimensions exists. Two studies, namely that of Van den Berg and Wilderom (2004) and Morrison et al. (2006) have attempted to combine overlapping dimensions into a new overview. In this study, these two overviews were merged, generating eight cultural dimensions (which can be found in Appendix A). Three of these will be investigated in this study and labels established by Morrison et al. (2006) will be used, as these were found to be the most comprehensible.

This triggers feelings of affect towards the organisation, which creates an obligation to care about the welfare of the organisation and to help it achieve its goals (Hurley and Hult, 1998; Rafferty and Simons, 2006). So, perceived organisational support enhances employee commitment to the implementation project and makes them adopt a positive attitude towards change (Rafferty and Simons, 2006; Self et al., 2007; Ke and Wei, 2008). Participation and involvement are also well-known strategies to prevent resistance from arising (Kotter and Schlesinger, 2008). Moreover, this type of culture is already familiar with the values that are important for talent-based organisation. Therefore, it is expected that a high degree of people orientation is positively related to implementation success.

2. The degree of formalisation, structure, control, and bureaucracy: deals with the application of rules, regulations and direct supervision to manage employee behaviour (Van der Post et al., 1997; Delobbe et al., 2002). It emphasizes concepts such as respect for authority, rationality of procedures, hierarchical structures, and division of work. It pertains to the level of autonomy that employees have in performing their job (Van Muijen et al., 1999; Van den Berg and Wilderom, 2004). As talent-based organisation aims to reduce hierarchy and to increase employee autonomy, it can be expected that a culture with little formalisation enhances implementation success. Moreover, implementation of a new organisational style is likely to disrupt existing procedures. Employees that are used to work autonomously (empowered employees) are better capable to make ad hoc decisions in response to these changes and to be responsible for their behaviour (Kei and Wei, 2008). Furthermore, flexible policies and procedures were found to be positively related with readiness for corporate transformation changes (Rafferty and Simons, 2006). Therefore, it is believed that a low degree of formalisation will be positively related to implementation success.

2.4 Leadership

A factor that has been described to be critical in enabling and driving change is the leadership within an organisation (e.g. Denning, 2005; Pfeffer, 2005; Gilley et al., 2008; Kotter, 2007). In this study, the reference to “leadership” or “leaders” implies all levels of leaders and managers within the organisation. Leadership can influence and remove barriers to change and stimulate the work environment to think and act innovatively (Gilley et al., 2008). Several skills and leadership behaviours have been found to be relevant during change projects (e.g. Sirkin et al., 2005; Kotter, 2007; Szabla, 2007; Gilley et al., 2008). In this study, three of these will be investigated:

1. Ability to formulate a vision and create support for it: According to Kotter (2007) a picture of the future is present in every successful transformation. The goal of a vision is to clarify the direction in which an organisation is moving and should appeal to the important stakeholders (Kotter, 2007), in this case especially the employees. The vision enables the organisation to create a sense of belonging amongst employees (Schoemaker, 2003b). When employees are not aware of, or do not support, the vision, it will become impossible to make them change their behaviour (Kotter, 2007; Ford et al., 2008). Change can only happen when a great amount of people are willing to help (Kotter, 2007) and the vision can persuade this critical mass, as it legitimizes the change, makes sense of ongoing developments and calls people to action (Ford et al., 2008). The vision should convince people that successful change is possible. Furthermore, the vision can prevent a change effort to dissolve into a range of conflicting projects (Kotter, 2007). For these reasons, it is expected that the ability to formulate a vision and create support for it will have a positive effect on implementation success.

Also, empowerment inspires employees to proactively participate in the project (Ke and Wei, 2008). As the goal is to give more autonomy to employees, it is wise to start sharing power and empowering employees from the beginning (Schoemaker, 2003a). Furthermore, encouraging employees to experiment within the new setting, to develop new ideas and to provide leadership helps to involve large numbers of people and reduce resistance (Kotter, 2007; Kotter and Schlesinger, 2008). So, it is expected that power sharing (empowerment) and role modelling by leaders positively effects implementation success.

3. Ability to coach: Coaching in this case is defined as ”a manager providing one-on-one feedback and insights aimed at guiding and inspiring improvements in an employee’s work performance” (Heslin et al., 2006, p.874). Leaders who coach help employees “improve their renewal capacity and resilience” (Gilley et al., 2008, p.157) and it enables employees to bring out the best in themselves. This is in line with the goal of talent-based organisation. Furthermore, it allows managers to support employees in implementing changes and gives them the opportunity to incorporate their ideas (Gilley et al., 2008). Moreover, coaching is believed to increase an employee’s self-efficacy expectancies (Moen and Allgood, 2009). Self-efficacy is defined as an overarching judgment of an individuals’ performance capability (Gist and Mitchell, 1992). In a change situation, people evaluate what can be done to manage that situation. The higher their self-efficacy, the more people believe they can deal with the situation and that they can achieve successful change (Rafferty and Simons, 2006). It is found that self-efficacy is positively related to readiness for change (Rafferty and Simons, 2006). Therefore, the ability to coach is expected to be positively related to implementation success.

A graphical representation of these hypotheses leads to the conceptual model as shown below:

- The degree of people-orientation - The degree of formalisation and control - The importance of people competency & learning

Expected Implementation Succes

Dimensions of Organisational Culture Leadership Abilities

- The ability to formulate a vision and create support - The ability to involve others and role model

- The ability to coach

3. METHOD

In order to answer the research question about how to get to the talent-based organisation, qualitative data was collected with the use of in-depth interviews. This type of data is especially appropriate when the goal is to obtain insight into participants’ perspectives (Flick, 2006), which is the case in this research. This section describes the processes of data collection and data analysis.

3.1 Data Collection

The first step in collecting data was to interview the three initiators of the project. These sessions were meant to obtain further understanding about the project, talent-based organisation and important factors when implementing this organisational form. After constructing the hypotheses from the literature, interviews for the qualitative analysis were performed.

Respondents

In order to obtain a complete view of the opinions and developments related to talent-based organisation, it was decided to select a wide array of participants for the research sample. Interviews have been performed in six organisations, which were classified to belong to one of three categories:

- Category A: organisations highly interested in talent-based organisation which are at the verge of transforming their organisations or already performing talent-based organisation; - Category B: organisations that are interested in talent-based organisation but which feel

unable to transform their organisations;

- Category C: ‘traditional’ organisations that have not indicated to be interested in talent-based organisation.

These categories have been defined beforehand, and organisations were selected to fit into these categories. During the interviews, this classification was verified with the participant.

Procedure

After determining the categories of organisations to approach, organisations from the network of the commissioning companies were selected. They performed the initial invitations for participation. All responded affirmative. After this, an e-mail was send in order to schedule the interviews.

Interviews

Interviews were performed face to face. When allowed, interviews were audio recorded (one participant preferred not to be recorded). Interviews were semi-structured and the goal was to receive in-depth information about talent-based organisation. The interview guide was used only to ensure completeness of the information gathered. During the interviews, an active membership role was taken by the interviewer. With active membership, the researcher clearly moves away from the marginally involved role of the traditional participant observer and assumes a more central position in the setting. This facilitates trust and acceptance of the researcher, but increases the identification of the researcher with members of the setting. Active-member-researchers may interact as colleagues: co-participants in a joint endeavour (Adler and Adler, 1987).

The interview consisted of several sections, starting with a short introduction by both the interviewer and the interviewee. The body of the interview consisted of three parts: (a) one part about talent management and talent-based organisation in general, (b) one part about cultural dimensions relevant for implementation success and (c) one part about leadership abilities relevant for implementation success. Every part started with an unstructured session (with room for brainstorming) and ended with a semi-structured session in which more specific questions about operationalised concepts were asked. The concluding section was used to reflect on the findings and to deal with issues as follow-up, anonymity and the sharing of results.

3.2 Participant Characteristics

As stated before, six different organisations were invited to participate in this research. In order to give a complete view of the participants, a description of these organisations will be provided:

- Organisation A1: This organisation provides consultancy services to their clients. Their mission is to improve the financial functioning of their clients’ businesses, and provide advice and support with managing their organisation, controlling costs and dealing with opportunities and risks. The organisation has 150 employees, working in different niches such as risk management, performance management and financial services.

- Organisation B1: This is a medium-sized enterprise in the consultancy business. Their goal is to support organisations in determining their vision, developing a strategy, controlling the processes and managing quality. The main sectors they operate in are the care sector, the insurance sector and the industry sector. B1 employs 60 people and has been ranked fourth in the Great Place to Work for three years.

- Organisation B2: B2 is a governmental organisation that is charged with the execution of educational legislation. Their main tasks consist of paying educational institutions, granting and providing student grants and loans, collecting tuition fees and debts, and organising the process of application to universities and colleges. Around 1800 employees are currently working in this organisation.

- Organisation C1: This organisation is a local governmental organisation in the province of Drenthe.

- Organisation C2: This is a bank with 140 offices all through the Netherlands. Interviews were performed in one of the northern offices. In this specific office, around 150 people are employed.

In each organisation, employees from three different backgrounds were interviewed, namely one manager, one HRM-officer and one work floor employee. This prevented the research to be based on one-sided views. Within these categories, participants were selected based on their willingness and availability. Participation in this research was on a voluntary basis and participants in this study remained anonymous.

One exception was made, as one of the organisations (A1) does not use job descriptions. In this case, it was decided to only interview two employees, as it was expected that a third interview would not add new information or insights. This brings the total amount of participants to be 17. Of these participants 59% was male, 41% was female. The age of the respondents in this research is distributed as follows: 18% of the respondents has an age between 21 and 30; 47% has an age between 31 and 40; 29% has an age between 41 and 50; and 6% has an age above 50 .

3.3 Data Analysis

In this study, data is analysed with the technique of theoretical coding in order to capture the relationships between different concepts. By analysing data with the use of coding, it is possible to develop a grounded theory (Flick, 2006).

2006). Then the coding process for grounded theory was started, as described by Baarda (2009) and Flick (2006). Within the text, information units were filtered out and fragments were classified. Irrelevant fragments, those parts of the interviews that did not deal with organisational culture, leadership or implementation of talent-based organisation, were filtered out and remaining fragments were labelled (open coding) line-by line in the margins of the transcripts. Concepts deduced from the conceptual model were used for coding, but also codes that were developed during the process of coding. Furthermore, during this phase, memos were used in order to capture relevant quotations, emerging themes not captured in the conceptual model and contradictory opinions. When this task was finished, all codes were listed. Comparable and overlapping codes were combined and then organized into categories (axial coding). Results from this process can be found in Appendix C. The categories can be subdivided in two groups, categories dealing with organisational culture and categories dealing with leadership abilities. These two labels are used for selective coding.

Preliminary findings were discussed with the commissioning companies. The goal was to discuss the dimensions of organisational culture that were not in the conceptual model, but that were spontaneously mentioned by at least eight of the respondents when asked which cultural aspects were important for implementation success. It was decided to report on these results separately, as providing this information will add to the goal of this research, namely to contribute to the development of talent-based organisations. Hence, the transcripts were assessed a second time, in order to capture not only information related to the conceptual model, but all information related to successfully implementing talent-based organisations. As not all respondents were asked about these dimensions, it was decided not to incorporate them in the conceptual model. For the same reason, findings from the memos, which did not deal with either cultural or leadership aspects, were also coded and dealt with separately. These codes dealt with impediments to the implementation of talent-based organisation (information that was deemed relevant for the commissioning companies) and were handled as additional findings.

4. RESULTS

The goal of this research was to assess which factors influence the implementation success of talent-based organisation, focussing on dimensions of organisational culture and leadership abilities. This section will present the findings derived from the codes obtained from the interview transcripts. First of all, an overview of findings on organisational culture linked to the conceptual model will be described. Then, additional findings are presented. After this, the same will be done for leadership skills. After every subparagraph, an analysis of the differences and similarities between Category A, B and C respondents will be made.

4.1 Organisational Culture

In this section, the findings on the selected dimensions will be presented. The codes and scores on these codes for every dimension are presented in Appendix C. The labels for cultural dimensions that were used in order to select which dimensions to investigate (those by Morrison et al., 2006), were also used as categories for the codes found during the data analysis.

4.1.1 Organisational culture dimensions from the conceptual model The orientation of people management

When trying to describe the culture that would be most appropriate to implement talent-based organisation, it was unanimously stated that it is and will be very important to have a strong level of trust, both among employees as well as between management and employees. Category A and B organisations argued that mutual trust was one of the prerequisites to successfully implement talent-based organisation. In order to implement a change that constitutes a new manner of working, there must be a strong belief that every employee has something to contribute to the organisation and the conviction that every colleague will act professionally and responsibly. As one respondent (category A) stated: “Every person is trustworthy and complete, that’s our belief.” Category C organisations added that a lack of trust was one of the reasons why managers were experiencing difficulties in delegating work to subordinates and to provide them with autonomy in their work.

According to category A and B respondents, a culture in which these values are promoted is a culture that illustrates people are treasured by the organisation. According to one category B respondent: “The most important resource is the employees. They need to feel comfortable and happy.” Not only is this expected to reduce resistance, it is also the basis from which to start talent-based organisation in the first place. Therefore, a high degree of people orientation was seen to be a prerequisite for implementation success.

The degree of formalisation, structure, control, and bureaucracy

Opinions about the degree of formalisation, structure, control and bureaucracy were contradictory. About 26% of the respondents argued that rules not necessarily impede the implementation of talent-based organisation. One of the organisations already applying talent-based organisation (A1) stated that it is imperative to have clear agreements: “If you’re not able to respect the agreement of not parking your car in front of the building, how can we trust you to respect agreements made with the client?” According to these respondents, rules or agreements could be used to set the boundaries in which to operate. However, they also agreed that within these boundaries not every task should be caught in formalised procedures.

Autonomy and flexibility were rated important during the implementation of talent-based organisation. First of all, providing employees with autonomy demonstrates they are trusted. Second, it is believed that employees that are allowed to work autonomously will feel a greater sense of responsibility for their outcomes. Furthermore, it enables them to perform their jobs in their own manner, with their specific talents, and to deal with the change in a way they feel comfortable with. According to 88% of the respondents, autonomy was at the base of talent-based organisation and a precondition for implementation success. Next to that, they mentioned that flexible policies and procedures are needed in order to support the autonomously operating employees, both for implementation success as well as for talent-based organisation to persist.

The importance of people competency and training

Implementing talent-based organisation should be done with the intention to allow employees to fully realize their potential. In order to achieve this, employees must be willing to invest in themselves and to feel a drive to develop their capabilities. Furthermore, when enabling individuals to work from their strengths, it is important for people to determine what these strengths are, but also for them to discover the limits of their competences. In order to do so, employees should involve in learning. Therefore, 82% of the respondents believed a strong drive to develop oneself to be essential for people to be able to work from their talents, and to enable them to deal with the change. It was also added that by respondents from organisations A2, B1 and B2 that organisations that value learning and development are used to remove obstacles for their employees and to support and facilitate them to grow, both personally and professionally. This means they will be better able to remove obstacles and provide support during the change. Employees in such an organisation are used to taking responsibility for their own development. As the three respondents from organisation B1 stated: “In order to be able to organise around talents, every employee should feel a strong, intrinsic drive to develop and discover these talents, as not everyone is aware of the fact that they possess valuable hidden talents.” For these two reasons, a culture that values individual learning is seen to be positively influencing the implementation success of talent-based organisation. Out of the three respondents (18%) that did not believe learning to be very important, two came from organisation A1. They claimed: “I don’t think the drive for personal development is what made me and my colleagues commit to this organisation. We focus on those aspects we do well, and we help each other in getting even better at it. Feedback is given and asked by everyone.” This comment illustrates that, even though they claimed that learning was not especially relevant for them, they engage in learning and employee development and that they perceive learning and development to be normal.

Furthermore, when discussing this dimension of organisational culture, organisational learning was mentioned to be vital as well. This will be further explained in the next section.

aimed for less hierarchy. As stated before, learning was found to be important by all respondents, except those from organisation A1 and one respondent from organisation C1

Combining the answers on the constructs that belong to every dimension, has led to the following answers: 100% believed a people-orientation to contribute to talent-based organisation; 71% believed a low degree of formalisation to positively influence implementation success and 82% regarded learning to be important for successful implementation. The distribution of these percentages is shown below.

People-orientation 29% 35% 0% 36% Formalisation 18% 29% 24% 29% Learning 18% 35% 29% 18%

Figure 3: Answers on relevance of cultural dimensions divided per category

4.1.2 Organisational culture dimensions not mentioned in the conceptual model

As stated before, this section will deal with dimensions of organisational culture that were not in the conceptual model, but were spontaneously mentioned by at least eight of the respondents.

A second additional finding about organisational culture relates to the degree of cooperation, integration and teamwork between departments. Category A en B respondents (65%) have underlined the importance of employees being able to find each other. In order to deploy employee talents to benefit the organisation, employees need to know each others talents. Several respondents from these two categories mentioned their organisation to work with some sort of internal network structure. When a task needs to be done, people who are believed to be able to contribute to the task are asked for help, or will offer their help themselves. But if employees are unaware of each others talents, or are only familiar with the talents of colleagues in their own department, the full potential and strength of the available human capital will never be exploited. “If I don’t know that one of my colleagues has a passion and talent for photography, I will hire an external, and expensive, photographer for our new website.” Hence, strong cooperation, integration and interdepartmental contact are needed in order to enable talent-based organisation.

Lastly, it was stressed by 71% of the respondents that the organisation as a whole should have an emphasis on goals and outcomes, rather than on tasks and procedures. Category C organisations mentioned an emphasis on the latter to be a great impediment for the implementation of talent-based organisation. This is closely related to the leadership ability of empowerment and being able to delegate some control to subordinates, which will be further illustrated below.

In short, a high degree of risk tolerance, a high degree of integration and cooperation and focus on results are believed to positively influence implementation success. All respondents from category A and B, and half of category C, mentioned risk tolerance to be important in order to successfully implement talent-based organisation. It were also mostly category A and B participants that mentioned the dimension of integration (only one participant from category C spoke about this concept). In the case of organisational focus, answers were divided over all three categories. A graphical representation of the distribution is shown below.

Risk Tolerance 18% 35% 29% 18% Integration 24% 35% 6% 35% Focus Results 29% 24% 18% 29%

4.2 Leadership

In this section, the findings on the selected leadership abilities will be presented. The codes and scores on these codes for every leadership skill are presented in Appendix C. The labels for these abilities, were also used as categories for the codes found during the data analysis.

4.2.1 Leadership skills from the conceptual model Ability to formulate a vision and create support for it

Three-quarters of the respondents agreed that in order to successfully implement a change in general, and talent-based organisation specifically, the entire organisation had to be aware of the vision behind this change. However, category A and B organisations strongly emphasized the idea behind talent-based organisation to be a vision in itself. It describes the beliefs of the organisation about people in general, about its employees and the value of their talents and capabilities. According to these organisations, the assumptions behind talent-based organisation, such as the regard that employees provide the human capital with which to create competitive advantage, the belief that every person possesses a talent that can be deployed in favour of the organisation and the idea that each employee is capable of, and feels responsibility towards, contributing to the organisation, should not only be known by every employee but should be seen as the organisational paradigm from which to work. A collective ambition must be established to focus on development of the human capital by allowing employees to discover, expand and deploy their talents. As formulated by a category B respondent: “Only when you know where the organisation desires to go, you can reflect on your own added value during the journey.”

So to conclude, not only should a vision about talent-based organisation be clear to all employees, it is believed that the underlying assumptions should be fully alive to the entire organisation in order to successfully implement talent-based organisation. It must be incorporated into its culture.

Ability to involve others & role model

The concept most mentioned (by all respondents) as a precondition for successful implementation of talent-based organisation, was empowerment. First of all, the lack of empowerment was seen to be a sign of distrust. Managers are then seen to disbelieve that their employees possess enough or the right skills to appropriately perform their job. As one category A respondent formulated it: “Stop patronizing your employees. They are able to buy a house and raise kids, so they absolutely will be able to deal with your business!” Furthermore, empowerment enables a sense of ownership of the change project by the employees. This will enlarge an employee’s drive to achieve success, as he will feel responsible for it. It must be said however, that this is only true if the change is seen to be legitimized and the goals are internalized by the employee (as stated before). As one A1-respondent said: “You will always take better care of your own baby than you will of your bosses’ kid.” In addition, empowerment allows employees to provide input, modify the direction of the change and deal with the consequences of the change. It also permits them to discover their talents and their weaknesses. Lastly, talent-based organisations are organisations that consider their human capital to be of utmost importance. Therefore, it must provide its employees with opportunities to deploy their talents, something which cannot be done if their behaviour is strictly regulated and supervised. The proposition that it is essential for managers to ‘walk the walk’ (do as they say) was supported by all of the respondents. However, only 48% believed it to be more important during this specific change than during any other change. According to the majority of this 48%, walking the walk would not be a problem for managers, as they are supposed to fully agree with the message they convey. Concluding, empowerment, involvement and role modelling are seen to positively influence implementation success. An interesting finding in this area was that this leadership behaviour not only directly influences implementation success, but also helps to (further) enlarge the degree of people-orientation in an organisational culture. Therefore, this ability both directly and indirectly affects implementation success.

Ability to coach

coached by his manager. Therefore, the majority of the respondents (59%) believed that managers/leaders not automatically need to engage in coaching. However, the importance of coaching was unanimously agreed upon. Coaching helps people to alter behaviour, to develop new skills, to receive feedback and to discover their talents. But this does not mean coaching should be done by a manager. In both category A en B organisations, every employee was coached by co-workers. One respondent stated: “Talent-based organisation is especially suited to transfer some tasks to employees. A manager does not necessarily have to be the best coach, so why not involve that employee that has attained a degree in coaching?” Managers can contribute to the establishment of these coaching relationships between colleagues and they may also need to ascertain that feedback-arrangements are in place.

Another side of the ability to coach was also uncovered. Even though a manager does not necessarily has to coach his employees, it was believed by 82% of the respondents that managers that possess the coaching mindset would be far more successful in implementing talent-based organisation. Having a coaching mindset was described as having (a) a strong people-orientation, meaning being interested in people in general and caring for employees’ ambitions, interests and passions; (b) being able to lead servantly and act as a facilitator for employees to develop themselves; and (c) being able to subordinate their interests to those of the employees and the organisation. This mindset leads to expressions of consideration for employees, and might lead to coaching behaviours such as showing them concern, respect, appreciation, and support. This assists managers with uncovering employee talents, passions and ambitions, manage these talents, encourage employees to organise work around their talents and help them deal with the consequences of the change project. Therefore, the coaching mindset was found to positively influence implementation success.

Vision 34% 24% 24% 18% Empowerment 29% 35% 0% 36% Coaching Mindset 35% 18% 18% 29%

Figure 5: Answers on relevance of leadership abilities divided per category

4.2.2 Leadership skills not mentioned in the conceptual model

As mentioned before, a culture that tolerates some degree of risk was seen to be essential in order to implement talent-based organisation. According to 54% of the respondents, leadership plays a vital role in the enlargement of tolerance for risk and change. Therefore, the ability to cope with risk is seen to be an important leadership skill. It influences implementation success both directly and indirectly via organisational culture.

Secondly, 48% of the respondents expected leaders to be able to reflect on their own added value. Talent-based organisation aims to deploy people at tasks in which they can provide the most added value. Therefore, leadership should be able to reflect on their own skills as well. In some cases, another person might be better suited to do the job, and leadership must be able to allow this. Furthermore, leadership must keep an open-mind in dealing with the consequences of the change. As one respondent stated (category B): “Kgotla, an African leadership style, would be perfectly suited for a talent-based organisation. As long as your followers believe you’re a good leader, you stay. Otherwise, someone else can take that role. It’s a sort of situational leadership, which might be quite difficult for leaders that do not want to loose their status or salary.”

In short, the ability to cope with risk; the ability to reflect on one’s own added value; and the ability to organise the change process are believed to positively influence implementation success. Comments about risk tolerance were made by all categories, as shown below. Statements about self-reflection mostly came from category A and B organisations. Category C respondents emphasized the significance of managing the implementation process, which was supported by one A2-respondent and 3 respondents from category B. An overview of the distribution of answers per category is presented below. Risk Tolerance 24% 46% 12% 18% Reflection 24% 18% 52% 6% Organise Process 6% 18% 24% 52%

Figure 6: Comments on additional leadership abilities divided per category

4.3 Additional Findings

Secondly, 41% believed that the organisation had to change its manner of handling talents. According to these respondents, the organisation had not yet uncovered every employee’s talent, was not able to strategically think about the talents needed for the organisation or had not found a way to deploy employee talents for the benefit of the organisation. Without a comprehensive insight into the available and needed talents, talent-based organisation cannot be implemented.

Lastly, differences of opinion arose about the appropriateness of talent-based organisation for various types of organisations. During the interviews, respondents from category C organisations emphasized that they expected difficulties when implementing talent-based organisation due to the nature of the work that had to be performed and the environment in which these organisations operate. Both organisation C1 and C2 have to function under strict legal and regulatory requirements. This is seen to be an impediment to the implementation of talent-based organisation by five out of six category C respondents. Furthermore, one respondent from organisation C1 mentioned the nature of some of the work to be repetitive and routine, thereby not allowing employees to deploy their talents. These two reasons contributed to the belief of category C organisations that talent-based organisation would be inappropriate for them. One respondent from organisation A2 and two from organisation B1 also expressed sentiments of doubt as to the applicability of talent-based organisation. All three were of the opinion that talent-based organisation would be most suited to organisations in which highly educated professionals provide services to clients.

On the other hand, organisation B2 also operates in an environment bounded by legal and regulatory requirements and has to deal with repetitive and routine work as well. All three interviewees in this organisation still considered talent-based organisation to be appropriate for their organisation. This organisation has been able to develop its own manner of combining both standardized work with talent-based projects. It customized the concept of talent-based organisation to fit its specific needs. This conviction was also demonstrated by organisation A1, in which both respondents claimed that every organisation can benefit from talent-based organisation in its own manner. The example of the Morning Star Company, the world’s largest tomato processor (Hamel 2011), confirms this belief. This organisation performs routine and repetitive work and still applies talent-based organisation. This example will be further elaborated on in the next chapter.

5. DISCUSSION

The goal of this research was to discover in what way organisations can successfully implement talent-based organisation, thereby contributing to the development of talent-based organisations. As a transition towards this new way of organising includes a great amount of aspects, it was decided to choose two possible influencing factors, namely organisational culture and leadership abilities. From the interviews, findings were derived that contributed to a description of the most appropriate organisational culture and leadership style for the successful implementation of talent-based organisation. It was unanimously agreed that the organisational culture should be a people-oriented one, in which employees are highly valued, supported and stimulated. Employees must feel committed, trusted and empowered. Leaders should contribute to this type of culture by trusting their employees, truly empowering them and involving them in the decision-making processes. Respondents added to the formulation of a conceptual model by describing a culture that displays a high degree of people-orientation; a low degree of formalisation; a focus on learning; tolerance for risk-taking and experimenting behaviour; a high degree of cooperation and integration and a focus on goals and outcomes instead of procedures. It was found that leadership should be able to communicate the new paradigm and convince others of its value; empower the employees, involve them in the process and let them work autonomously; set the right example; facilitate and support employees; cope with risk, uncertainty and lesser degrees of control; reflect on one’s own value; and organise and balance the change process with financial performance.

The findings have led to a model with which to describe in what way organisational culture and leadership dimensions influence the implementation of talent-based organisation, as shown below:

- High degree of people-orientation - Low degree of formalisation and control - Focus on people competency and learning - High degree of flexibility and risk tolerance

- Emphasis on outcomes and goals - High degree of cooperation between departments

Expected Implementation Succes

Dimensions of Organisational Culture Leadership Abilities

- The ability to formulate a vision and create support - The ability to involve others and role model

- The ability to coach - The ability to cope with risk - The ability to reflect on own added value - The ability to organise the change process

As stated before, this study has focussed on discovering which cultural and leadership aspects should be in place in order to successfully implement talent-based organisation. However, the findings have provided a broader perspective than the importance of cultural and leadership prerequisites for successful implementation. Not only do the findings enable organisations to create the right preconditions for successfully implementing talent-based organisation, it was also strongly emphasized that talent-based organisation is much more than a manner in which to organise work. Two interesting conclusions can be drawn. First of all, it was found that talent-based organisation assumes a pro-social, people-oriented manner of working. It is based on a positive view of people and human nature, believing that everyone is trustworthy, complete, equal and gifted with at least one talent from which the organisation can benefit. Even stronger, it is built upon the conviction that organisations cannot exist without the employees and that remarkable performance stems from the unique talents and the unique network of every single employee. It can be said that talent-based organisation assumes identical values as those described in McGregor’s Theory Y, in which the author states that it is the task of management to enable people to recognize and develop characteristics such as “the potential for development, the capacity for assuming responsibility, and the readiness to direct behaviour toward organizational goals” (p.11) for themselves (McGregor, 2000). Therefore, talent-based organisation is well-suited for those organisations that belief in these assumptions, in the strength of their employees, and that allow them to do what they do best.

5.1 Theoretical Implications

The findings of this study contribute to the change literature in several ways. First of all, the current findings have confirmed both general change management literature and innovation literature by agreeing with the importance of a low degree of formalisation and a focus on learning (as described by e.g. Hurley and Hult, 1998; Kei and Wei, 2008; Morrison et al., 2006). The insight that a high degree of people-orientation is essential for implementation success combines findings about the significance of participative decision-making, commitment, support and collaboration (by e.g. Hurley and Hult, 1998; Kei and Wei, 2008; Morrison et al., 2006). Furthermore, the insights derived from the interviews allow for new dimensions to be added to the conceptual model, such as the degree of flexibility and risk tolerance, an emphasis on goals and outcomes and a high degree of cooperation and integration. This study did not aim to investigate these dimensions, but due to the exploratory interview style, the respondents confirmed the propositions of e.g. Hurley and Hult (1998), Ke and Wei (2008), and Morrison et al. (2006) that these dimensions are vital for innovative change and implementation success.

Secondly, this research adds to the literature already available on relevant leadership abilities for implementing change. Previous studies have indicated that coaching, communication, involving others and stimulating cooperation (amongst others) are necessary for leading change (e.g. Gill 2003; Gilley et al., 2008). This research supports past research, confirming that a leader’s ability to create a environment of support for the change, and involvement and commitment of the employees are critical for implementation success (e.g. Bowen and Ostroff, 2004; Hebda et al., 2007; Seibert et al., 2004). However, it nuances the emphasis that is placed on the ability to coach. Coaching by leadership is seen to bring out the best in people and supports employees when facing the challenges arising from the change (Gilley et al., 2008). This research does not disagree with the effects of coaching, but with the assumption that coaching necessarily has to be done by leaders. On the other hand, it agreed with the proposal that leaders with a coaching mindset might be more capable of successfully implementing talent-based organisation. Furthermore, it emphasized the idea that for change to be implemented, leaders might need to focus their coaching behaviours more on themselves than on their employees.

change projects (e.g. Sirkin et al., 2005), none of them have dealt directly with the balancing of time, money and attention spent on change projects versus normal business by leadership.

Lastly, the research adds to the subject of communicating a change vision. Several authors have stated that a clear, and common sense of direction is necessary in order to successfully implement change (e.g. Kotter, 2007; Gilley et al., 2008). This study confirms and expands that idea. It was found that in order to successfully implement this specific change employees must not only be aware of the change direction, but also of the values, assumptions and convictions underlying the change.

5.2 Practical Implications

The findings allow for some interesting recommendations for the implementers of talent-based organisation. It can be concluded that talent-based organisation is not achieved by transforming the organisational culture into one that is highly people-oriented, risk tolerant and flexible, nor by hiring or training leaders to empower, coach and involve their employees. It is believed that talent-based organisation starts with a collective ambition (Ready and Truelove, 2011). A collective ambition is described as “a summary of how leaders and employees think about why they exist, what they hope to accomplish, how they will collaborate to achieve their ambition, and how their brand promise aligns with their core values” (Ready and Truelove, 2011, p.96). Many organisations have not thought about why they exist (Sinek, 2009), which leaves the employees without a set of values to relate to (Chalofsky, 2003) and difficulties to give meaning to their work (Schoemaker, 2003b). Moreover, a collective ambition guides employees in deciding in which way they can employ their talents in the most valuable manner for achieving the ambition (Mehciz, 2012).