Talent management in a context: four empirical essays

Recent research has determined that talent management is a highly context-sensitive phenomenon. Indeed, the way talent is defined and managed varies from one context to another. Although talent management has been studied for the last two decades, the majority of scientific works still focus on the context of large multinational corporations with a prevalence of managerial views. Therefore, this thesis aims to contribute to the literature by challenging the dominant understandings of talent management through examining the phenomenon in the contexts that are less explored. To that end, four empirical studies were conducted constituting this thesis. The first study explores how talent is defined and managed in the not-for-profit sector. Based on the interviews with 34 leaders of 34 mission-driven organizations, it offers a unique definition of a talent and an understanding of how TM is implemented in this sector. The second study analytically contextualizes talent management in micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises. Based on 31 interviews with TM leaders of 27 aerospace companies, this research proposes three types of TM in this context, namely “strategic”, “entrepreneurial” and “ad hoc”. The third study, in the context of the high technology industry, explores understanding of talent management not only from the perspective of managers but also that of talent. It is based on the discussions with 20 managers and 20 talents from the aerospace industry and identifies three views on TM: talents’, managers’ and shared. Finally, the fourth study explores gender differences in quitting intentions of talent in the knowledge-based field. Drawing on the survey responses from 119 talented individuals, it shows that gender moderates relationships between talent intention to quit and its main antecedents. This thesis provides an important theoretical contribution to the talent management literature and offers useful practical implications for organizational leaders, managers, talented individuals and policy-makers.