TALENT MANAGEMENT: A Conceptual Framework For The Construction Industry

End-Assignment Enschede (29-01-2013)

“Winning the Race for Talent in the Construction Industry. How to keep the correct players to the correct positions? Anticipating or Designing Tomorrow?” Abstract The construction market constantly struggles to find the ideal balance between the exploration and exploitation forces which affect directly the innovation capabilities of the industry. The aforementioned issue is like trying to solve the so called Competition Policy dilemma in a dynamic environment where construction firms collaborate and simultaneously compete to charter, acquire and retain their brilliant minds. In particular, graduate programs, several cycles of pre-hiring training and interviews hamper the initial enthusiasm of candidates. If construction firms do not articulate clearly the spirit of pre-occupation with what is the match wanted from both sides; the employer and the employee, this demand and supply gap in all levels; industry (macro), organization (meso), and individual (micro), will not be bridged. The purpose of this article is to provide a practical framework linking the work abilities (Human Resources) with the insight of the construction work environment and make interconnections with all the talent-analytics around the pipeline. The framework selects specific change drivers and will aid to develop a comprehensive end-to-end process illustrating the transition from poor practices to best, and latter on to implementation challenges. Hopefully, this framework will induce academic research on exploring applications of Complex Production Systems and High Reliability Organizations in the work of HR professionals. Key-words: Talent management, Construction industry, Talent analytics

Managing Human Resource Flows (194120090) UT. / M-BA DIMITRIOS KORDAS (M-CME/s1231901)

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Contents “Winning the Race for Talent in the Construction Industry. How to keep the correct

players to the correct positions? Anticipating or Designing Tomorrow?” ............................ 1

1. Introduction .................................................................................................................. 4

2. Background ................................................................................................................... 5

2.1 Denmark-case ................................................................................................................... 5

2.2 France-case ...................................................................................................................... 5

2.3 Netherlands-case ............................................................................................................. 6

2.4 Germany-case .................................................................................................................. 6

2.4 Portugal-case ................................................................................................................... 6

3. Situation analysis .......................................................................................................... 7

4. Scenario planning ......................................................................................................... 8

5. Naming the pain ......................................................................................................... 11

6. Problem statement ..................................................................................................... 12

7. The relevance triangle ................................................................................................ 12

7.1 Strategy to create competitive advantages................................................................ 14

7.2 Strategic implications for talent ................................................................................. 15

7.3 Talent pool strategy .................................................................................................... 15

7.4 Talent Management systems ..................................................................................... 16

7.5 Talent practices .......................................................................................................... 17

8. A tool for thinking (TM Framework) ........................................................................... 19

9. Managerial implications ............................................................................................. 20

10. Further discussion ...................................................................................................... 22


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Executive Summary Many critics have been written the last decade for the limited productivity and the low adoption rate of innovation in the construction industry. Several conceptual models are already developed to explain the ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ character of the construction sector and to visualize the need for looking in and looking out in order to gain a common shared vision amongst stakeholders (Barrett, 2005). National and European reports are structured to evaluate the present productivity capacities and innovation capabilities of large construction firms in order to design guidelines for the future transformation of the industry. Today’s construction recipe must be urgently modernized to deliver the highest customer-value by improving the construction performance, improving client and supplier performance and procuring and managing Construction. Modernizing construction (NAO, 2001) however entails not only technical and engineering approaches to the central themes of the industry; it leads to the need for re-designing the Human Resource departments’ working philosophy. Nowadays more than ever construction industry increases its pace to keep up with other industries and become more competitive moving towards the targets for improvements illustrated in the following picture.

Figure 1: Drivers for Change in Rethinking Construction (Egan, 2002)

For many years now the construction industry has lost out to other sectors in attracting the very best people. This has been partly because of economic circumstances - boom and bust cycles have denied the industry the opportunity to train and provide long term careers for its workforce. The consequence is that we now have an aging workforce and too few people entering the industry (Egan, 2002, p. 29). This reality calls for sketching an holistic framework concerning all the Talent Management components; as they are identified by (Lewis & Heckman, 2006), which are; strategy to create sustainable competitive advantages, strategy implications for talent, talent pool strategy, talent management systems, and talent practices. The restructuring of the talent hierarchy creates new views on the need for specialist skills, for multi-skilling, or for de-skilling. In practice the term de-skilling is probably more accurately re-skilling. In some scenarios there may be a narrowing of the existing skill base of some trades, but all trades are likely to need training and re-training to cope with the new methods and materials that may emerge in the innovative scenarios, even if their use is apparently simpler. On balance the most probable outcome appears likely to be a blend of specialist skill, multi-skilling and re-skilling, but in any given scenario there will be a different blend (Consulting, 2008).


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1. Introduction The Construction Industry is attached on three market categories; the residential market, the non-residential market and the infrastructure market. Overall, for all the three market segments, it appears that innovation will have to respond to an increasingly differentiated ownership and usage of premises and facility services, as well as to sustainability issues and life-cycle considerations which will become important decision-making criteria (COM, 2007). Creating a sustainable construction industry was and will be the constant driver of change and performance improvement shaping the shareholders’ values and affecting Buyer/Supplier relationships. In the building industry, designing, constructing, and supplying parties work together in constantly changing coalitions on different building projects (O'Brien, Fischer, & Jucker, 1995). Contractors, architects, suppliers negotiate through bilateral contracts when following the traditional building recipe. However, the inherent complexity of the industry reflects on a high market share in the EU-27 family as the next table presents (Table 1). The construction industry in general, plays a key role in the EU economy (10.4% of EU GDP in 2008), in employment (7.6% of total EU employment) and in climate change policies (buildings are currently responsible for 42% of EU final energy consumption and produce about 35% of all greenhouse gas emissions). Table 1. Key figures | Activity 2011

CONSTRUCTION IN EUROPE (EU-27)

Total Construction Output 9.6% of GDP 51.5% of Gross Fixed Capital Formation

Jobs in Construction 7% of Employment 30.7% of Industrial Employment

Total Number of Enterprises 95% of <20 workers 3.1 million enterprises

(source: European Construction Industry Federation, June 2012 Edition) In the pursue of designing with the optimal way strategies for maximizing the performance of the three construction submarkets several problems emerge fragmenting the flow production process of the end-products; facilities management and maintenance of infrastructural projects. Regulatory framework, including safety standards, design rules, sensitive operations, and high-risk working practices constrain the adoption of innovation and the rise of productivity. The construction sector recently (in 2006) was recognized as a Lead Market by the European Commission which set an agenda of transforming the construction industry in a knowledge-based innovation platform. Lead markets aim to leverage innovation in with a high growth potential in Europe and globally. EU industry should have the potential to develop competitive advantage in these areas to lead global markets, while the public sector should have the potential to significantly impact market development, whether as regulator, customer or facilitator. Finally, lead markets should provide solutions to economic and societal challenges in areas such as health, energy, environment or transport (COM, 2007, p. 3). Under this scope the Egan Report (2002) formulated the target group for improvement (fig. 1) which constitutes the central concept behind the Talent Management framework that will be constructed in the following sections.


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The end-product of this research approach is to show what has to be changed in this modern War for Talent in order to accomplish the selected targets after a scenario planning for the construction firm assigned. The Supply Chain Management will be the main point of view when analyzing the case. For doing so we have to assess how the construction employment was developed in some baseline countries, looking them as guide examples.

2. Background Around the 1990s a new approach was adopted towards explaining the inside structure of the industry; and that was a shift from dealing with the Construction Industry as being a unified Sector System. Given that the fictitious company of this article is a multinational large construction firm with over 50,000 employees and operating several European countries, it is wise to present the general past picture in some example construction industries. For this reason the following national cases are used to present how the employment rates fluctuated during the previous decade as it is seen important in making assumptions in the proposed framework. 2.1 Denmark-case In the 1990s, the Danish economy has moved from an initial period of stagnation and falling employment to a period of economic boom and a return to the previous employment levels. The lean years in the early 1990s showed an average annual economic growth of less than 0.6 percent. This development was turned around at the end of 1993 when a strong economic recovery began. The average annual growth in GDP was 3.4 percent from 1994 to 2000 (CIB, 2004, p. 58) What became clear through these years is that the construction employment followed the productivity of the sector. In the 1990s, the lowest construction employment level occurred in 1993, after which it increased slowly during the second part of the decade and made six percent of the total workforce in 2000 (CIB, 2004). Table 2. Danish construction employment in the 1990s (× 1000)

1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002

National Employment

2794 1792 2808 2773 2778 2786 2803

Construction Employment

171 162 140 154 161 168 173

Construction/Total (%)

6.1 5.8 5.0 5.7 5.8 6.0 6.2

(source: Statistics Denmark, 2003) 2.2 France-case In France, the share of repair and maintenance is nearly a half of all construction works because of the importance of the stock built after a Second World War. The construction sector system is made up of four very big firms, SMEs and self-employed. The fragmentation of the sector system allows a high flexibility in cyclical situations. The sector system is so heterogeneous that several construction sub-systems can be analyzed. The influence of central government on the institutional regulations remains high.


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Figure 2: Employment in the French construction sector in 2001 (CIB, 2004)

2.3 Netherlands-case The Dutch construction industry’s capability to deliver difficult and innovative projects is equal to that of any national construction industry worldwide. The production of the construction industry in the Netherlands represents 11 % of the GNP. Also in terms of employment, construction is important for the Dutch economy. Including all construction related employment, the employment in the construction industry amounts to 9.5 % of the total employment in the Netherlands (PSIB, 2004). 2.4 Germany-case In 2000, the German construction industry had about 2.76 million employees, which corresponds to 6.6 percent of the total workforce (CIB, 2004, p. 96). The construction employment rate in 2000 was the lowest since the reunification in 1990 (see Table 2). Table 3. Construction Employment in Total Work Force (× 1000)

1991 1994 1995 1996 1999 2000

Total workforce 40689 40583 40524 40692 41431 41769

Total unemployment 2190 3304 3194 3482 3416 3133

Total Construction 2796 3165 3227 3126 2851 2761

Employees Self-employed

2536 260

2849 316

2887 340

2757 369

2453 398

2356 405

Construction in Total Workforce (%)

6.9 7.8 8.0 7.7 6.9 6.6

2.4 Portugal-case The growth in construction activity is also visible in employment. Table 4 shows data on construction employment, total employment and the contribution of construction to total employment. The share of construction employment in total employment reached 12.2% in 2002, one of the highest levels in the European Economic Area.


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Table 4. Portuguese construction employment in 1990s (× 1000)

1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002

National Employment

4466.3 4340.7 4251.1 4250.5 4863.3 5028.9 5106.5

Construction Employment

352.6 346.2 330.8 340 3 343 1 596.4 622.3

Construction/Total (%)

7.9 7.9 7.8 8.1 10.9 12.1 12.2

3. Situation analysis

Is it easy now however to foresee what is the hot-potato emerging in the built environment in correlation to which is the ideal proactive talent management strategy to copy with the potential threats? To answer somebody this question he needs to pre-think on the basis of what happens inside the construction world. Firstly what became prevalent, after 2008 where the crisis brought a new cadre of transactions, negotiations, employment relations, and labor rules; is the everyday trade-off between recession and recovery, something that both employees and employers are aware. This new picture created a parallel thinking in HR-managers mindset, calling them to balance the unemployment rates with the changes in labor income (Fig. 3).

Figure 3: The change in unemployment and labor income (OECD, 2012)


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The aforementioned analysis showed till now how much turbulent is the market formation not only for the construction sector but in general the employment situation in the construction field is too fluid to be predicted with a degree of safety. Given now the situation inside the construction market, the main hypothesis before thinking how to produce a holistic framework concerning the talent management strategies followed by the large scale company is the lack of skills is the timeless problem inside the construction world. The following graphic illustrates how current projections are perceived in the entire EU family and it is considered to align lack of skills to age, education and contract type.

Figure 4: The change in employment and average hours worked by age, education and type contract (OECD, 2012)

4. Scenario planning Scenarios are claimed to support strategic decision makers. They are especially effective in dealing with uncertainties (Postma & Liebl, 2005). The traditional uses of scenarios and scenario development are evaluation and selection of strategies, integration of various kinds of future-oriented data, exploration of the future and identification of future possibilities. More recently, scenarios aim at making managers aware of environmental uncertainties, stretching managers’ mental models, and triggering and accelerating processes of organizational learning (Postma & Liebl, 2005, p. 2). In order to visualize the location of the hidden uncertainties and their impact on the organization we need to reply or quantify the next questions. After replying them a picture (Fig. 5) can be sketched to illustrate predictability and impact lead to the final selection of the most high-risk case.

How big could be a change in the construction employment in the upcoming years (Fig. 5)?


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Is there any possibility to predict the amount and the type of skills needed in the future in specific operations (Fig. 7)?

Would be wise to narrow down our effort of restructuring talent management policies focusing on specific performance improvements (Fig. 8)?

Figure 5: Scenario construction, adapted from (Heijden, Bradfield, & Burt, 2002)

Figure 6: Past and forecast employment changes by economic sector (CEDEFOP, 2012, p. 23)


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Figure 7: Future job opportunities by occupation (CEDEFOP, 2012, p. 24)

Figure 8: Future job opportunities by broad level of qualifications (CEDEFOP, 2012, p. 25)

After translating the managerial meaning of Kvetan et al. (2012) research paper entitled “Cedefop’s skills supply and demand forecast: 2011 update and reflections on the approach” (CEDEFOP, 2012) a table with potential scenarios was constructed. The following table illustrates the projections of figures 6 & 7 in terms of Risk Priority Numbers (RPN). The RPN is not a measure of risk, but of risk priority (eq. 1). Thus we will apply the worst-case scenario to the talent management framework. The RPN gives generally a model to allocate these resources. Equation (1): RPN = S × P × D S: Severity (1-10 scale) = Replacement Demand (Fig. 7) P: Probability score (1-10 scale) = Replacement Demand (Fig. 6) D: Detectability score (1-10 scale) = Subjective determination The values of S, D taken from the two pictures are divided by 40; the max. Value of the X-axis. PC = 0.80 × 0.40 × 0.04 = 0.013


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PC+ = 0.45 × 0.40 × 0.80 = 0.144 TC = 0.80 × 0.20 × 0.60 = 0.096 TC+ = 0.45 × 0.20 × 0.80 = 0.072 Table 5. Selecting scenarios

Change (C) in Construction

Professionals (P) PC: RPN=0.013 PC+: RPN=0.144

Technicians (T) TC: RPN=0.096 TC+: RPN=0.072

Summarizing this preparatory section of the article the main proposition is that the following managerial approach will be focused on how HR-mangers have to reconsider their working philosophy when they design organizational routines to attract, develop, retain and mobilize the recruited highly-qualified professionals who are potentially ranked as the most crucial human resources. High Low High Low

Figure 9: Scenario construction and selection of PC+

5. Naming the pain When trying to interpret what is the missing link between an effective talent management policy and the actual acting strategy of the firm a main question was borne; in a highly fragmented industry as the construction one, where employment data are changing continuously which segment and why has to be selected as the most critical one? Lack of skills was assumed as the main problem precursor. Highly skilled professionals such as architects, contractors, supply chain specialist, procurement officers and purchasing managers do play a vital role in the evolution and growth of construction activities. Traditionally, however the construction sector has been dependent on the government, which acts in various roles: client, regulator, or business-cycle manager (Voordijk, Haan, & Joosten, 2000). Having now defined the target group (highly qualified professionals) and the route-cause of the problem (lack of skills), what’s remaining is to specify the firm’s operation-related department for which the framework will be designed. Manufacturers, contractors and architects are becoming dominant parties in the building process. Different supply chains have to be managed as recently it is observed a significant

PC+

PC

TC TC+


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turn from the traditional integrated design delivery system to a more product-specialized contract approach. The main problems threatening the sustainability of construction are

The fragmented regulation The focus of public procurement on the lowest-bid rather than on MEAT (Most

Economically Advantageous Tender) criteria The training gap for delivering employees of higher adding-value and higher

organizational commitment

Aligning these three construction-related threats a clear transition can be done through the first picture, where predictability is now selected as the main driver for our Talent Management related framework. In other words, the required increase of 20% in the predictability is translated in the following three core outcomes:

Predictability of legislation Procurement innovation Investment in training

6. Problem statement

Based on the analysis already done the problem to address this framework is reflected by the research question asking; “How the talent management system of a large multinational European construction firm can become more adaptive, more proactive, and enhance predictability by increasing the inflow and retention rate of highly skilled professional in Supply Chain operations?”

7. The relevance triangle Is the research question relevant enough to the core Human Resources issues concerning the arenas composing the construction industry? In other words, are the interests (stakes) of society (individuals: employees/employers and public agencies), academy (science: institutions) and market (industry/organizations) sufficiently represented in the problem statement? The construction sector is characterized by demand from different sources. Not only private demand for residential or office buildings also public infrastructure projects are of particular importance for the market. The public sector is a major client of the construction industry and is expected to boost further development by targeted and criteria-oriented procurement. Moreover, regulatory frameworks, e.g. in terms of quality and environmental standards, have substantial impact on technological direction and sector-specific R&D activities, may induce innovation in the construction sector and shift public and private demand to specific products and services (Loikkanen & Hyvönen, 2011, p. 88). The major levers for change of the construction sector are the industry / client forums, governments and procurers. The other, rather dependent focal area is the project team and at a more abstract level “society” groupings and education and training have the potential to make longer terms impacts (Barrett, 2005).


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Meso-level

(Firm)

Micro-level

(Individual)

Macro-level

(Industry)

Figure 10: Summary disposition of stakeholders (Barrett, 2005, p. 62)

The problem to be outlined is relevant to the industry/clients needs as clients nowadays more than ever know how to assess and maintain long term relationships with their suppliers. In that role the HR department of the assigned firm has to create a strategy through which maintaining Buyer/Supplier relationships will be one of the most innovative and fundamental competitive advantage of the internal human capital. This condition between the industry and the Talent Management (TM) structure brings into the light the need for designing specific skills packages and prioritizing them. If this approach is adopted, predicting the legislative changes will constitute a central strategic implication for talent. The government often participates in high market-share construction projects, knows as Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) which demand the employment of highly-educated personnel who will be enable to understand the market dynamics and the legal agreements among various parties formulating often Joint Ventures (JVs). Segmenting the talent pool to be designed is a solution for the firm to differentiate from their competitors. In the project arena, procurement is the black-box for the construction sector containing the bulk of the mainstream talent management tools, like talent analytics, mentoring, integrating newcomers, empowering older workers, etc. The final stage of this five-component procedure of Talent Management (Lewis & Heckman, 2006) leads to the creation and implementation of talent practices.


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Table 6. Aligning TM stages to working (to be tested) assumptions

Talent Management (TM) Component

Assumptions / Mediating variables

Skills required

Strategy to create competitive advantages

Identify firm’s mission Maintaining Buyer/Supplier relationships

Locus of control & Perception of future growth

Strategic implications for talent

Managing firm’s positions Market dynamics understanding (PPPs / JVs)

Talent pool strategy Manage workforce portfolio Fit & Flexibility

TM Systems Enhance creativity, trust, motivation, productivity, commitment

Talent analytics

Talent practices If the framework applied, predictability targets will be achieved (+20% increase)

Retaining critical knowledge (create a knowledge infrastructure) & Solving the Age/Employment paradox

7.1 Strategy to create competitive advantages

Dealing in a context of multilateral relations and ongoing transactions, the construction professionals will be quickly confronted with the dynamic 4Cs character of the industry (Fig. 10). Most construction companies operate in a decentralized network of suppliers and customers in which they acquire production capacity from external suppliers. Construction projects can be viewed as temporary organizations among firms. The development and management of long term Buyer/Supplier relationships at the cross-project level is therefore difficult, as project teams and product designs change from project to project (Bemelmans, Voordijk, Vos, & Buter, 2012). This fact leads to consider constantly the maturity level of Buyer/Supplier relationships as it

constitutes the core integration factor between operational processes and value creation

ones. The management of Buyer / Supplier relationship embodies five aspects:

Optimize the supply base

Manage the supplier relationships

Integrate suppliers into the operational processes

Integrate suppliers into the value-creation processes

Develop suppliers

Once all the five key-areas are combined into one employee’s competencies package then

he will be able to relocate the locus of control related to his decisions and reconsider to

which extent he acts towards the accomplishment of the strategic vision of the firm; 20%

predictability increase in logistical defects.


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Figure 11: Dynamic 4Cs model (Barrett, 2005, p. 60)

7.2 Strategic implications for talent

Prime contractors spend up to 90% of a construction project’s turnover on buying goods and services, and thus suppliers have a large impact on project performance. Therefore, the purchasing function management of the prime contractor has a large influence on the overall performance: the more developed (i.e. mature or professional) this function is the greater its positive contribution (Bemelmans & Voordijk, 2012). The highly-skilled professionals required by the firm have to work on the basis of developing the most profitable and sustainable coalitions with private or public partners. For this reason candidates must be characterized by a systemic thinking like the one in Figure 12.

Figure 12: Research framework for a designing an effective purchasing management tool

(Bemelmans & Voordijk,2012)

7.3 Talent pool strategy

Before an HR-manager thinks about the characteristics, the size, the depth and type of the talent pool to create in this predictability-seeking organization he/she should initially define the meaning of Strategic Human Resource Management (SHRM). Human resource deployments and organizational activities when combined with such way to achieve growth goals reveal the strategic direction of formulating the talent pool.


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According to (Wright & Snell, 1997) speaking in terms of SHRM, two are the central dimensions to be explored; the fit and the flexibility. Fit is all about the matching between the HR-practices and the strategy. First, vertical fit involves the alignment of human resource management (HRM) practices and the strategic management process of the firm. Second, horizontal fit implies congruence among the various HRM practices. Achievement of horizontal fit is viewed as instrumental for efficiently allocating human resources. Vertical fit, in turn, is viewed as directing those resources toward the primary initiatives of the organization. Flexibility provides organizations with the ability to modify current practices in response to non-transient changes in the environment. Weick (1979) argues that flexibility requires detecting changes in the environment and retaining a sufficient pool of novel actions so that these changes can be accommodated. Resource flexibility: refers to the extent to which a resource can be applied to a larger range of alternative uses, the costs and difficulty of switching the use of a resource from one alternative use to another, and the time required to switch from one use to another. Coordination flexibility: consists of the extent to which the firm can "resynthesize" the strategy, "reconfigure" the chain of resources, and "redeploy" the resources. In the construction firm case, the two dimensions of SHRM are translated as the following table shows; Table 7. Fit & Flexibility in the a construction firm

Fit Vertical Directing production/work towards the predictability target

Horizontal Allocation of talents to appropriate positions (legislation, procurement, training)

Flexibility Resources Tangible products easy to be reused (formal contracts, cost forms, time planning programs)

Coordination Modular components of the supply chain (metrics, routines, production models)

7.4 Talent Management systems

Competing in a world searching for novelty, the construction company needs to organize its HR functions around the three strategic targets; predictability of legislation, procurement innovation, and investment in training, having as guidelines not only on how to measure the talent, but firstly how boost creativity, trust, motivation, productivity, and organizational commitment is seen much more important. So before going to the Talent Analytics, simple topics such as the interrelation between passion for work (intrinsic motivation) affecting external motivation has to be chartered by the HR managers and thereafter to design the social interaction process for enhancing them. A new approach on how to design the social processes inside the firm is to align the quadrant in which each talent is classified correlated with his personal perception on his basic needs. Thus a prediction map of where (under which performance conditions) and when an employee could react through a future burnout or how strong is his/her self-esteem.


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Figure 13: Talent/Potential matrix in relation with Scharlow’s pyramid

Talent Analytics Using sophisticated and high-tech performance monitoring systems of analyzing employee data to enhance their personal competitive advantages are always needed. The true evaluation of the value of human capital assets and their value-contribution calls for complete accountability of employees. In the case of the construction firm, HR managers need surely to calculate the optimal number o f staff member in the positions of legal consultants (legislation predictability), procurement officers (procurement innovation) and investment in training (productivity of Learning & Development programs). Applying talent analytics includes six steps (Davenport, Harris, & Shapiro, 2012);

1. Human capital facts: What are the key-indicators of my organization’s health? Employee engagement and financial performance

2. Analytical Human Resource: Which units, departments, or employees need attention?

Real-time review, feedback channels, mentoring, coaching 3. Human capital investment analysis: Which actions have the greatest impact on my

business? Monitoring of satisfaction levels, and maintain them

4. Workforce forecasts: How do I know when to staff up or cut back? Scenario planning analysis, Demand & Supply analysis

5. Talent value model: Why do employees choose to stay or leave the company? Re-placement of employees, evaluation of positions held by poor

performers, fix out possible mismatches 6. Talent supply chain: How should the workforce needs to adapt to changes in the

business environment? Predict the education tends and the market demands, design job

opportunities based on the power of the existing workforce and expand the orders’ experience into fresher’s motivation for learning and challenge.

7.5 Talent practices

Proactive behavior in the organization To efficiently mobilize the talent selected and retained the company has to build up a Proactive Personality Scale (PPS) in the HR department. The four attributes of proactive behavior have to be realized in practice as (Crant, 2000) had identified them are; proactive personality, personal initiative, role breadth self-efficacy, and taking charge overlap


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conceptually. In particular, the constructs share a common behavioral domain. Each construct considers the way in which an employee approaches and defines his or her work role, focusing on efforts to improve things in the workplace. Thus, the conceptual underpinnings of each construct incorporate employee changes to the work environment (Crant, 2000, p. 443). In the effort of developing and retaining the talented highly-skilled professional the firm has to take also context-specific proactive measures like socialization (networking), proactive feedback seeking, issue selling, promotion of (external) innovation to rise the champions, career management strategies for mapping the evolution of each employee separately. Coping with stress and burnouts Over the past 30 years, interest in burnout, from academics and managers alike, has increased dramatically as we have begun to understand the significant negative impact it has on employees (Halbesleben & Buckley, 2004). Burnout was defined by Maslach (1982) as “a syndrome of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and reduced personal accomplishment that can occur among individuals who do ‘people work’ of some kind.” The JD-R model of (Schaufeli, Bakker, & Rhenen, 2009) proved clearly that increase in Job Demands and decrease in Resources available predicts burnout and that increase in job Resources predicts job engagement. Apart from the structural model’s results what is very important to notify is the obligation of HR-management to point out exactly the job context and boundaries in order to minimize unrealistic expectations because this misfit between the organization and the employee often leads to burnout symptoms. In the end, the HR-managers of the construction company is strongly recommended to use Realistic Job Interviews and Expectation Lowering Procedures to manage recruitment, increase organizational commitment, and reduce turnover (Halbesleben & Buckley, 2004, p. 873)

Solving the Age/Employment paradox Several strategies have been already analyzed by academics. The main issue that will be discussed here is how far away the construction industry (in large scale) is from increasing or maintaining the normative commitment of older employers? It is a fact that flexible work options, job design, mature employee training, manager training, compensation, etc are some strategies to engage older employees on HR practices according to (Armstrong-Stassen, 2008). However given the situation that there is a serious lack of highly and specialized professionals in the multi-faced departments and submarkets of the construction sector, the dominant approach on attaching older employees better and with a social, creative way is the teaching method. I named this attitude of mentoring when an employee, close to the retirement age is assigned to develop a beginner and bring into the pool some new, well-selected talents. The picture below endorses the previous statement (Fig. 14).


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(a) (b)

Figure 14: (a) Iv-Oil & Gas: Structural designer (23 years) / Structural design coordinator (65 years)

(b) Iv-Infra: Constructor (28 years) / Chief design engineer (54 years)

8. A tool for thinking (TM Framework) In the construction of the Talent Management framework there are three components that till now are not fully clarified. These are

- The visibility line: It represents the critical moment where we decompose the problem after the scenario planning and based on the chosen less-advantageous one we move on the analysis of the case. The term “visibility line” is borrowed from the terminology of Project Management. It illustrates practically the start of the actual business process while all the IT resources are mobilized to optimize the portfolio management.

- The High Reliability Organizations (HROs): type of organizations operating on the edge while being reliable is too critical for the societal benefits. HROs are governed by the five attributes of mindfulness or enriched awareness.

- The Complex Production Systems (CoPS): an integrated approach of concentrating around key-roles (System Integrators) several stakeholders and interconnecting the system’s centre with the superstructure and infrastructure.


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Figure 15: A thinking tool on designing Talent Management strategies for large construction

firms

9. Managerial implications

The last picture depicts the line of reasoning of the whole approach. Said differently, if the

HR-managers of the construction firm should put in practice the above framework they

should follow the roadmap described (Fig. 16).

Additional ideas from academics to be explored inside the Construction Industry;

- “Organizations that move quickly to seize new opportunities compete through flexibility and do not develop employee competencies from within. (Cappelli & Crocker-Hefter, 2001)”

- Think twice before outsourcing for your personnel, as (Cappelli & Crocker-Hefter, 2001) has stated: “Organizations that compete through their dominance in a market rely on organization-specific capabilities developed internally…”

- Balance and map, the HR-departments’ competencies with the business strategies that flow from them.


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A comprehensive end-to-end process

Figure 16: End-to End process for TM

Attract Talent

Think about future staffing needs: design

positions, instead of employees (e.g.

procurement officers)

Be sure about who recruits for your company

(hire industry related people)

Identify and communicate what the project will

teach and why (open the agenda)

Adjust newcomers’ expectations and learning

goals with firm’s experiences Develop Talent

Link employees: internal networking as

collaboration-driven innovation

Mentor employees: reverse-traditional-

anonymous-micro feedback

Make mentoring a reciprocal relationship

Don’t exclude inside-outsiders internal

candidates

Give time and space for employees to react

Retain Talent

Provide room to grow towards the strategic

direction of predictability

Enrich the personal experiences continuously

(role games, virtual cases, external training,

create schools)

Express satisfaction, and reward wisely and

transparently

Transform employee routine in a hunting for

entrepreneurship

Challenge your top-performers Mobilize Talent

Share a proactive behavior vision

Make stars part of the planning process

Personalize as much as possible L&D programs

Reinforce the vision: by focusing on the right

assessors, rather than on the assessment

technique (Fernadez-Araoz, Groysberg, & Nohria,

2009)

Manage the A positions, manage B&C positions

Inspire B or C performers to become A players

Conceptualize the future framework for

attracting & retaining the Z-Generation

Consider talent pools in BRIC economies


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10. Further discussion

After designing this action plan and incorporating all the stages of talent management for a large European construction firm an ambition will be created to open the window for further research on HRM literature and Strategic Talent Management. The first relies on the theory of Complex Production Systems (CoPS), dealing with the question “How we can still create some focus on our internal processes and distinguish our self as a company by recognizing the role of HR managers like the one of Systems Integrators (Winch, 1998)?”

Figure 17: Construction as a complex system industry (Winch, 1998, p. 270)

Moving from the typical role of System Integrators (architect & contactor) it would be very interesting to conceptualize a modern role of the HR managers. This role could be the two faces of the same coin; the first would be the role of performance boosters and the other the reputation builders. Is it feasible to execute some research on the following figure?

Sourcing

Development

Deployment

Retention

Assimilation

Performance Management

Engagement

HR-managers as

Performance Boosters

Corporate Branding Builders

Talent Staff Talent Pool Executive Team

Line Managers

Functionality Zone

Vitality Zone


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Secondly what will be outlined is the emerging importance of High Reliability Theory (HRT), which calls for exploring deeper the question “To which extent HRM and HRD processes are mindful in the construction industry? Is there enough systemic space and organizational willingness to apply the five attributes of enriched awareness as (Weick, Sutcliffe, & Obstfeld, 1999) have mapped them?” HRT, if applied, is expected to enlighten what we can learn from B performers. A new game plan can be conceptualized for C Players as Beth Axelrod, Helen Jones, and Ed Michaels have stated in their correspondent article in Harvard Business Review (2012). When people in HROs focus on failures, tendencies to simplify, current operations, capabilities for resilience, and temptations to over structure the system, these concerns cover a broader range of unexpected events. As shown in Figure 17, these separate concerns are tied together by their joint capability to induce a rich awareness of discriminatory detail and a capacity for action. We label this capability mindfulness. It is this enriched awareness, induced by the distinctive concerns of HROs with potentials for catastrophe that facilitates the construction, discovery, and correction of unexpected events capable of escalation. The five processes of HRT can be the weapon against the appearance of organizational (human capital) silos. The role of each process could be the answer in the continuous effort for improving Coordination and Communication efficiency among internal silos (e.g. finance, operations and quality assurance, administration).

Figure 17: A mindful infrastructure for high reliability (Weick, Sutcliffe, & Obstfeld, 1999)

The conclusion of this last paragraph is that both topics introduced in the field of HRM and HRD will create a quite radical scope, a more lean approach enabling companies to operate within smaller time frames, in a friendlier and more efficient HR-environment.


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TALENT MANAGEMENT: A Conceptual Framework For The Construction Industry

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