Employers’ experience in managing high potential employees in Malaysia

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to determine key competencies used by organizations in identifying high potential employees. It also seeks to examine practices and programs to manage such employees and finally to identify problems encountered in the development programs. Design/methodology/approach – The respondents of the study were HR practitioners. Convenient sampling was used and the respondents answered survey forms that were sent out using regular mails and e-mails. As a result, 237 forms were generated and used for analyses. In order to test construct validity, factor analyses were performed and mean values of each variable were also used for interpretations. Findings – Employers put highest emphasis on employees who were customer service oriented. Three major competences were identified – results-oriented character, interpersonal competence and technical competence/flexibility. The most common method to identify potential was performance appraisal by immediate superiors. The most common method to develop high potential employees was job enlargement and the most common problem in the development programs was in dealing with those who had personal and work-life balance. Practical implications – Performance appraisal done by immediate supervisor may not be the best method to gauge future performance and should be coupled with performance review or discussion with the superiors. Job experience is still effective in developing potential. Specific policies that help employees to balance personal and work life are important in development programs. Originality/value – The responses from the HR practitioners shed some lights on what major competences are important in identifying potential that can be used in talent management.

Identifying and assessing talent potential for future needs of a company

“…However, in many organizations, it is performance that is the main indicator of potential, as found in many European, American and Asian studies (Church et al. , 2015; Dries and Pepermans, 2008; Juhdi et al. , 2015; Posthumus et al.…”

Human Resources Development Through Scholarship: A Case Study of Ministry of Public Works and Housing of Indonesia

“…However, Kaspersma, Alaerts, & Slinger (2012) argued that even if a particular professional has a "technical" orientation, they may have a strong interest in obtaining other competencies, specifically learning meta competence and aggregate competence for management. Juhdi, Pa'wan, & Hansaram (2015) emphasized that employers attribute the highest value on employees who were customer-service oriented. Three major competencies were identified: results-orientation, interpersonal competence, and technical competence.…”

Talent development: a systematic literature review of empirical studies

“…Issues. Issues identified from the review of literature include dealing with personal concerns, and employees' work-life balance is an issue that organizations can face when implementing TD interventions (Juhdi et al, 2015). Organizations are also concerned about losing their trained employees because they believe that better-trained and highly skilled employees may be more attractive to their competitors (Zheng, 2009).…”

“…An additional issue identified by Hana and Lucie (2015) is that employees do not usually actively look for development, but rather expect their organizations to provide TD opportunities for them. However, although employees assumed that the organization would initiate the developmental activities, fewer than half of the organizations under study had (Juhdi et al, 2015) Young and senior executive and non-executive programs (Festing et al, 2015) Collaboration with external source of knowledge such as universities, trade associations and consulting companies, company's own T&D programs (Chadee and Raman, 2012;Burbach and Royle, 2010;Sparrow et al, 2013;Cho and McLean, 2009;Valverde et al, 2013Festing et al, 2013Tansley and Tietze, 2013;Wang-Cowham, 2011;Hartmann et al, 2010;Hall-Ellis and Grealy, 2013) On-the-job, off-the-job, and external training (Zheng, 2009;Wang-Cowham, 2011;Hall-Ellis and Grealy, 2013); Expertise and talent training (Cho andMcLean, 2009, Lehman, 2009;Tansley and Tietze, 2013) Individualized training (Valverde et al, 2013;Lehman, 2009;Hall-Ellis and Grealy, 2013;Oppong and Gold, 2016;Thunnissen, 2016) Personalized credibility training such as awareness and liaison training (Gold et al, 2016) Leadership and management training (Gold et al, 2016;Macfarlane et al, 2012;Maxwell and Maclean, 2008;Thunnissen, 2016) Individual-level OD Job design: transfers, downward and upward movements job enlargement, enrichment, job rotation (Juhdi et al, 2015;Lehmann, 2009;Macfarlane et al, 2012;Hall-Ellis...…”