Talent management and retention strategies in luxury hotels: evidence from four countries

Abstract

International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to provide a definition of talent and talent management in the luxury hotel sector with a focus on talent retention strategies. Design/Methodology/ApproachA qualitative approach was employed and 27 face-to-face semi-structured interviews were conducted with managers in luxury hotels in four countries (US, UK, Australia, and Greece). FindingsTalent refers to those who "go above and beyond". Talent retention strategies in luxury hotels include a friendly, family-oriented and open access culture, teamwork, compensation, succession planning, and training and development. A hybrid exclusive and inclusive approach to TM is proposed with the implicit engagement of the individuals. Practical implicationsLuxury hotels should choose talent management practices that fit the organizational culture with a focus on retention strategies that are tailor-made to the individual or groups of individuals. Opportunities to progress, succession planning and employee participation to talent management are valued in the industry. Originality / valueThis study provides findings from empirical comparative research conducted in four different countries, whereas most published work on talent management focuses on bibliographic reviews. It provides a conceptualization of talent and talent management. This study frames the nature of TM in hotels, and advances the knowledge of talent retention strategies found to be effective in hospitality.

Talent management related concepts and debates in container shipping industry by an emerging market perspective

“…When the concept of talent is examined, four main well-established comparative trend of approaches, utilized to determine its meaning and scope, draw attention. These are: object vs. subject; innate vs. acquired; input vs. output; transferable vs. context-dependent (Dries, 2013 , p.272; Meyers and van Woerkom, 2014 , p.193; Bolander et al, 2017 , p.1525: Cui et al, 2018 , p.11; Marinakou and Giousmpasoglou, 2019 , p.3858; Kravariti and Johnston, 2020 , p.80).…”

“…Innate vs. acquired approach is related with nature-nurture debate, which contemplates whether talent is inborn (innate approach), or something can be nurtured with adequate learning and training (acquired approach) (Meyers et al, 2013 , p.305; Meyers and van Woerkom, 2014 , p.194; Bolander et al, 2017 , p.1525; Marinakou and Giousmpasoglou, 2019 , p.3858; Meyers et al, 2020 , p.563). The innate approach, evaluates talent as a stable and fixed entity and identifies it as a natural ability that cannot be taught (Meyers et al, 2013 , p.306; Pantouvakis and Karakasnaki, 2018 , p.651).…”

“…Stahl et al ( 2012 , p.26), revealed that the two approaches of TM are not mutually a single thing, many of the companies use a combination of both. The hybrid approach of the TM can be identified as a holistic perspective to talent management, in which the two distinct processes proceed simultaneously: a) labelling the entire workforce as organizational talent and assigning them as the focus of the developmental activities in line with inclusive approach; b) identifying the key and pivotal positions which pre-eminently make contribution to the company’s sustained competitive advantage and filling them with high-potential, high-performance, competent employees congruent with exclusive approach (Thunnissen et al, 2013a , p.1750; King and Vaiman, 2019 , p.196; Marinakou and Giousmpasoglou, 2019 , p.3866; Meyers et al, 2020 , p.581). Stahl et al ( 2012 , p.26), also mentions that, by implementing a hybrid approach companies can differentiate and distinguished from their competitors and skirt the controversial issue of whether some employee groups are more valuable than others or not.…”

“…Although talent and talent management (TM) concepts have received a lot of attention in academic studies in recent years, many studies have expressed the lack of intellectual and theoretical foundations (Scullion et al, 2016 ; Marinakou and Giousmpasoglou, 2019 , p.3856). The TM field is still considered to be a not fully established field that is still evolving, and researchers often reiterate that there is a need for consensus on definitions of talent and talent management notions.…”

“…Gallardo-Gallardo and Thunnissen ( 2016 ) argue that very few empirical studies have concentrated on the conceptualization of talent and TM concepts. In addition, Nijs et al ( 2014 ) suggest that more studies should be done from different country and industry perspectives on how talent and talent management is conceptualized in order to develop concepts by analyzing and incorporating different views (Collings and Mellahi, 2009 ; Tansley, 2011 ; Vaiman et al, 2012 ; Chung and D’Annunzio-Green, 2018 ; Marinakou and Giousmpasoglou, 2019 ). Vaiman et al ( 2012 ) acknowledge that, this will help to counteract an overly ethnocentric or Anglo-Saxon conceptualization of talent management which is not reflective of practice in many parts of the world.…”