Talent Management at the University: an experimental design to enhance students’ employability

In Human Resources Management (HRM) literature talent management is considered as an emerging field of research, characterized by lack of clarity. The ambiguity inherent to TM is bound up to the inadequate operationalization of the underlying construct talent, that often is not explicitly defined but just taken for granted. Over the last two decades talent management (TM) is at the center of a big debate and it is in the strategic agenda of organizations. Nevertheless there is a scarcity of empirical research and scholars don’t speak the same language. Furthermore the literature has a narrow and biased approach, based on the unitary and managerial perspective, with strong focus on private sector organizations, multinationals and organizations in the US-context. The present study attempts to shed some light in the empirical implementation of the Talent Management in a public organization, the University of Pavia, with students as targeted population with the expected outcome of enhance their employability. The research design is experimental design for the talent development (TD) treatment with the aim to demonstrate the eventual effectiveness in terms of students’ employability. Talent management is a process that starts with the talent identification and/or acquisition, prosecutes with the talent development and ends with the feedback phase. The present study could be divided in three main parts. First, the starting and crucial building block for TM is the definition of talent. At this aim the present research includes on one hand a multidisciplinary literature review in divergent streams correlated with the university context (i.e. giftedness, vocational and positive psychology) in order to overcome the lack of clarity about the concept of talent observed in HRM literature; on the other hand a multilevel explorative study inside the organization and in the labor market through semi-structured interviews in order to gather qualitative data about the definition of talent and the content of the talent development. This part adopts the inductive rigor qualitative method The results of this first part highlight that talent has an object (i.e. the potential in terms of employability), developable and inclusive approach. In other words each student possess talent and can develop in order to excel at one’s personal best. Secondly, the study analyzes the TD with the experimental design, implemented in synergy with representatives of the labor market. Two online surveys, that serve as pre and post treatment tests, measure some dimensions through scales, validated and not, and adjunctive questions in order to assess the talent of the students (i.e. the potential in terms of employability). After this the TD treatment is administered only to the treated group. The pathway takes part inside a mandatory course in “Management and Economics” at the Department of Pharmacy at the University of Pavia. The TD architecture is based on the DOTS model and include formal and informal training. Thirdly, the study faces the feedback part with a multilevel approach that entails the individual (students), the organizational (University) and the community level (labor market). In order to verify the results about the effectiveness of the TD implemented the research entails the external evaluation of HR professional. They evaluate through a form CV and job interviews of students, selected randomly in both groups. The study confirms the effectiveness of the TM process implemented in terms of employability and the related outcome of enhancing the role of the University as a crucial actor for the development of the workforce, leading to the creation of a talent brand with a lot of multilevel positive returns.