WHo is able to complete this discussion?

Oedekoven, O. O., Robbins, D. K., Bishop, B., Thomas, M., & Mansheim, R. (2018). Hiring: A practical guide for selecting the right people . Retrieved from https://www.vitalsource.com

Personnel Psychology and Talent Management in Perspective

People have always been subjects of inquiry by psychologists, and the behavior of people at work has been the particular subject matter of industrial and organizational (I/O) psychology. Yet sciences and subdisciplines within sciences are distinguished not so much by the subject matter they study as by the questions they ask. Thus, both the social psychologist and the engineering psychologist are concerned with studying people. The engineering psychologist is concerned with the human aspects of the design of tools, machines, work spaces, information systems, and aspects of the work environment. The social psychologist studies power and influence, attitude change, communication in groups, and individual and group social behavior.

As noted earlier, personnel psychology is a subfield within I/O psychology. Some of the major areas of interest to personnel psychologists include job analysis and job evaluation; recruitment, screening, and selection; training and development; and performance management.

Personnel psychology and talent management overlap both psychology and the broader field of HRM. Both exclude, for example, such topics as labor and compensation law, organization theory, industrial medicine, collective bargaining, and employee benefits. Psychologists have already made substantial contributions to the field of HRM; in fact, most of the empirical knowledge available in such areas as motivation, leadership, and staffing is due to their work. Over the past decade, dramatic changes in markets, technology, demographics, organizational designs, the “psychological contract,” and the respective roles of managers and workers have inspired great emphasis on and interest in personnel psychology and talent management (Cascio, 2010; Cascio & Boudreau, 2016). The following sections consider each of these topics in more detail. Figure 1.2 illustrates them graphically.

Figure 1.2 The Changing Nature of Work and Organizations

Globalization of Product and Service Markets

Globalization—the ability of any individual or company to compete, connect, exchange, or collaborate globally—is exploding. The ability to digitize so many things, to send them anywhere and to pull them in from everywhere via our mobile phones and the Internet, has unleashed a torrent of global flows of information and knowledge. Global flows of commerce, finance, credit, social networks, and more are interlacing markets, media, central banks, companies, schools, communities, and individuals more tightly together than ever before (Cascio, 2018). That same connectivity is also making individuals and institutions more interdependent. As author Tom Friedman notes, “Everyone everywhere is now more vulnerable to the actions of anyone anywhere” (Friedman, 2016, p. 27). Product and service markets have truly become globalized.

Global labor markets are another feature of globalization, created by cheap labor and plentiful resources, combined with ease of travel and communication. This is fueling mobility as more companies expand abroad and people consider foreign postings as a natural part of their professional development. Beyond the positive effects that such circulation of talent brings to both developed and developing countries, it enables employment opportunities well beyond the borders of one’s home country (Dulebohn & Hoch, 2017). This means that competition for talent will come not only from the company down the street but also from the employer on the other side of the world (Economist Intelligence Unit, 2014).

Consider three other emerging trends spawned by globalization (Cascio, 2018). The first is increasing workforce flux as more roles are automated or outsourced and more workers are contract based, are mobile, or work flexible hours. This may allow companies to leverage global resources more efficiently, but it also will increase the complexity of management’s role. Second, expect more diversity as workers come from a greater range of backgrounds. Those with local knowledge of an emerging market, a global outlook, and an intuitive sense of the corporate culture will be particularly valued. Not surprisingly, talented young people will more frequently choose their employers based, at least in part, on opportunities to gain international experience. Finally, technical skills, although mandatory, will be less defining of the successful manager than the ability to work across cultures and to build relationships with many different constituents (Lublin, 2011; McGovern, 2017).

Why then, is there sometimes a backlash against globalization? It stems largely from a fear on the part of many people that globalization benefits big companies instead of average citizens, as stagnating wages and growing job insecurity in developed countries create rising disenchantment. In theory, less-developed countries win from globalization because they get jobs making low-cost products for rich countries. Rich countries win because, in addition to being able to buy inexpensive imports, they also can sell more sophisticated products, like financial services, to emerging economies. The problem, according to many experts, is that workers in the West are not equipped for today’s pace of change, in which jobs come and go and skills can quickly become redundant (Brynjolfsson & McAfee, 2014; Friedman, 2016).

Despite these concerns, economic interdependence among the world’s countries will continue. Global corporations will continue to be created through mergers and acquisitions of unparalleled scope. These mega-corporations will achieve immense economies of scale and compete for goods, capital, and labor on a global basis. As a result, prices will drop, and consumers will have more options than ever (Bhagwati, 2007; Ghemawat, 2017).

It takes more than trade agreements, technology, capital investment, and infrastructure, however, to deliver world-class products and services. It also takes the skills, ingenuity, and creativity of a competent, well-trained workforce. Workers with the most advanced skills create higher value products and services and reap the biggest rewards. Attracting, developing, and retaining talent in a culture that supports and nurtures ongoing learning is a continuing challenge for all organizations. Human resource professionals are at the epicenter of that effort.

Impact on Jobs and the Psychological Contract

The job churning that characterized the labor market in the 1990s and early twenty-first century has not let up. If anything, its pace accelerated during and after the Great Recession (Farber, 2011; Schwartz, 2009). Both white- and blue-collar jobs aren’t being lost temporarily because of a recession; rather, they are being wiped out permanently as a result of new technology, improved machinery, and new ways of organizing work (Friedman, 2016; Hamlin & Roberts, 2017). These changes have had, and will continue to have, dramatic effects on organizations and their people.

Corporate downsizing has become entrenched in American culture since the 1980s, but it was not always so. It was not until the final 20 years of the 20th century that such downsizing and the loss of the perceived “psychological contract” of lifelong employment with a single employer in the public and private sectors of the economy came to characterize many corporate cultures and the American workforce (Cascio, 1993b, 2002a, 2002b). The psychological contract refers to an unwritten agreement in which the employee and employer develop expectations about their mutual relationship (Payne, Culbertson, & Boswell, 2008; Rousseau, 1995). For example, absent just cause, the employee expects not to be terminated involuntarily, and the employer expects the employee to perform to the best of his or her ability.

Stability and predictability characterized the old psychological contract. In the 1970s, for example, workers held an average of three to four jobs during their working lives. Change and uncertainty, however, are hallmarks of the new psychological contract. Soon workers will hold 7–10 jobs during their working lives. Job-hopping no longer carries the stigma it once did. Indeed, the massive downsizing of employees has made job mobility the norm rather than the exception. This has led workers operating under the new psychological contract to expect more temporary employment relationships. Paternalism on the part of companies has given way to self-reliance on the part of employees, and also to a decrease in satisfaction, commitment, intentions to stay, and perceptions of an organization’s trustworthiness, honesty, and concern for its employees (Lester, Kickul, Bergmann, & De Meuse, 2003; Llopis, 2013). Indeed, our views of hard work, loyalty, and managing as a career will probably never be the same.

Effects of Technology on Organizations and People

We live in a global world where technology, especially information and communication technology, is changing the manner in which businesses create and capture value, how and where we work, and how we interact and communicate. Consider five technologies that are transforming the very foundations of global business and the organizations that drive it: cloud and mobile computing, big data and machine learning, sensors and intelligent manufacturing, advanced robotics and drones, and clean-energy technologies. These technologies are not just helping people to do things better and faster but also enabling profound changes in the ways that work is done in organizations (Cascio & Montealegre, 2016).

The new wave of technological innovation features the emerging general paradigm known as “ubiquitous computing,” or an environment where computational technology permeates almost everything, enabling new ways of connecting people, computers, and objects. The ubiquitous computing infrastructure also enables the collection of enormous amounts of structured and unstructured data, requiring the adjective big to distinguish this new paradigm of development. Ubiquitous computing also blurs the boundaries between industries, nations, companies, providers, partners, competitors, employees, freelancers, outsourcers, volunteers, and customers. These blurred boundaries yield opportunities to unify the physical space and the electronic space, which has implications for privacy and security, as well as how companies are organized and manage talent (Montealegre & Cascio, 2017).

As with other new developments, there are negatives as well as positives associated with new technology, and they need to be acknowledged. Workers may be bombarded with mass junk e-mail (spam), company computer networks may be attacked by hackers who can wreak havoc on an organization’s ability to function, and employees’ privacy may be compromised. A comprehensive review of literature in this area revealed three lessons about the effects of ubiquitous computing. One, the effects of ubiquitous computing on jobs is a process of creative destruction. Ubiquitous computing is not the first technology to affect jobs. From steam engines to robotic welders to ATMs, technology has long displaced humans, often creating new and higher skilled jobs in its wake. Two, ubiquitous computing can be used to enable or to constrain people at work. As an example, consider electronic monitoring systems. Evidence indicates that attitudes in general, and attitudes toward monitoring in particular, will be more positive when organizations monitor their employees within supportive organizational cultures (Alge & Hansen, 2014). Supportive cultures welcome employee input into the monitoring system’s design, focus on groups of employees rather than singling out individuals, and focus on performance-relevant activities. Three, ubiquitous computing is changing the nature of competition, work, and employment in ways that are profound and that need to be managed actively.

A caveat is in order here, however. It relates to the common assumption that since production and service processes have become more sophisticated, high tech can substitute for skill in managing a workforce. Beware of such a “logic trap.” When it comes to engaging and inspiring people to move in the same direction, empathizing with customers, and developing talent, humans will continue to enjoy a strong comparative advantage over machines. No computer will ever manage by walking around, but inspirational leadership will always be in demand (Cascio & Montealegre, 2016). At a broader level, to succeed and prosper in a world where nothing is constant except the increasingly rapid pace of change, companies need motivated, technically literate workers who are willing to retrain continually. However, organizations of the future will look very different from organizations of the past, as the next section illustrates.

Changes in the Structure and Design of Organizations

Many factors are driving change, but none is more important than the rise of Internet technologies. Like the steam engine or the assembly line, the Web has already become an advance with revolutionary consequences, most of which we have only begun to feel. The Web gives everyone in the organization, from the lowliest clerk to the chairperson of the board, the ability to access a mind-boggling array of information—instantaneously from anywhere. Instead of seeping out over months or years, ideas can be zapped around the globe in the blink of an eye. Organizations are adapting to management via the Web: premised on constant change, not stability; organized around networks, not rigid hierarchies; built on shifting partnerships and alliances, not self-sufficiency; and constructed on technological advantages, not bricks and mortar (Cascio, 2018; Friedman, 2016). Twenty-first-century organizations are global in orientation, and all about speed. They are characterized by terms such as virtual, boundaryless, and flexible, with no guarantees to workers or managers.

This approach to organizing is no short-term fad. The fact is that organizations are becoming leaner and leaner, with better and better trained “multi-specialists”—those who have in-depth knowledge about a number of different aspects of the business. Eschewing narrow specialists or broad generalists, organizations of the future will come to rely on cross-trained multi-specialists in order to get things done. One such group whose role is changing dramatically is that of managers.