CIPD Level 7HR02 Assignment: Resourcing and Talent Management to Sustain Success Question

About this unit

This unit focuses on the day-to-day practicalities and the longer-term strategic issues associated with resourcing organisations appropriately, ethically and fairly and to maximise the performance of staff and the organisation. These activities take place in a competitive context in which different employers aspire to recruit and retain the most talented and experienced people.

What you will learn

You will cover the impact of the business environment on resourcing and talent management and the significance for strategy and practice, explaining and debating the relevance to organisations and presenting advice on workforce and succession planning. You will evaluate attraction and retention, comparing ways in which organisations build and maintain positive reputations in key labour markets. Additionally, you will learn about which technologies can be used to improve recruitment and retention, evaluating measures designed to reduce employee turnover. Finally, you will evidence policy and practice in selection and induction, including developments in job analysis and debates about employee selection, referencing legal compliance and staff underperformance in organisations.

Learning outcome, assessment criteria and indicative content

1 Understand the impact of the changing business environment on resourcing and talent management strategy and practice.

• 1.1 Analyse current developments impacting business environments and their significance for organisational resourcing and talent strategy and practice.

Key contextual developments (technology, labour markets, business ethics, diversity and inclusion, regulation).

• 1.2 Evaluate the value of resourcing and talent management strategies.

Securing and managing people resources for organisational success, the relative benefits of utilising the internal labour market vs external labour markets, defining and identifying talent, managing and developing talent, retaining talent, rewarding talent, advantages and disadvantages of ‘fast track’ approaches.

• 1.3 Critically discuss potential future developments in the fields of resourcing and talent management.

Debates about new flexible and agile staffing practices; relevant technological developments; responding to skills shortages and surpluses.

• 1.4 Compare ways in which organisations build and maintain a positive reputation in key labour markets by offering compelling employee value propositions.

Achieving recognition as an employer of choice; developing a compelling employee value proposition; debates about employer branding. Managing diversity, ethical working practices.

2 Understand organisational recruitment and selection strategies.

• 2.1 Research current developments in job analysis, job design and competency frameworks.

Job descriptions, person specifications and accountability profiles; debates about competency frameworks; the principles of effective jobdesign.

• 2.2 Evaluate effective recruitment, selection and induction methods in organisations.

Major alternative recruitment methods (networking, social media, advertising, informal and internal approaches, education liaison, working with agents). Employee selection and induction: the major alternative methods used to select and promote staff (shortlisting, interviewing; ability testing, psychometric testing; biodata; assessment centres) and debates about these.

• 2.3 Analyse the use of technologies to improve:

• attraction
• selection
• induction

Use of technology in attracting – social media; interactive recruitment; in employee selection: online sifting, the use of chatbots, virtual reality and gamification; induction and socialisation of new staff; staffing overseas posts.

3 Understand the importance of succession planning to support sustainable organisational performance.

• 3.1 Evaluate long- and short-term talent planning approaches to meet organisational demand.

The major stages in workforce planning; debates about the relevance of workforce planning and major ways it is developing; talent reservoirs and pipelines; tools of succession planning and debates about these.

• 3.2 Analyse a range of analytics to determine talent planning and retention strategies.

Employee turnover data, wastage rate, average tenure, cohort half-life, career progression and pathways; methods of measurement and recording; value of considering a number of variables in analysis, including gender, age, ethnicity, role, department, entry qualifications/skills.

• 3.3 Justify measures designed to reduce voluntary employee turnover.

Interventions designed to improve staff retention (pay, promotion and developmental opportunities, employee experience, work-life balance, effective leadership).

4 Understand approaches to improving individual and team performance.

• 4.1 Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to manage and enhance employee performance.

Punitive approaches; reward penalties, discipline. Strengths: speed, deterrent effect. Weaknesses: impersonal, lacks holistic analysis of underlying reasons for poor performance, undesirable outcomes, fails to elicit employee engagement. Collaborative approaches; negotiation, effective leadership, counselling, coaching, improving work redesign and employee experience. Strengths: empowers employees, supportive, fair, encourages continuous improvement, improves employee commitment. Weaknesses: time, resources, skills dependent.

• 4.2 Evaluate the use of technology to monitor individual and team performance.

Contemporary innovations in performance monitoring and recording, video surveillance, call recording, productivity data, customer feedback, remote online monitoring to assess work quality, work pace; debates about the ethics of using technology to facilitate, monitor and predict performance at work.

• 4.3 Discuss management strategies for attendance and underperforming staff in organisations.

Effective absence management; different attendance management practices; managing unsatisfactory performance ethically, lawfully and effectively.

• 4.4 Critically discuss the legal, ethical and professional lens in relation to retirement, redundancy and dismissal practices.

Legal lens: statutory processes and requirements, statutory redundancy pay (SRP) and notice, consultation periods, removal of the Default Retirement Age (DRA), objective justification for a retirement age, contractual retirement, age discrimination considerations, fair and unfair reasons for dismissal, suspension, statutory notice period and pay obligations. Ethical and professional lens: managing redundancy with sensitivity, ‘at risk’ jobs pool, appeal processes, outplacement support, retirements: retirement courses, financial advice, pensions support, lifestyle and wellbeing interventions; dismissal: felt fair, consistent, dignified and respectful, confidential, trade union representation, communication, notetaking, recording.