Do you see what I see? The role of technology in talent identification

This paper applies a social constructivist lens to understand more about the ways in which technology shapes our understanding of talent management, in particular the processes of talent identification. Specifically, it examines similarities and differences in the identification of talent across a range of business units at a large professional services firm. The findings show that while objective evaluations of talent based on data and information were possible using talent-related technology, managers had subjective and widely different understandings of what constituted talent at the organisation and how to go about identifying it. These different understandings, based on organisational context, personal attitudes, behaviours and past experiences, determined the ways in which the technology and the information it yielded was used. We conclude that the full potential of the talent-related technology and the talent identification processes were unrealised. We discuss the implications of these findings for HR and the management of talent more generally.