Strategic HRM & Talent Management: Apple and Kirkwood Hospice Analysis

This report analyzes the strategic human resource management (SHRM) challenges and the importance of talent management programs within organizations, particularly focusing on Apple and Kirkwood Hospice. It emphasizes the significance of recruiting the right employees through stringent processes, enhancing employee motivation via diverse methods, and improving employee performance through targeted training and development programs. The report also highlights the critical role of talent management in employee retention by offering competitive compensation and benefits. Effective talent management practices contribute to a favorable internal environment, enabling organizations like Apple to gain competitive advantages. The analysis underscores the need for organizations to adapt their talent management strategies to address changing business environments and employee expectations, ensuring a motivated, engaged, and high-performing workforce.

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Strategic human resource management
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Talent management is being widely initiated by the contemporary business organizations
such as Apple in order effectively manage their internal stakeholders and gain competitive
advantages. However, there are very few instances where large organizations have actually
gained from the initiation of the talent management (Dries, 2013). There are various issues and
problems being faced by the business organizations in achieving the desired outcome from the
initiation of the talent management. In this case, talent management program should be initiated
by the business organizations in order to have effective and positive outcome of the talent
management (Al Ariss, Cascio & Paauwe, 2014). The following sections will discuss about the
reasons about why organizations such as Apple should implement a talent management program.
Recruiting the right employees
An effective and ideal talent management program will start from the recruitment and
selection of the new employees. This is due to the reason that selection of the right employees
will ensure right employees with right skill sets in the right place of the organization. Initiation
of the talent management will help in having different mediums or processes of recruiting and
selecting new employees. This will include developing the job description, communicating and
advertising the job description to the potential employees, short listing the applied candidates,
pre interview screening process, assessment test and final round of interview (Abraham et al.,
2015). Thus, having all these processes will help to make sure that employees are being selected
through stringent processes. This will also ensure the quality of newly appointed employees.
Therefore, it can be concluded that effectiveness of the first step of the talent management
program will help in having right employees in place and will help in gaining the desired
outcome from talent management.

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Apple follows unique and distinctive policies of recruitment and selection. This helps
them in having the brightest mind in place. All the employees in Apple posses expertise in their
own field and they are helping the organization in having the best internal management in place.
All these are due to the reason of the effective talent management policies of Apple.
Enhancing the employee motivation
Another reason of implementing talent management program in the organization is to
increase the level of motivation of the existing employees. In the current business scenario,
employee motivation is important due to the reason that motivated employees will have more
productivity and effectiveness in their respective jobs and they will contribute more in the
organizational performance (Lau & Roopnarain, 2014). In majority of the cases, talent
management is not got succeeded due to the reason that employees are less motivated in their
workplace or only a particular type of motivating employees is being followed in the
organization.
On the other hand, initiation of the talent management program will help in having
different mediums to motivate the employees in their workplace. These mediums will include
financial benefits, perks, and job recognition and career growth for the employees. Having
diverse mediums for motivating the employees will help the organizations to have fully fledged
and 360 degree mechanism in their internal management (Hammerly, Harmon & Schwaitzberg,
2014). This will ensure that employees with having their different requirements and expectation
will still be motivated in their workplace. Apple is a global organization and they are having
diverse employees in place. Their policy of diversity management helps them to maintain
equality in the organization. Employees are engaged to communicate and interact with each other

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in order to have more effective learning process in place. This is also helping them in having
engaged employees in place. Initiation of the talent management program will help in keeping
the employees motivated and engaged in their workplace. This will in turn increase the
organizational effectiveness that will prove the talent management successful. Moreover, in the
case of Apple, effective process of talent management is one of the major reasons for their
organizational success.
Enhancing the employee performance
The current business scenario much more challenging for the business organizations. This
is due to the reason that the business environment is rapidly changing and it is becoming difficult
for the business organizations to cope up with the change. In this case, organizations will be
benefited from the initiation of the talent management program. This will help in having an
effective mechanism in the workplace to determine the gaps and the areas for improvement in
the current organizational processes. In addition, initiation of the talent management program
will also help the organization to have proper and accurate training and development program for
their employees (Jehanzeb & Bashir, 2013). The approach of the training and development
program will be different and will enhance the performance of the employees in accordance to
their identified gaps. Employees in Apple are all updated and are having the information about
latest business scenario and approaches. Apple is having the system of periodical training
process, which initiates a continuous process of providing training to the employees. Thus, Apple
is having the advantage of dealing with any organizational challenges in less amount time. This
is due to the reason that employees are well updated about the present business situation.

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Thus, talent management program will ensure that the entire workforce is having training
and development program according to their needs and they all are equipped and trained enough
to deal with the changing organizational challenges. Initiation of the training and development
will further increase the effectiveness of the employees along with making them updated with the
current business requirement. Hence, it can be concluded that initiation of the talent management
program in Apple will ensure that the existing employees are up to date with the business
requirements and the organization is having right internal resources in relation to the
requirements.
Employee retention
The current business scenario provides huge career opportunities for the employees due
to the presence of huge number of business organizations. Thus, employees with having right
talent and eligibility tend to change their organization frequently according to the added facilities
and benefits being offered. However, on the other hand, it is challenging for the organizations to
cope up with this phenomenon due to the reason that there is a cost involved in recruiting and
selecting new employees. In addition, attrition of the employees will also cause in the loss of
competitive advantages for the organization. Hence, they are in the need of effective talent
management program to retain the top talents with the organization.
Initiation of the talent management program will help the organization to determine the
requirements of their top talents and providing those with benefits and facilities accordingly. One
of the major features of talent management program of Apple is compensating the top talents is
to offer best in the industry compensation (Terera & Ngirande, 2014). This is due to the reason
that majority of the employees change their organization in order to have more hike in their

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salary. Thus, offering the best in the industry compensation will ensure that employees will not
get motivated to change their organization due to not having any chance to have more salary in
other organization.
Thus, it can be concluded that initiation of the talent management program will help the
organization to have a holistic process of looking after their human resources and providing them
every facility to make them engaged and motivated in their workplace. Effective implementation
of these elements will ensure that the organization will have desired outcome from the talent
management. Moreover, it can also be concluded that the effective process of talent management
is helping Apple to have a favorable internal environment in place. This in turn is helping them
to gain competitive advantages in the market by generating the majority of the competencies
from the employees.

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