Talent management as a management fashion in HRD: towards a
research agenda

Iles, PA; Preece, D; Chuai, X

Abstract

HRD practitioners have long shown concerns about the status and legitimacy of
the occupation, and, arguably, this has not been unconnected to the range of titles
HRD has been given over the years. Has there been an element of ‘management
fashion’ about this, or have they reflected some real change at the level of
practice? This paper considers whether ‘talent management’ (TM), as a recentlyemerged
area of interest for HRD, can be argued to display features of a
management fashion. On the basis of a review of three main perspectives, we
conclude that it is too early to say with regard to two of them, given TM’s recent
emergence and the paucity of empirical material, but that TM displays features of
institutionalism in TM talk in the business and professional literature. A research
agenda, based primarily on institutional theory, is developed and a number of
research questions outlined.

Citation

research agenda. Human Resource Development International, 13(2), 125-145. https://doi.org/10.1080/13678861003703666

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: Apr 1, 2010
• Deposit Date: Oct 5, 2011
• Journal: Human Resource Development International
• Print ISSN: 1367-8868
• Publisher: Routledge
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 13
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 125-145
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/13678861003703666
• Publisher URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13678861003703666