HRM331 Arc Insights Talent Management Strategies Paper Do take note this is an important assignment and has to be submitted on time.It involves Human Resou

HRM331 Arc Insights Talent Management Strategies Paper Do take note this is an important assignment and has to be submitted on time.It involves Human Resource Management as a base, please take up only if you have background knowledge on HRM. Many strategies & HRM methodologies has to be illustrated. Guidelines
1.
There are SIX (6) COMPULSORY QUESTIONS that you have to answer in this
assignment.
1.
In order to do well in this assignment, you are encouraged to support your analysis, points
and recommendations with research.
2.
Bibliography. Cite your references in standard format. This means that your bibliography
should include author(s) name, year of publication, source (e.g., journal/ book), and
publisher. Refer to the references or bibliography section of a textbook to see how
references are cited.
NOTES:
• Do take note this is an important assignment and has to be
submitted on time.
• It involves Human Resource Management as a base, please
take up only if you have background knowledge on HRM.
• Many strategies & HRM methodologies has to be illustrated.
Talent Management at Arc Insights1
Introduction
“Joanne, it has been more than one year since you have taken the position of Chief Human
Resource Officer. Employee engagement (especially organizational identification) levels are
significantly lower than industry average and attrition is significantly higher than industry
average.
The core value of our company is about knowledge creation and knowledge sharing. Yet, I
do not see many of our staff sharing knowledge with their peers and colleagues. I hope you can
spend some time to take stock of the situation and improve our retention rate and engagement
levels. I hope to see your master-plan in a month or two.”
Joanne went back to her office to mull over what the CEO of Arc Insights had said. She decided
to take stock of Arc Insights talent management strategies and diagnose fundamental problems
with it. Arc Insights hires some of the brightest individuals in the world and has a solid
performance management structure. What led the CEO to suggest that something is wrong?
Company Overview
Arc Insights is a consulting firm that provides services to many MNCs. Established in
1966, it currently hires around 5000 employees worldwide from diverse backgrounds (so as to
tackle the complex problems that clients are facing). Geographically, Arc Insights is
headquartered in Chicago (USA) and has a distribution of 52 offices in roughly 12 countries
that connect all the business elites globally. The company’s global presence is an advantage
that allows Arc Insights to reach giant multinational businesses.
In terms of business operations, it serves commercial, public and social sectors. Arc Insights
provides solutions to clients with regards to:
• business managerial issues
• strategy development
• marketing promotions
The main industries that Arc Insights serve are mainly financial services,
telecommunications and pharmaceutical. On top of providing solutions to companies, Arc
Insights also provides free publications and insights to leaders. The goal of the publications
(namely Arc Annual and Arc Worldwide) is to provide insights into the understanding of global
issues and environmental changes including their impact on businesses.
This case is also adapted from “Challenges in the Consulting Industry: Dealing with Talent
Management”
1
Arc Insights is an organization that prizes excellence and cutting-edge knowledge. It has
strict internal standards that allow them to apply equal excellent practice to clients in various
countries. Arc Insights is also globally known to be “the firm” that provides the most
comprehensive and cutting-edge knowledge and trends that help organisations and businesses
do better.
Arc Insights strongly believes in the value of knowledge sharing to clients, peers and
colleagues. Right at the front entrance of every single Arc Insights office is a plaque with this
quote:
“If you have knowledge, let others light their candles in it.”
Margaret Fuller
Management Consulting Industry Background
Arc Insights operates in the knowledge-based management consulting industry. The
management consulting industry is always known for its rigorous recruiting process and high
performance employees as well as their mission and efforts in improving the world. In general,
the consulting industry earned a revenue of $390 billion in 2012, which represents a substantial
growth from 2011 of $366 billion.
Arc Insights Recruitment Policy
The most important source of new talents for Arc Insights is from universities in the USA.
There are over more than 20 universities from which Arc Insights is looking for talents. Arc
Insights usually hires talented undergraduates for internships and especially those who are
willing to undertake postgraduate studies. A second important point in the university
recruitment is that this strategy is applied internationally. Arch Insights strives to hire the best
graduates. During active recruitment periods throughout the year, Arc Insights consultants and
recruiting staff visit several universities. These visits are an opportunity for potential candidates
to learn about Arc Insights and meet Arc Insights consultants. The methods are used globally,
and besides some minor differences, are the same in each country. First, Arc Insights presents
the company regularly to universities and invites graduates to company visits.
Another important point concerning Arc Insights recruitment strategy is strongly linked to its
reputation. Arc Insights endures as the ultimate global brand name. This reputation strongly
helps to attract a certain type of employee internationally. Consultants who forge a career at
Arc Insights have similar resumes. They are all smart, self-confident, mostly male, and have
graduated from one of the best business schools in their country. They are also driven,
hardworking and highly competitive.
Statistically, only 3% of the 5000 global competent candidates are successfully
recruited by Arc Insights every year. This rigorous selection process is at the basis of finding
the most suitable employees to ensure future effectiveness and productivity. The recruitment
policy at Arc Insights is depicted as follows: to continue recruiting exceptional candidates from
a diverse range of backgrounds for generalist and specialist consulting roles. The first step for
getting a job interview is to send a resume to the company. The company screens it and makes
an initial selection out of the candidates. The screening is done by a number of people in
different positions. This step takes approximately one week. If a candidate passes the screening,
he will be invited for the first time to the company. The task-solving test lasts 40 minutes and
requires an upper-advanced level of English. It is a multiple choice test. After this part, the third
round of the selection process begins. In this round, the actual job interview takes place. The
candidate has to go through two different rounds of interviews. Each round consists of 34
individual interviews with consultants from various tenure-levels. In these discussions with the
consultants, the candidate has to answer questions about personal data and work experience.
In addition, the potential employee has to solve, in each interview, a business case. These cases
are a critical factor in the final evaluation of the candidate. These tasks should show the
candidate’s ability to structure and organise his or her thoughts when solving a problem,
especially when facing with uncertainty. These tasks are either brain-teasers or numerical cases.
Shortly after the end of the first interview round, the candidate is given feedback about their
strengths and weaknesses. A few days later, the potential employee is invited to a second round
of interviews.
Training and Development Practices
Training and development are a high priority and a constant at Arc Insights. It is at the
core of the Arc Insights business. The company spends $15 million a year on formal training
programmes. The comprehensive training system provided across all stages of a consultant’s
career is evidence that Arc Insights aims at continuously building the skills of its employees in
order to maintain and improve its service standards to clients. All consultants from business
analysts to directors have to go through different training during their career path at Arc
Insights. During their first two years, consultants can have up to eight weeks of training.
Personal preferences, specific needs and background are taken into account in their career
development in the company. Consultants receive extensive career counselling to be sure that
the consultants’ careers at Arc Insights are correlated to their own expectations. The
development policy of Arc Insights is to develop consultants as global leaders.
Development at Arc Insights is based on an up-or-out policy. It means that a consultant
has to develop in order to succeed at Arc Insights. If consultants keep developing and improving
their performance and skills, they will stay in Arc Insights. On the contrary, if consultants don’t
show their potential to go further, people from inside the company will help them to find a role
outside of the company. Most of the time, consultants start work with Arc Insights clients. In
order to provide a new consultant with constant development, Arc Insights immerses the new
consultant in a strong culture of mentorship and coaching. With regards to forms of training,
Arc Insights offers more than a hundred training programmes. Below is a list of some of Arc
Insights’ main training programmes according to professional standards. For example, in order
to be more effective consultants, newcomers follow between five and eight training
programmes during their first two years:
Introduction for newcomers
The first step in Arc Insights: consultants get familiar with their environment and meet their
senior colleagues.
Basics in Consulting
Over five days, consultants have to understand the core skills needed for success, the values,
and guiding principles, to apply the Arc Insights approach to problem solving and
communications and to build trust-based relationships within teams and clients by way of
different practical role and tips.
Business Analyst Training
This is preparation for new consultants becoming business analysts. During a week,
consultants focus on advanced problem solving and communication skills. Regarding Arc
Insights development policy, consultants have to define personal developmental goals and
write a personal development plan.
Mini-MBA Programme
During six weeks, new consultants without substantial business training join a business
school to get experience with key concepts, basic analytical tools and frameworks in
different subjects such as strategy, finance, accounting, economics etc.
The programme is for associates who join the firm with an advanced degree but without
substantial business training. It is an intensive, six-week immersion in a business school
curriculum.
Workshops
Consultants who already have one year’s work experience have to identify and develop Arc
Insight’s techniques.
After several years at Arc Insights and after having more experiences, business analysts can
specialise their training regarding their career development and consolidated leadership,
communication and management skills, namely:
Leadership. Over four weeks, employees explore their individual leadership potential and
learn how to increase leadership skills.
Communications. Employees build speaking and presentation skills and learn how to adapt
their communication regarding the environment.
After being business analysts, consultants can be promoted to engagement managers. To be
promoted, business analysts should complete two different training programmes.
Engagement. An engagement manager has to learn the essentials of client leadership by
attending Cambridge EM college.
Engagement Leadership. The purpose of this workshop is to develop engagement skills for
inspirational leaders.
Training and career development are part of Arc Insights’ organisational culture. Consultants
complete training to boost the performance and profits of Arc Insights. A career in Arc Insights
is pre-designed and well-structured. Nevertheless, if consultants provide strong leadership
skills and high performance and results, they will be developed and promoted in the firm very
rapidly.
Career planning differs depending from which position a candidate starts. Differences exist for
bachelor graduates, advanced professional degrees, and MBA graduates. People with
Bachelor’s degrees join Arc Insights as business analysts. In some offices, they are called
“newcomers”. Some stay for two or three years before attending graduate school or gaining
further work experience. Others are invited to stay at Arc Insights and move directly into an
associate role. These graduates have the possibility to travel to different countries and work
with people from different cultures and backgrounds. In many countries, this opportunity is
unique for bachelor graduates, because normally, students will finish their Master’s programme
before they start working.
Arc Insights also hires candidates with advanced professional degrees. In fact, more than half
of their consultants have a doctorate, law, medical or non-business Master’s degree.
Furthermore, the future career path heavily depends on the candidate’s specialization and
interests. So, a typical career at the company looks like this:
• 3-4 years as analyst after undergraduate studies (any field) typically followed by MBA
and an offer to return upon graduation
• 2-3 years as associate consultant after MBA or strong industry experience
• 3-5 years as manager or senior manager
• 5-10 years as junior partner
The highest possible position to obtain in the company is “Director”. Furthermore, Arc
Insights is also known for its career possibilities outside of the consulting company. Employees,
especially high ranked ones, who want to change jobs, have a good chance of entering a high
ranked position in another company.
Performance Management and Performance Appraisal
Arc Insights managerial practices are based on performance. It has to be evaluated to boost
talent, strengthen values and reinforce Arc Insights’ corporate culture. Feedback is the main
part of performance appraisal at Arc Insights. A consultant’s mentor also provides feedback
and advice for work done. Moreover, a consultant at Arc Insights goes through two collective
performance reviews annually. The reviews focus on involvement to improve client
performance and strengthen the company.
To point out some figures, for example, top senior partners and managing director have similar
compensation. An estimation says that managing director will earn between five to ten million
dollars. A new consultant from business school will earn between US$60,000 to
US$100,000. An engagement manager, with four to five years’ experience, earns without
bonuses US$120,000. An associate principal, with four to five years’ experience, earns without
bonus, US$175,000.
Bonus structure is based on individual performance and contribution to knowledge creation of
the company.
Knowledge Sharing Events
To motivate employees, Arc Insights organizes different events inside the company. The
objective is to develop, capture and provide leverage of employees’ knowledge and ideas base
in serving clients.
Part A (50marks)
Please read the case provided and answer questions 1 to 4.
Question 1
Analyze the case and hypothesize why engagement levels (specifically organizational
identification) are significantly lower than industry average (5 marks) and attrition levels of
Arc Insights are significantly higher than industry average (5 marks).
(10 marks)
Question 2
The values of Arc Insights are to create knowledge and share knowledge. Closely examine the
talent management strategies of Arc Insights currently and analyse why knowledge sharing
between peers and colleagues is not taking place.
(15 marks)
Question 3
Design a talent management programme that would help Arc Insights increase knowledge
sharing amongst employees in the company.
(15 marks)
Question 4
Design a competencies framework. The competencies framework will reflect the behaviours
and attitudes that employees need to adopt for knowledge creation and knowledge sharing to
take place.
(10 marks)
Part B: Desk-Top Research Component (50 marks)
Question 5
Conduct desk-top research on an innovative company that has a culture of knowledge sharing.
Examine the key talent management strategies and organisational cultural features of the
organisation and analyse why knowledge sharing is taking place in the company.
Word limit: 1000 words
(25 marks)
Question 6
Based on your research, provide some insights as to how organisations can truly become a
learning organisation.
Word limit: 1000 words
(25 marks)
—– END OF PAPER —–

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