From Talent Management Towards Talent Engagement: Responsiveness in a Digitised Post-COVID-19 Strategic Organisation

Employees are considered critical stakeholders in the drive towards organisations attaining their goals, remaining relevant and competitive within their respective industries. The biggest growth in the workforce has been the entry of the millennial professional, who are becoming experts and joining the ranks of decision-makers in organisations. Talent management is used to refer to skilled employees, also referred to as talent, and communicative practices with employees continue to be managerial, top-down in approach by organisations, in a post-modern age of engagement and dialogue. The COVID-19 pandemic was an organisational shock that forced organisations to re-evaluate their communicative approach to operating and communicating in the midst of a pandemic, requiring more flexibility with respect to the employee engagement. Digital communication technologies facilitated the flexibility of hybrid and remote working. This chapter argues that organisations need to shift from a top-down approach to talent management, towards a strategic communication practice of talent engagement to progress the employee-stakeholder relationship and retain skilled employees. The chapter, supported by data from a previous study involving millennial professionals highlights the implications to organisations of such skilled individual employees, i.e. talent not being adequately engaged as key organisational stakeholders, namely the loss of critical skills.