Talent management in professional service companies - The Art of Keeping the People that Keep You in Business

Abstract: Today's increasingly mobile, competitive and globalized labour markets have resulted in a vast and growing demand for skilled professionals worldwide. Simultaneously, macroeconomic and demographic trends are forecasted to intensify a future shortage of skilled and qualified workers. Consequently, global as well as local organisations are facing considerable recruitment challenges. Companies that are dependent on skilled labour but unable to attract and retain talent are subject to severe operational risks. Therefore, having an attractive company profile is of paramount importance. Employer branding has subsequently become a strategic priority for organisations in their quest for winning the war for talent. Previous research on employee recruitment has identified and validated a number of factors that both affect people's appeal to an organisation and benefits corporate recruitment practices. However, little research has been done on the specific organisational attributes that affect applicants' job switching propensity; highly relevant for any recruiting organisation. The overall purpose of this thesis is to identify how different organisational attributes affect an individual's general job satisfaction and further, how those attributes affect an individual's job switching propensity. Furthermore, the thesis investigates the incidence of prospect theory and loss aversion in job switching situations. Two extensive quantitative surveys with 1408 respondents in total and three qualitative expert interviews form the basis of the analysis. Results from our quantitative and qualitative data do not fully support the prevalence of loss aversion in job switching situations. However, results support the fact that functional factors have the highest explanatory power for individual's job switching propensity. Thus, it is through the organisational attributes and core activities that companies ultimately can influence individual's attraction to an organisation, incorporate the laws of attraction and win the war for talent on the tight labour markets.