Ethos Issue 5, Nov 2008

Talent on Demand: Managing Talent
in an Age of Uncertainty
Author: Peter Cappelli
Published by Harvard Business Press, Massachusetts: 2008
Reviewed by Toh Boon Kwan

Cappelli’s idea of incorporating the making and buying of talent into corporate human resource strategy may not sound new. In fact, he reminds us that most of the management development practices in use today are of recent vintage. For instance, the first high-potential programme was only introduced in 1926.⁸ Peer assessments and forced ranking was pioneered in the armed services before making its way into industry. Similarly, the use of psychological assessments and selection boards became common practice after their pioneering use in the military. This is not surprising since the armed services had to develop and deploy huge numbers of manpower quickly and efficiently during the Second World War.⁹ However, before we dismiss Cappelli’s ideas as largely common sense with nothing new to offer, it is worth noting that common sense is not common practice. By focusing senior management’s attention on what is inadequate in current talent management approaches, Cappelli has done human resource practitioners a great service. Take heed.



Toh Boon Kwan is the Assistant Director of Training and Development in the Leadership Development Department, Public Service Division, Prime Minister's Office. He holds a history degree from the National University of Singapore, a diploma in human resource management from the Singapore Institute of Management, and a postgraduate degree in strategic studies from Nanyang Technological University. He is also a prize-winning historian whose works on local and regional military history have been published and reprinted in leading international academic journals.

NOTES
01.	See p. 1.
02.	See pp. 101-102.
03.	See p. 148.
04.	See pp. 201-202.
05.	See p. 181.
06.	See Neo Boon Siong, Dynamic Governance: Embedding Culture, Capabilities and Change in Singapore (Singapore: World Scientific, 2007), pp. 354, 456-457.
07.	For an American perspective on the divide between inexperienced scholarship holders and long-serving officers within the Singapore Armed Forces context, see Sean P. Walsh, "The Roar of the Lion City: Ethnicity, Gender and Culture in the Singapore Armed Forces", Armed Forces & Society, 33, No. 2 (January 2007), pp. 265-285.
08.	See p. 35.
09.	See pp. 40-43; The British armed forces perspective is provided in Jeremy A. Crang, The British Army and the People’s War, 1939-1945 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2000).

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