Toward an Understanding of the Failure of Talent Identification Initiatives in the African Public Sector

Abstract

This paper reports upon a study designed to understand talent identification initiatives in African public sector organizations. Specifically; to identify the reasons that have led Human Resource (HR) professionals in some of those organizations to observe that mainstream western talent identification practices do not work in the African context. The study was conducted applying a Grounded Theory Research Method (GTRM) using semi-structured interviews with twenty-two HR professionals from ten African countries representing a diverse range of public sector organizations. The participants were selected using convenience sampling in that the participants were all attending strategic HR workshops being facilitated by this papers lead author.