The report highlights that for too long talent management has focused on a limited number of high potentials and top-tier employees. Whilst there has been dissatisfaction from some corners for awhile, the COVID-19 crisis has now made talent an enterprise-wide issue.

Organisations are having to pivot who works where, doing what, and when - and traditional talent-management processes and structures have proved inadequately agile or transformational at the time they have been needed most.

David Perring, director of research at Fosway commented, “With the new world of work unfolding around us at pace, the old foundations of talent management fail to add up. It's time for organisations to rethink and move beyond historic views of succession planning, performance management, and annual engagement surveys. Against a tough backdrop of recruitment freezes, training budget cuts, furloughs, and redundancies, it's time to tackle talent differently now.”

The 2020 Fosway 9-Grid™ for Talent & People Success builds on the previous six years of 9-Grids™ that were focused on talent management. In addition to the Group's other annual 9-Grid™ reports across Cloud HR, Talent Acquisition, Learning Systems, and Digital Learning, it is a key piece of industry research used by buyers of HR, talent, and learning solutions across Europe.

David Wilson, CEO of Fosway said, “Last year we widened our analysis to encompass a growing number of specialist talent solutions. However, talent management has been disrupted by HCM Suites from above and by fast-growing disruptors and specialists from below. It is time to rethink and recalibrate.”

He continues, "The pandemic has forced organisations to change. Companies must be agile, as must their workforce and their talent processes. This is not just about employee experience; it is about organisational agility, performance, and success, which is why we have completely reclassified this category. We urge HR to understand the critical need to look at all of its people and rethink talent approaches completely."