The cultural and occupational roles attributed to trust in talent management: Chapter 7

This chapter considers the significance of ‘trust’ in talent management and
assesses its critical nature through cultural and occupational roles, by observing
group dynamics within the social framework of mutual-equivalence. Positive
forms of trusting beliefs can create an organisational climate that conveys a
sense of confidence. This in turn, could inspire generative learning and an
innate driving force for talent to manifest itself throughout an organisation’s
workforce. Notwithstanding, realities of work-life balance and the management
of change could, for example in recessionary times, impede notions of mistrust,
replacing confidence with some degree of suspicion. By implication this could
cause reduced productivity and talent potential. Managing social diversity
or unpredictability to on-going organisational dilemmas can be assisted when
observed within a cultural setting of in-group (e.g. organisation), out-group (e.g.
occupations) processes. Using an applied concept known as mutual-equivalence
(Wallace, [1961], ed.1964), an analytical insight could assess positive or negative
push-pull environmental and operational behaviours such as, for example, a
‘recession push’ vs. ‘prosperity pull’ (e.g. Brünjes and Diez, 2013). Such social
perceptions (and others) could affect opportunities for talent acquisition or create
or inhibit inspired aspirations amongst employees, for which trust would be an
important variable to consider.