Talent retention strategies: The role of self-regulatory career behaviour among working adults

Abstract

The increasing demand for proactive career self-management in working adults in a business environment that competes for scarce and critical skills necessitates self-regulatory career behaviour which relates to the retention of employees in uncertain employment markets. The unpredictable and rapidly changing world of work, requires employees to be more accountable and responsible for their own careers and to thus remain employable, adaptable, committed and retainable. Security lies in employability, rather than in employment. Hence the investigation of the relationship between self-regulatory career behaviours and retention factors has become vital in light of the dynamic nature of the current world of work, and the scarcity of talent. These self-regulatory career behaviours include career adaptability, employability attributes and organisational commitment. Based on the relationship found between these self-regulatory career behaviours and retention, human resource practitioners and industrial psychologists should utilise interventions and strategies to promote individual self-regulatory career behaviours in order to increase the retention of talented staff.