Marina Latukha

Talent management in Russian companies: domestic challenges and international experience

The study investigates talent management practices in Russian and foreign companies and their influence on a companys performance. In our work, foreign companies are foreign-owned companies (multinational or global) that operate in the Russian market and their headquarters are located outside the Russian Federation. Attention is paid to the analysis of the factors that support talent management implementation. As the results of the research are based on a comparative analysis of differences and peculiarities in talent practices in Russian and foreign companies, the paper explores and provides a number of ideas and conclusions about talent management elaboration, realization and talent practices improvement in the Russian context. Our data show that talent management practices are influenced by a number of factors that are different, in parts, in Russian and foreign companies. Supplementary analysis also suggests that the positive connection between talent management efforts and a companys performance can be found.

Entrepreneurial FDI in Emerging Economies: Russian SME Strategy for Brazil

Brazil is perceived by potential investors not only as a country of samba, carnival and beaches, but also as the land of growth and development. Using the example of KGK Global, a small enterprise in the field of technology-intensive services, this case study examines why Russian investors go to Brazil and what kind of obstacles they may face there.

Obtaining international results through partnerships: evidence from Russian MNEs in the IT sector

The paper discusses the internationalisation specifics and results of Russian MNEs in the IT sector. The strategies of these firms are focused more on the acquisition of customers than of technologies when expanding abroad. As the technological sophistication of Russian companies and foreign firms in the high-tech sector is about equal (if compared to natural resource-based enterprises), our findings indicate that partnership-oriented strategy provides Russian firms with a better chance of obtaining positive results when expanding abroad. IT companies from Russia are relatively less influenced by their home government, being shaped more by economic than political factors in their international expansion Hence, we argue that they seem to be more marketing-oriented in their international expansion than their natural resource-based counterparts.

To stay or leave: Motives behind the decisions of graduate programs’ trainees’ in European and Russian companies

This paper investigates the problem of retaining business school graduates after they have completed a trainee program in a company. Often when a company invests in training programs for young graduates, the company’s management expects that a graduate will remain with the company for a long time. But in some cases, the trainees decide to leave. This research shows the different perceptions among the trainees and the company of motives or reasons for such a decision. The main findings also indicate a significant difference in the graduates’ preferences in the countries being compared and suggest a list of motives that drive such decision making. Furthermore, managerial applications are given and the possible approaches for future discussions are suggested.

Talent Management Practices in IT Companies from Emerging Markets: A Comparative Analysis of Russia, India, and China

ABSTRACT In this article, the authors review talent management practices in information technology (IT) companies from Russia, India, and China, discussing their differences and similarities. Using the emerging market context, the authors debate the factors influencing talent management, specifically in IT companies. The article examines the relevant research on the main talent management issues in Russia, India, and China, and offers one of the first intercountry comparative analyses of talent management practices in IT companies from emerging markets. The authors argue that although talent management practices are influenced by different institutional and cultural factors, there are similarities and differences that can be explained by the emerging market and industry-specific contexts.

Talent development and a firm’s performance: Evidence from Russian companies

The study investigates talent development (TD) as a part of human resource management (HRM) using the emerging market context and its influence on a company’s performance in Russian companies. Attention is paid to the analysis of TD programs that are used to develop talent in Russia and the factors that influence the creation and implementation of TD in Russian firms. The article explores and provides a number of ideas and conclusions about TD elaboration, realization, and talent practices’ improvement in the Russian context. The data shows that the positive connection between TD efforts and a company’s performance can be found in emerging market firms. The findings contribute to the field of HRM by showing that TD significantly influences organizational results.

The Competitive Advantage of Emerging Market Firms: Is Talent Management Involved?

The strategic role of talent management cannot be discussed without understanding the link between talent management practices and corporate results. As described in previous chapters, talent management nowadays is strategic and future-oriented, and proceeds in parallel to overall business objectives. Talent management practices seem to be aligned with organizational strategy and to be integrated with a business planning process and management involvement, have cultural embeddedness, internal consistency, balance of global and local needs, and develop the corporate image so as to attract, develop and retain talent.

Corporate Universities as a Tool for Talent Development

The impressive recent global economic development has required amounts of highly qualified specialists and managers, especially in emerging markets. With many emerging markets facing problems of labour force shortages, firms have realized that sometimes it is best to nurture personnel within internal structures, such as corporate universities. Although helpful, short-term training programs cannot create the necessary competitive advantage for companies from emerging markets; the educational process needs to be more structured, focused, complex and systematic. These reasons help underpin the larger-scale training and development programs that are offered in corporate universities.

Foreign Expansion of Russian Firms Based on Natural Resources and Technology

Although the theory of firm internationalization has been built to explain the motives and strategies of firms from developed countries, there have been several attempts to test the applicability of the entrenched notions in the internationalization of firms originating from emerging economies.

International Competitiveness of Russian IT Firms: Strong Rivals or Survivors at the Edge?

The competitiveness of firms from emerging markets has come increasingly to the focus of the international business research during last decades. The scholars have attempted to comprehend the foundations of their competitiveness and whether these foundations are different from those of developed market MNEs (Collinson and Rugman 2007; Luo and Tung 2007; Demirbag et al. 2009). Although literature has addressed these issues in the context of manufacturing firms from emerging economies (Jormanainen and Koveshnikov forthcoming), service sector, and in particular IT services, received significantly less attention. Indeed, only 50 academic studies for the time period of 1971–2007 were devoted to service companies (Kundu and Merchant 2008). This proves that theoretical and empirical knowledge about the patterns and determinants of international competitiveness in the service sector are still limited and the analysis of their growth potential has yet not been conducted in proper depth (Pauwels and de Ruyter 2005). Moreover, with regard to the IT services, the existing studies have been conducted on the basis of empirical evidence from Indian and Chinese firms (e.g., Narayanan and Bhat 2009), while other contexts are clearly under researched.