Talent management, talent mindset competency and job performance: the mediating role of job satisfaction

This study advances and tests four interlinked hypotheses explicating the relationship between talent mindset competency, job satisfaction and job performance. Talent mindset competency is dimensionalised as: (a) value and goal alignment with the organisation, (b) manager's talent mindset, (c) talent application in everyday behaviours, (d) autonomy using talent and (e) development of talent in organisation. Results generated from a series of path analyses from a data set of 198 public and private sector employees suggest that strategies centred on talent management impact job performance, but through job satisfaction which acts as a mediator. Thus, it is not postulated that we have to pursue job satisfaction as a main underlying contributor to job performance, but rather that if we develop and institutionalise a comprehensive talent system, this can affect both job satisfaction (directly) and job performance (indirectly).