| Course | GB542 Strategic Talent Development and Organizational Learning |
|---|---|
| Unit | Unit 10 |
| Paper type | Talent strategy report |
| Length | About 1,140 words, 7 pages double-spaced |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | Purdue University Global |
| Program | MBA |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for GB542 Unit 10
From Thirty Percent to Ninety: A Unit 10 Talent Strategy Report for an Adhesives Maker Entering Battery Packs
[Student Name]
Purdue University Global
GB542: Strategic Talent Development and Organizational Learning
Unit 10 Talent Strategy Report
[Instructor Name]
[Date]
The company, its strategy and every count, measure and cost are composite and illustrative; the frameworks and the sources cited are real.
Summary
Corvane's strategy is to grow automotive structural adhesives from 12 to 40 percent of revenue in three years. The talent strategy that supports it has five parts. Invest above standard in two role families, application engineers and continuous-process technicians, and hold every other role at market. Develop continuous-process technicians internally from batch operators. Hire application engineers and borrow experienced ones while the hires ramp up. Search externally now for the five critical roles with no internal successor. Treat knowledge transfer as a funded program rather than a retirement courtesy. Over three years these actions should raise capability coverage from about 30 percent to 90 percent and ready-now succession coverage from 25 percent to 50 percent, for roughly $3.5 million beyond the salaries already in the operating plan. Application engineering will be short through year one regardless, and the report prices the arrangement that covers it.
The strategy's largest gap is the easiest to close and its smallest is the hardest, so the plan spends its money according to lead time, not headcount.
Capability
The Unit 2 analysis defined six capabilities as work people perform and found 21 of 71 required positions held at working proficiency. The gaps are largest in continuous-process control, 22 positions with none held, and application engineering, 11 short. Four of the six gaps are rated high in criticality. Collings and Mellahi (2009) argue that talent strategy should begin with the positions that create the most value, and the capability count is the basis for every later choice in this report.
Segmentation
The Unit 3 memo classified 36 positions, about three percent of the workforce, as A positions on two tests, strategic impact and variation in performance. Application engineers pass because one line trial can decide a multi-year award and trial success rates vary widely. Continuous-process technicians pass because a slow alarm response can scrap hours of output. Formulation chemists and quality engineers remain B positions at market pay with full development access. The differential costs $389,520 a year at full staffing.
Sourcing
The Unit 4 workforce plan found 52 positions to fill by year three. Applying the sourcing logic Cappelli (2008) sets out, it develops technicians internally, hires quality engineers, formulation chemists and process safety engineers, and both hires and borrows application engineers. Every batch operator may apply for technician training under one set of criteria, and the batch line's backfill is planned separately because 22 of its 96 operators are 60 or older.
The admitted shortfall. Application engineering will be short in year one. A newly hired engineer spends roughly twelve months learning Corvane's chemistries and its customers' lines, while the first battery-pack launches begin about seven months into year one. The plan covers the gap by borrowing three engineers from the resin supplier's technical service team for $720,000 and rehiring two retired Corvane engineers part time for $152,000, a total of $872,000, with each borrowed engineer paired with a new hire.
Development
The Unit 5 design develops 22 batch operators into technicians through a 36-week program timed to end just before the line starts, with transfer built into the work environment. The Unit 9 evaluation of the first cohort found reaction at 4.4 of 5, test scores rising from 41 to 86 percent, alarm standard compliance of 88 percent against 52 percent for untrained crews and a first-year return of 2.7 percent after isolating the program's effect. The second cohort runs as designed with two changes. Both cohorts cost $846,760.
Knowledge Retention
The Unit 7 plan moves the senior formulation chemist's judgment about resin lots, customer variants and bonding failures to a successor through critical decision method interviews, paired complaint work, bench recordings and weekly reviews. It takes 163 hours of the chemist's time and 366 hours in all, costs about $36,169 and counts as a success when the successor makes eight in ten lot adjustments alone by month twelve. The Unit 6 seminar reflection added one item: the weekly review records problems the chemist believes should not exist, so the company learns what to remove as well as what to correct.
Succession
The Unit 8 review found 4 of 16 critical roles with a successor ready now, 5 ready in one to two years, 2 three or more years out and 5 with nobody. Four of the empty roles, those leading the continuous line, automotive quality, the engineering team on customer lines and hazard management, are new or reshaped by the strategy. External searches begin now, at about $277,500 in fees, and each external hire is asked to develop an internal successor within three years.
Measures
Six indicators are reviewed by the leadership team each quarter. Boxall and Purcell (2022) caution that human resource measures are most useful when they track capability rather than activity, and each indicator below does so.
Capability coverage: share of the 71 required positions held at working proficiency. Baseline about 30 percent; year-three target 90 percent.
Ready-now succession coverage: share of the 16 critical roles with a successor ready now. Baseline 25 percent; target 50 percent.
Qualified technicians: technicians passing the scenario test and the alarm audit. Baseline zero; target 22.
Alarm response compliance: share of audited alarm events handled to standard. Baseline 88 percent for trained crews; target 95 percent across all crews.
Application engineer trial approval rate: share of customer line trials approved. Baseline about 50 percent; target 65 percent.
A-position retention: annual voluntary turnover among application engineers and technicians. Baseline about 22 percent for application engineers; target below 10 percent.
Risks
The continuous line slips. Technician training is tied to the line's commissioning date, so a delay moves the program rather than wasting it.
Borrowed engineers are recalled. The supplier agreement sets a minimum term and notice period.
External searches fail. If any of the four new leadership roles is unfilled six months before its milestone, the company should engage an interim executive rather than delay the milestone.
Retention of trained people. Above-standard pay and visible career paths for technicians and engineers reduce the risk that competitors hire them away.
Three-Year Cost Summary
Segmentation differential: $142,000 in year one, $318,000 in year two and $389,520 in year three, $849,520 in all.
Technician program, both cohorts: $846,760.
Borrowed and rehired application engineers: $872,000.
Knowledge transfer: $36,169.
External searches for five roles: $277,500.
Recruiting for 28 experienced hires: $616,000.
Total: about $3.5 million over three years, excluding the salaries of new hires already in the operating plan.
References
Boxall, P., & Purcell, J. (2022). Strategy and human resource management (5th ed.). Bloomsbury.
Cappelli, P. (2008). Talent on demand: Managing talent in an age of uncertainty. Harvard Business Press.
Collings, D. G., & Mellahi, K. (2009). Strategic talent management: A review and research agenda. Human Resource Management Review, 19(4), 304-313. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2009.04.001
Reading the GB 542 Unit 10 instructions
In GB542 Unit 10 you integrate the term's analyses into a talent strategy for your organization. Begin with a single page giving the strategy and what it costs. Give a short section on each part of the work, such as capability, segmentation, sourcing, development, knowledge retention and succession, carrying key figures over exactly and referring to the unit that produced them. Name any capability that will fall short and how the gap is covered. Set a small number of measures, each with a baseline and a target. Identify the main risks. Close with a costed summary over the strategy's horizon. Expect about ten pages with an appendix of earlier analyses, citing sources in APA 7.
How the GB 542 Unit 10 example is put together
The summary states five parts and a cost of about $3.5 million, and the highlighted sentence explains that spending follows lead time rather than headcount. Capability draws on Collings and Mellahi and the 21 of 71 count. Segmentation repeats the 36 A positions and $389,520 differential. Sourcing applies Cappelli to 52 positions and admits the year-one application engineering gap, covered by $872,000 in borrowed and rehired engineers. Development carries the Unit 9 results, knowledge retention the 163-hour plan and succession the five empty roles. Boxall and Purcell frame six measures, from coverage rising toward 90 percent to engineer retention, and four risks and a costed summary close it.
Reading the GB542 Unit 10 grading rubric
A strong GB542 talent strategy report is graded on whether its parts form one argument and whether every number traces to an earlier unit. A summary that states the strategy and cost on one page earns points because leadership reads it first. Short sections that carry figures over exactly show integration. Admitting a shortfall and pricing its cover shows credibility. Measures of capability and bench strength, each with a baseline and target, show the strategy can be tracked. Risks with responses show judgment. A costed summary lets leadership weigh the plan. The three APA 7 sources, on talent management, sourcing and HR strategy, each back a particular decision.
GB542 Unit 10 help: mistakes that cost points
Many GB542 Unit 10 reports reprint each earlier unit in full, which buries the strategy that should connect them. Others introduce new figures that do not match the earlier analyses, which a grader will check. A frequent gap is honesty: a strategy that claims every gap will close on time is less believable than one that names a late capability and covers it. Some writers fill the measures section with training activity counts. Summarize first, give each part a short section with exact figures, admit the shortfall, choose a few capability measures with baselines and targets, list the risks and cost the plan. Placing full analyses in an appendix keeps the report readable.
Get a GB542 Unit 10 example written to your instructions
Unit 10 usually draws on the analyses your section completed earlier, so attach those or their key figures, plus the final prompt and rubric. A talent strategy report with one governing logic and measures that track capability is ready in 24-48h, with the first custom sample free. The paper above is an original model document written by our desk, not a submitted student paper and not an official Purdue University Global document.
More GB542 papers and MBA samples
- GB542 Unit 1: Discussion Board Post
- GB542 Unit 2: Capability Gap Analysis
- GB542 Unit 3: Talent Segmentation Memo
- GB542 Unit 4: Workforce Plan
- GB542 Unit 5: Development Program Design
- GB542 Unit 6: Seminar Reflection
- GB542 Unit 7: Knowledge Transfer Plan
- GB542 Unit 8: Succession Bench Review
- GB542 Unit 9: Learning Evaluation Report
- GB541 Unit 10: Executive Risk Briefing
- GB534 Unit 10: Consumer Behavior Report
- GB533 Unit 10: Sales Management Report
GB542 Unit 10 questions, answered
Should the report repeat the earlier units in full?
No. Summarize each analysis in a paragraph or two, carry its key figures over exactly, and place the full versions in an appendix where the prompt allows. The report's job is to connect the analyses into one strategy, which repetition obscures. Readers should be able to trace every number back to the unit that produced it.
How many measures should a talent strategy have?
Few enough that leadership will actually review them, usually five to eight. This report uses six, each with a baseline and a year-three target, and each measuring capability or bench strength rather than training activity. A long dashboard of indicators is read by nobody, which defeats its purpose and leaves the strategy unmonitored.
Can the strategy admit it will fall short somewhere?
It should. Naming a capability that will arrive late, and the arrangement that covers the interval, makes the rest of the strategy more believable. This report admits application engineering will be short in year one and prices the borrowed engineers who fill the gap. A strategy with no admitted weakness tends to invite a grader's skepticism.
Where can I find a free GB542 Unit 10 sample paper?
This page carries a full GB542 Unit 10 talent strategy report for a composite adhesives maker, joining the term's analyses with six measures, an admitted shortfall, risks, a costed summary and APA 7 references.
What does the strategy cost over three years?
About $3.5 million beyond the salaries already in the operating plan, led by the borrowed engineers, the technician program, the segmentation differential and recruiting for 28 experienced hires.