The research entity is unique for several reasons:

• We are the only programme incorporating a variety of disciplines to research the Talent Management phenomenon – this provides a holistic perspective on Talent Management and the understanding thereof in multi-national contexts;
• Currently a lack of scientific rigour exist on Talent Management research – all Talent Management research have a strong scientific foundation to enhance the validity and reliability of our findings;
• Most of the research on Talent Management to date is done from a human resource management perspective – our research are purely from a Talent Management perspective and our research methodologies are applied as such;
• We have empirically developed and validated Talent Management diagnostic tools that can be globally applied – most Talent Management assessments are consultancy based;
• We have tested antecedents, mediators and outcomes of effective Talent Management practices which made a significant contribution to the scarcity of scientific knowledge in this area;
• We can also differentiate between the application of Talent Management practices across different demographic groups of which a global scarcity of information still prevails; and
• Research on Talent Management in Sub-Saharan Africa remains scarce. The proposed research entity is currently spearheading empirical knowledge on the Talent Management phenomenon in Sub-Saharan African with the continuous enrolment of post-graduate students from neighbouring countries such as Namibia, Botswana and Zimbabwe.

The importance and need for our Talent Management research are reflected in the results of the recent Global Talent Management Index that ranked South Africa 51 out of 93 countries in terms of Talent Management efficiency (Adecco, 2014). One of the key aspects that contributed to this ranking was the lack of knowledge in managing Talent effectively in organisations. Other factors included ineffective Talent acquisition and retention practices. The proposed research entity therefore plays an important role in generating both scientific and practical knowledge to enhance Talent Management in the workplace and subsequent organisational and economic viability.