Passage Two
Each year Universum, a Swedish consulting firm asks American
MBA students where they would most like to work. The 2007 survey showed a few
surprises in its top 50 companies named: Hewlett-Packard and Cisco Systems had
fell, while old reliables such as General Electric, Coca-Cola and General Mills
had jumped up the list. But the most-desired industry remains consulting,
despite the beating it has taken since the end of the dotcom boom, and the top
firm remains McKinsey. Perhaps the reason is: in recent years McKinsey has done
as much as any company to provide MBA graduates with increasingly better and
more profitable positions. The reason for this was the firm’s
popularization of a concept known as "war for talent". It advocated finding the
best and brightest and rewarding their innovations (创新) in proportion to
"talent" instead of their performance or seniority (资格). But what is talent And
how does a company measure its employees’ talent, especially when assigning them
to new projects The "war for talent" recommends a careful assessment of the
inner skills and characteristics ready for success but gives few clues as to
what those inner skills might be, which might make the war standardless. For a
company focused on quick growth, one shortcut could be young hires who had
already been rewarded for their talent by receiving MBAs from well-respected
schools. Thus as the idea of finding talented employees who could quickly learn
the skills took off, so did the asking price of the star MBA
graduates. Unfortunately, now the "war for talent" seems less of
a brilliant idea. The economic downturn, bringing with it less competition for
the available talent, also did its part to control in indulgent (宽容的)
employers. Similarly, Professor Jeffrey Pfeffer emphasized that
cultivating a talent means not just hiring the most effective performers, but
being able to deal quickly and firmly with the least effective C performers. But
he adds that the C refers not to the person but to the individual’s performance
in a given job. Some low-performing managers were A or B performers earlier in
their careers—and may attain that level of performance again.
MBA programs will remain attractive recruiting areas, but the MBA model
itself has come under increasing criticism. Prof. Pfeffer, in a 2007 article
found little evidence that an MBA had much effect on future salary or career.
Future MBA students might need to provide more evidence of their talent to
impress potential employers. What can we learn from the third paragraph
A.The "war for talent" is totally useless nowadays. B.The "war for talent" has caused serious economy decrease. C.The Employers’ attitude toward available talent has changed. D.The economy decrease was caused by the lack of available talent.