“To govern a country, talents are of the priority”. Talent resources are the most important. And it is people that are the fundamental source of national scientific and technological innovation. Nowadays, in the process of building an innovative country, the innovation culture of encouraging innovation and tolerating failure is particularly advocated. On the one hand, we should give full play to the government's functions, "cultivating talents" as the foundation, and "attracting talents" as the supplement. On the other hand, we should stimulate the vitality of enterprises, "pooling talents" as the basis, and "using talents" as the key, so that we can "have unlimited vitality".

How to realize talent innovation? The article by Jiang Wan, a talented associate professor in the Department of Organization and Strategic Management, in collaboration with Zhao JingYi, a master's student in Grade 2021, shows the pathway to grow the talent engine from four senses (sense of identity, competence, acquisition and mission) in an in-depth and simple way, which is deeply inspiring for governments, enterprises, and individuals. The article was published in Economic Information Daily (September 13, 2022), which is sponsored by Xinhua News Agency. (http://www.jjckb.cn/2022-09/13/c_1310662090.htm)

Enhance the "four senses" of talents.

Stimulate innovation vitality of talents.

The quantity and quality of innovative talents play an important role in the quantity and quality of national and enterprise innovation. The education and training of scientific and technologically innovative talents can produce innovative achievements and knowledge spillovers, and make creative contributions to scientific and technological undertakings. Because of this close relationship, how to build a high-quality and high-level innovative talent team and stimulate the innovative ability of talents through appropriate management measures is one of the important issues of human resources management.

Cultivating and enhancing the innovation ability of talents can start from four aspects: stimulating talents’ sense of identity, sense of competence, sense of acquisition and sense of mission. Sense of identity refers to the talents’ degree of self-awareness of the innovation needs, the innovative thinking and actions required to complete the tasks; the sense of competence refers to the degree of self-awareness of whether the talents can carry out technological innovation activities and whether they have the required technology and knowledge; the sense of acquisition and sense of mission focus on the external material incentives and internal motivation to stimulate the innovation enthusiasm of the talents respectively. The state, relevant departments and enterprises should gather their resources and make concerted efforts in the process of cultivating innovative talents.

Based on two-way guidance, self-respect and other concern.

Stimulate the sense of identity of talents.

On the one hand, we should guide talents to enhance their identity as builders and practitioners of national science and technology innovation. Guide talents to enhance their territorial recognition of their innovation parks, research industries and scientific research projects. Guide talents to enhance their national recognition of and understanding of the national development strategy and talent strategy. On the other hand, we should guide the people and society to express respect and courtesy for innovative talents. In the process of building an innovative country, we should advocate an innovative culture of encouraging innovation and tolerating failure, and strive to form an atmosphere of respecting science, innovation and talents in society. The recognition and support of the external environment is the nourishment of innovative talents’ sense of identity.

The government should improve scientific evaluation and set examples for talents. "Talents, no matter where they come from, can do their best." With the strengthening of China's scientific and technological innovation strength, overemphasizing and overreliance on roles of papers, titles, qualifications and awards as "four restrictive conditions" have shackled the evaluation of innovative talents’ positions and titles. It makes the innovative talents unclear about their own identity and excessively pursue short and quick subjects that can easily produce papers and results. The unhealthy culture of impetuous and pompous, quick success and instant benefit has distorted our original intention of cultivating and creating high-level and high-quality national strategic talent force. Moreover, through scientific evaluation in various high-tech industries and innovation demonstration cities, we should set a number of excellent examples and encourage innovative talents to learn from the backbone of outstanding innovative talents, which helps to motivate innovative talents to find gaps and fill shortcomings and improve the social image and social influence of innovative talents. Only by providing upward channels and development space for innovative talents and creating talent role models with excellent quality and clear cognition can we enhance the sense of identity of innovative talents and mobilize their enthusiasm to dedicate themselves to entrepreneurship and innovation.

Enterprise employers should encourage team innovation and stamp their identity through innovative practices. Enterprises must focus on individual and collective for better development. They should not only encourage scientific and technological innovation talents to carry out various forms of innovation activities, but also encourage the construction of innovation teams, create a strong atmosphere of team innovation and courage to try, so that scientific and technological personnel are willing to cooperate and become successful together, and improve their self-awareness and sense of identity as a member of the innovation talent team. In addition, the innovative talents of enterprises are in the front line of production, and solving "containment" technical problems and improving production efficiency and quality in practice is an important way for them to identify with their work tasks and be proud of their talent status.

Increase investment and improve the quality of talents.

Stimulate the sense of competence of talents.

Adhering to the independent cultivation of talents in China cannot be separated from the support of scientific research investment. China's R&D investment has increased from 1.03 trillion yuan in 2012 to 2.44 trillion yuan in 2020, ranking second in the world in total. From "Introduction, digestion, absorption and re-innovation" in the past to now, more and more attention has been paid to original and basic research, relying on scientific research institutes, scientific and technological innovation centers, etc., to cultivate high-quality talents with outstanding technological innovation ability and good at tackling key problems. In addition, we should use the mode of industry-university-research cooperation to cultivate innovative talents, mobilize the innovation enthusiasm of scientific research institutions and enterprises, establish national major scientific research projects based on the enterprise-led, market-oriented, and multi-form industry-university-research joint training system, and cultivate innovative talents through practice to improve their innovative ability and quality.

The government should improve the cultivation policy and optimize the innovation environment. The government can introduce more preferential and flexible talent policies based on the actual situation of employers to promote the recruitment of talents. At the same time, all government departments need work together to integrate social resources and provide subsidized training, vocational qualification or skill level assessment and training bases for innovative talents. Strengthen intelligence support services and give full play to the role of scientific research institutions and expert teams as think tanks. In terms of optimizing the talent innovation environment, we should focus on running high-tech entrepreneurship and innovation support centers, science parks and other scientific and technological innovation incubators to provide conditions and resources for scientific and technological innovation talents to the maximum extent.

Enterprise employers should adhere to communication and training for creating an innovative atmosphere. In order to enhance the ability and quality of innovative talents, enterprises must establish the concept of lifelong learning for employees. By continuously absorbing new knowledge, cultivating employees' innovative thinking ability, combining with practice to change the traditional way of work, and consciously improving employees' innovative ability and good thinking habits of active innovation. On the other hand, relying on the vocational training provided by enterprises to employees, employees can learn about the advanced technologies and concepts of today's society in a timely manner through learning, lectures, exchanges and other ways. Encourage employees to go out for exchange and visit, broaden their horizons and increase their opinions. Actively create an innovative learning atmosphere for employees and constantly inspire employees to innovate.

Based on reality and meeting talents’ needs.

Stimulate the sense of acquisition of talents.

Our country needs to meet the practical needs of talents in the process of introducing, using and retaining them. It is embodied in stimulating the sense of acquisition of talents’ innovation content, innovation process and innovation achievements, giving scientific and technological innovation personnel greater decision-making power of technological routes, greater control of funds, greater resource scheduling power, and more flexible space to release innovation vitality. Enhance talents’ sense of acquisition to relevant treatment in the process of scientific and technological innovation, including effectively solving the material needs of innovative talents such as housing, household registration and children's education, and creating good conditions for attracting and retaining talents.

The government should give full play to its service function and implement incentives and rewards. The government should comprehensively improve the level of social public services such as medical treatment and education, enhance the sense of belonging and happiness of innovative talents, create a good environment for talents to work and live, provide comprehensive services such as financial support, and promote innovative talents to make achievements in the field of scientific and technological innovation through government funding guidance and monetary support. At the same time, accomplish the "last mile" of the incentive policy: all provinces and cities select experts, scholars and technicians with outstanding contributions to enjoy special government subsidies; Implement the full refund of individual income tax for the R&D front-line personnel who meet the policy conditions in key enterprises in the high-tech industry; Open a green channel for talents, and provide support for innovative talents on household registration, housing security, spouse employment, etc.

Enterprise employers must allocate innovation income and protect innovation achievements. Enterprises should resolutely abandon the practice of having everybody "eat from the same big pot" and an egalitarian form of distribution, so that the talents with scientific and creative achievements and outstanding contributions can enjoy reasonable and legitimate innovation income. Establish an income distribution system closely related to job responsibilities and performance, increase the proportion of income from the transformation of achievements, and improve the sense of acquisition of innovative talents through measures such as technology equity, stock options and cash dividends. At the same time, strengthen the protection of intellectual property rights, protect the legitimate rights and interests of innovative talents, and mobilize their innovation enthusiasm and initiative.

for the country and industry.

Stimulate the sense of mission of talents.

The cultivation of innovative talents is closely linked with the development and prosperity of the country. We should continue to carry forward the spirit of scientists as a spiritual guide in the process of cultivating innovative talents. Innovative talents thus can transform determination into a sense of mission of scientific research and innovation and make great contributions to building a world power of scientific and technological innovation.

By setting up honorary titles, experts, academic leaders and other measures, the government can give full recognition to talents with outstanding innovation achievements, so that they can truly feel the sense of mission of " always making sure to contribute their share to the success of the cause". At the same time, the government combines the local industrial base and advantages to find the most suitable talent role models.

Enterprises should firmly shoulder the mission of scientific and technological innovation entrusted by the times and continue to promote the innovative development and technological progress of enterprises. Enterprises should take the cultivation of talents’ innovative ability as an important development strategy, integrate it with the business of the enterprise, and combine it with the long-term development of the enterprise. And in the implementation of the strategy, stimulate innovative talents’ sense of mission of being important members of the enterprise.

In order to strengthen the leadership of innovation and promote high-quality economic development, our country must coordinate various departments and take multiple measures to cultivate talents in innovation practice, train talents in innovation activities, and pool talents in innovation causes.

By College of Management and Economics

Editor: Sun Xiaofang