The changing environment: implications for human resource management

Citation

Hervas-Oliver, J.-L. (2013), "The changing environment: implications for human resource management", International Journal of Manpower, Vol. 34 No. 8. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJM-08-2013-0190

The changing environment: implications for human resource management

Article Type: Guest Editor's introduction to the thematic issue From: International Journal of Manpower, Volume 34, Issue 8.

About the Guest Editor

Dr Jose-Luis Hervas-Oliver, PhD, Associate Professor at the Universidad Politecnica de Valencia (Spain) and the Florida State University, IP (USA). His research interests are located at the intersection of strategic management and innovation. He teaches strategic management and innovation topics at both postgraduate and undergraduate levels. Dr Hervas-Oliver has been a Visiting Scholar in the London School of Economics and Political Science at the MERIT-Maastricht University, and the Edinburgh University, among others.

1. Note by the Editor-in-Chief

Five of the articles in this Thematic Issue have been presented in the IJM track of the annual conference of the International Network of Business & Management Journals (INBAM), Valencia, March 2012. These are authored by: Gil-Marques and Moreno-Luzon; Enache, Sallan, Simo and Fernandez; Pasamar and Valle; Jaen and Liñan; and Korzynski. The remaining five articles - by Wang and Chen, Kroon and Freese, Mukkala and Tohmo, Rosholm, Roed and Schone, and Tsai and Shih - are regular submissions to the IJM.

My thanks to the Guest Editor, Dr Jose-Luis Hervas-Oliver for his sterling work in seeing this thematic issue through to publication.

Adrian Ziderman,
Editor-in-Chief, IJM

2. Introduction

This issue considers an emerging new challenge for human resource management practices (HRMP, hereinafter): a changing environment. Environmental change is accelerating and becoming more turbulent, and firms are facing new demands and requirements if they are to develop sustainable competitive advantages. The concept of environment encompasses many different interconnected and overlapping influences, which are changing at such a speed that it is becoming increasingly difficult for managers to adapt their HRMP accordingly.

The main purpose of this paper is to consider environmental influences and their effects on HRMP. The mainstream literature categorizes environmental influences into six main types: political, economic, social, technological, environmental and legal (e.g. Johnson et al., 2007). There is no doubt that all environmental forces impact in a complex and non-linear way on HRMP, making it difficult to analyse the implications for human resource departments. However, it should be said that this special issue does not provide a complete picture of the multiple environmental influences on HRMP, and nor does it represent an exhaustive list of the particular types of HRMP influenced. On the contrary, this thematic issue sets out to promote a thought-provoking debate and reflection on specific important environmental challenges, and how firms respond as they try to adapt their workforces to the changing environment.

The articles included in this thematic issue on "The changing environment: implications for human resource management" highlight the following major environmental challenges for HRMP: new innovation imperatives; the rise and endurance of the knowledge economy, with the emergence of new skills and work practices; changing technological paradigms, especially in relation to the effect of social networks on employee communication and worker recruitment; the persistence of the global economic crisis and its tough pressure on firms to reduce costs; the burgeoning of analysis of regional contexts for sourcing talent; and, the establishment of new societal attitudes and legal regulatory frameworks in respect of the work-life balance. In addition, the effect of a complex interaction and overlap of the individual environmental influences provides further challenges for an understanding of what should be appropriate HRMP.

3. Innovation and human resource practices as integrated systems

Innovation has long been considered as the key factor for the survival, growth and development of firms (Acs and Audretsch, 1990), and as a source of competitive advantage (Adner and Kapoor, 2010; Hervas-Oliver et al., 2011). In particular, innovation is an issue of utmost importance when it comes to questions of human resources (Gumusluoglu and Ilsev, 2009). Thus, in order to sustain competitive advantage, in a context of intensifying competition and shortening product life cycles, new HRMP need to be addressed to generating and developing firms’ innovation capabilities (e.g. Dean and Evans, 1994; Tidd et al., 2005; Diaz-Diaz and De Saa-Perez, 2010).

Indeed, Beugeisdijk (2008) noted that the adoption of specific HRMP influences innovatory capabilities, while Chen and Huang (2009), also, established that the adoption of strategic HRMP is positively related to innovation performance. Further, Gil-Marques's and Moreno-Luzon's work in this issue, employing a total quality management framework, challenges assertions that HRMP could be an obstacle to radical innovation; the authors show how cultures of exploitation and exploration moderate the relationship between total quality management and innovation, either incrementally or in a radical fashion. This paper also argues that a new perspective is required in order to understand the link between HRMP and innovation.

Considering the issue of innovation as an imperative, Wang and Chen's paper looks at HRMP as integrated systems (i.e. they say "high-performance work systems") which facilitate the formation of innovative capabilities (Messersmith and Guthrie, 2010). The paper makes a novel contribution by claiming that for the promotion of innovation and competitive advantage, it is necessary to consider, as a system, a "bundle" of connected human resource practices (e.g. Chen and Huang, 2009), rather than simply considering isolated individual practices (e.g. Arthur, 1994). In addition, the paper proposes intellectual capital constructs that mediate between high-performance work systems and innovation. Thus in their study, new and interesting research avenues are opened up regarding the roles of mediators and moderators (such as "creativity") in the relationship between HRMP and innovation (e.g. Zhang and Bartol, 2010; Jiang et al., 2012).

4. The knowledge economy, flexibility and regional institutional settings favouring talent sourcing

The knowledge economy is now an integral part of our economic systems, with a demand for higher levels of thinking and analytical skills, as well as for more information technology and social and interpersonal skills (Frenkel et al., 1999). Turner and d’Art (2007/2008) reported on a substantial expansion over a decade of highly skilled workers in Ireland. Also, the European Commission (2003) highlighted an increasing share of high-skilled workers in Europe.

The knowledge economy is also associated with people needing to spend more time maintaining and renewing their human capital; with a rise in labour market turnover (e.g. Korpi and Mertens, 2004); and with greater employment flexibility as increasingly there is a market demand for specific temporary tasks. Consequently, there is observed an emerging shift away from workers experiencing long-term (possibly single employer) stability with progressive careers, to a situation where the use of contingent employees and short-term contracts in non-standard career arrangements has become more the norm (e.g. Sullivan, 1999).

The different job security expectations, together with the changing nature of the workforce, pose a challenge to our understanding of organizational commitment. This is what Enache, Sallan, Simo and Fernandez's paper explores, looking at the idea of "boundaryless careers". In a new environmental scenario of a knowledge economy, flexible workforces and increased job-mobility, individuals are seen as the sculptors of their own careers, becoming less tied to single employers, and replacing workplace loyalty with a focus on continuous learning - and thereby the development of a greater marketability and future employability (Cappelli, 1999; Dany, 2003; Guest, 2004). The contribution of these authors clarifies the way organizational commitment is understood in the new labour market scenario.

Kroon and Freese also contribute to this debate by analysing the attachment of specialist contract employees to contract agencies serving as flexible employment providers for firms (e.g. Matusik and Hill, 1998). The authors address how specialist contract agencies carry out successful HRMP. The paper opens up promising research avenues, looking at the circumstances in which contract agencies which deal with short-term specialist human capital, cope with the conditions of a changing environment.

Addressing the debate on the new economy and its impact on job-mobility and the erosion of loyalty and commitment to permanent jobs, Mukkala and Tohmo's paper analyses the mobility of highly skilled workers in high-tech and knowledge-intensive business sectors. The phenomenon of job-mobility between industries provides an opportunity to study new HRMP, while addressing the debate about a region's capacity to re-combine knowledge from different fields and industries (e.g. Mukkala et al., 2006).

In the economic geography environment field, little is known about regional entrepreneurship conditions influencing HRMP of co-located firms. Does the region provide a complementary source of competitive advantage to co-located firms? Responding to this question, Jaen and Liñan's paper offers an interesting contribution. They change the lens of analysis about how to understand the relationship between a region's entrepreneurial capital and its firms’ workforce. For this, they disentangle how a region's superior resources of knowledge and attitudes can influence the entrepreneurial capital of its members and thus improve firm performance. This analysis unravels the importance of a region's cultural values for determining the level of entrepreneurial capital in the area's work force, and how this influences the competitive advantage of firms.

5. Societal, legal, technological and new economic conditions

Continuing with the theme of external-to-the-firm environmental influences on HRMP, worthy of mention is the significant influence of new societal attitudes, and legal frameworks about working conditions (e.g. de Luis Carnicer et al., 2004; Helle et al., 2011). Pasamar and Valle analyse the institutional pressures on employers to improve the work-life balance in a context of economic crisis. They explore how the diffusion (e.g. Di Maggio and Powell, 1983) of work-life balance practices are affecting HRMP and show that companies pay attention to the dynamics of the institutional environments (national legal frameworks) in which they operate.

Then, addressing specifically new societal and technological paradigms in HRMP practices, that is, the role of online social networks and how they influence firms (e.g. Jarvenpaa and Tanriverdi, 2002), Korzynski presents a study on the effect of online social networks on leadership, providing evidence that participative and consultative leadership styles are positively linked to the use of social networks.

Complementing Korzynski's article, Rosholm, Roed and Schone pose an interesting question: what is the relationship between immigrants and the requirements of new technologies and work practices? This paper shows that workplaces where employees use personal computers intensively (e.g. Acemoglu and Autor, 2011), as a result of new technological demands on work practices, are biased against immigrant workers. This is because the new technologies require effective understanding of social and cultural codes, and unwritten rules and norms, of which immigrants may not be aware.

Lastly, in a context of environmental turbulence, increasing competition and, especially, an economic crisis that has catalyzed all environmental forces, Tsai and Shih's paper contributes to the literature by engaging in a thought-provoking debate about understanding dynamic capabilities, HRMP, responsible downsizing and firm performance (e.g. Cascio, 2002). They provide a solid explanation for the role of dynamic capabilities as a mediator between complex downsizing strategies and firm performance.

6. In conclusion

This themed issue offers new insights for scholars and managers, provoking a debate on how to adapt HRMP to the changing environment. All the papers presented offer an excellent repository of evidence-based knowledge to draw on when discussing the issue of how the new environmental conditions are influencing HRMP. These papers’ findings have the potential to help managers cope with current environmental changes, and to shape future research on HRMP.

Jose-Luis Hervas-Oliver
Department of Management, Universidad Politecnica de Valencia, Valencia

Acknowledgement

Financial support from the Ministry of Economics and Competitiveness (ECO2010:17.318) is gratefully acknowledged. The author also appreciate INBAM 2012 support during presentations and reviewing processes.

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Further reading

Feldman, M.P. and Audretsch, D.B. ( 1999 ), "Innovation in cities: science-based diversity, specialization and localized competition", European Economic Review, Vol. 43, No. 2, pp. 409-429 .