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This paper examines the beliefs of human resource professionals (HRPs) regarding the impact of Industry 4.0 on organizations in terms of readiness for human resources management (HRM) transformation, the challenges of a potential new legal and financial framework, the new means on performance management and automation, and finally the decision-making process in the era of human-machine cooperation.

The authors analyzed a sample of 251 HRPs from 11 different countries divided into 4 cultural clusters to explore their attitude to incorporate new practices to the HR field because of technological development. The paper explores HRPs' beliefs in a legal and financial context, performance management issues, and the impact of automation on the decision-making process. Furthermore, the authors perform a cross-cultural comparison analysis to examine potential significant differences between cultural clusters.

HRPs are aware of how technology adoption is affecting work environment and they highlight the importance of human resources (HR) for businesses, despite the global trend of extensive machinery exploitation. Interestingly, our results suggest that overall globalization, common knowledge, and internationalized practices lead to homogeneity for most issues under study.

To the best of the authors' knowledge, there has not been any comprehensive study exploring and analyzing the effects of Industry 4.0 on HRPs perceptions in the context of a dynamic HR environment influenced by technological transformation. The study shows that HRPs' present similar perspectives for most issues addressed, irrespective of cultural characteristics of HRPs. Hence, this paper generates some important insights in an attempt to build a framework for enhancing HR in this new era.

This quantitative study seeks to explore HR professionals' perceptions regarding the adoption of technological applications under the fourth industrial revolution on 25 critical human resource management (HRM) challenges. Additionally, the authors compare data for potential cross-cultural differences.

A total sample of 251 HR professionals from 11 countries was divided into four different cultural clusters. They were asked about their attitudes to the most important HRM challenges when managing industrial relations. A 25-item structured Likert five-point scale questionnaire was used to explore the human vs technology relation and examine if there were any significant differences between clusters for each of the challenges.

The results suggest that most HR professionals believe that the use of technology instead of people cannot solve entirely human-centered and emotional based challenges, as those seem to be less exposed to machinery. Moreover, their views on only two of the 25 challenges present significant differences between cultural clusters, regarding making decisions solely on personal interest and managing confidential information after terminating employment.

This paper constitutes the first attempt of addressing the impact of the fourth industrial revolution on HRM challenges at a cross-cultural level. It is plausible that globalization and the fourth industrial revolution affect the perceptions of HR professionals worldwide. The study shows that respondents' perceptions about the “human vs technology” dilemma point toward the same direction, irrespective of their cultural background: that of enhancing human worker's role in business in the age of rapid technological advancements. In addition, the way our sample was drawn, taking into account the top Global Competitiveness Index 4.0 countries, makes our results robust and reliable.

This paper concerns the transfer of human resource management (HRM) practices by multinational companies (MNCs) to their overseas subsidiaries. It investigates how factors originating from the cultural and institutional framework of the host country impact on this transfer. Using data collected from MNC subsidiaries located in Greece and local Greek firms, we examine the degree to which several HRM practices in MNC subsidiaries resemble local practices. Our empirical findings indicate that subsidiaries have adapted their HRM practices to a considerable extent, although some practices are more localised than others. Specifically, practices that do not fit well with Greek culture or are in contrast to employee regulations show a low level of transfer. On the other hand, our interviews revealed that significant cultural changes are underway and that the institutional environment is gradually getting more relaxed, leaving more room to manoeuvre for MNCs.

This paper suggests that motives for engaging in affiliative‐promotive “helping” extra‐role behavior is related to cross‐cultural differences. The cultural dimensions of in‐group collectivism, uncertainty avoidance, performance orientation, and humane orientation, and their differential effect on helping extra‐role behavior in a diverse workforce are examined. Theoretical implications provide guidance for future empirical research in this area, and provide managers with more realistic expectations of employee performance in the workplace.

This paper focuses on the debates about globalisation – its nature and impact – and the significance of multinational companies in the global economy. Introduces the special issue of the International Journal of Manpower, based on selected papers presented at the 7th Conference on International Human Resource Management hosted by the University of Limerick in June 2003, which focused on the issue of HRM and its transferability in such corporations. The MNC is viewed as the vehicle by which dominant HR policies and practices are transported across national boundaries and the papers shed light on the likelihood of, and limits, to this transfer. In order to contextualise the debate, the paper begins by outlining the extent to which human resource management remains a key issue for multinational corporations and, in advance of introducing the five papers in this special issue, summarily charts some of the key research trends emerging in the literature on international human resource management (IHRM).

Methodological advances in cross‐cultural scale development have addressed many concerns regarding the development of valid scales. However, several issues remain to be examined – including the potential problems of using language to measure communication phenomena using self‐reported studies and addressing the effect of response scale type on the validity of resultant measures. The purpose of this paper is to expand the cross‐cultural measurement paradigm by comprehensively examining these issues and suggesting a new response scale type that may potentially produce more valid cross‐cultural measures of communication‐based phenomena.

Measures of Hall's concept of context were developed using three types of response scales – Likert, semantic differential, and conceptual metaphoric. The last response scale type is developed within this research. Samples were gathered in 23 countries using existing scale development procedures. The response scales were compared for psychometric properties and validity based on reliability, metric invariance, response styles, and face validity.

Overall all three response scale types adequately measured the construct of context. The newly developed conceptual metaphoric scale performed marginally better on most comparative metrics.

International marketers measure a host of variables related to culture for many purposes. The new response scale type may provide slightly better measures to more accurately reflect communication based constructs – many of which are central to marketing.

The findings indicate that the new conceptual metaphoric response scale type may overcome some existing biases inherent in standard response scale types. In addition, this research provides the first viable and parsimonious measure of Hall's concept of context.