Business Commons^™

The Role And Impact Of Hrm Policy, Carol Gill, Denny Meyer

Carol Gill

Purpose – This study seeks to investigate the role and impact of HRM policy, and the gap between policy and practice, on organizations and their employees. It looks at the role that soft policy plays in obscuring hard practice and considers the impact of unions and HRM role on policy. Design/methodology/approach – This study uses survey data collected from senior members of the HRM function in 189 large Australian organizations. Findings – The research found a gap between policy and practice with soft policy being used more often than soft practice. This gap had a negative impact on outcomes. Strategic …

High And Low Road Approaches To The Management Of Human Resources: An Examination Of The Relationship Between Business Strategy, Human Resource Management And High Performance Work Practices, Carol Gill, Denny Meyer

Carol Gill

The Contingency approach to human resource management leads to the hypothesis that High Performance Work Practices (HPWP) are more compatible with ‘High Road’ business strategies that emphasize product differentiation through quality and innovation. More traditional human resource management is better suited to ‘Low Road’ business strategies that emphasise cost control and competition based primarily on price. Using data collected from a sample of 179 large Australian workplaces we tested the contingencies that influence HPWP implementation and impact. Our results support the Contingency approach in that High Road organisations are more likely to adopt HPWP and the Universal approach in that …

A Review Of The Critical Perspective On Human Resource Management, Carol Gill

Carol Gill

Implementing An Employee Survey That Is Linked To Business Strategy, Carol Gill

Carol Gill

Employee Surveys And Hrm Strategy, Carol Gill

Carol Gill

This article demonstrates that employee surveys can be an important strategic tool but poor implementation can diminish their value. Specifically surveys should be linked to Business Strategy and have actionable outcomes.

Psychological Testing: Rogues, Romance And Roadside Assistance, Carol Gill

Carol Gill

Psychological testing has the mystique of white magic…potential and existing employees complete several relatively brief paper and pencil tests and the organization receives a concise report (accurate to the percentile!) that is able to describe personality, intelligence and various other significant characteristics in detail…to predict the future! This magic though, in most cases, can only be performed by a witch doctor (Psychologist), which contributes to the “black box” aura of testing. Despite the reported validity of testing there are a range of methodological and ethical issues in using psychological tests, however, the most important question is how significant is the …

A Fitting Strategy, Carol Gill

Carol Gill

Take advantage of the tools available to check the fit between HRM and business strategy

Hrm As Chameleon: Is Soft Hrm Rhetoric Used To Disguise An Increase In Managment Control?, Carol Gill

Carol Gill

The Critical Perspective proposes that HRM is ineffective, suggesting that only a name change differentiates HRM and its precursor Personnel. Simultaneously, it presents HRM as a predator that uses rhetoric to disguise an increase in management control. This research examines these propositions from the Critical Perspective through a survey sent to Human Resource Managers in 896 large, Australian organizations. The results challenge the propositions of the Critical Perspective indicating that HRM has been implemented in rhetoric and reality. The results also show that HRM does not manipulate the workforce to increase management control by using soft rhetoric to obscure hard …

Review Blues, Carol Gill

Carol Gill

Performance assessments can be a shattering experience, writes Carol Gill, who looks at one way of making them more objective

Talent Wins, Carol Gill

Carol Gill

Progressive HR Practices can make your business an employer of choice if you can move beyond 'toxic accounting' and 'downsizing' anorexia.

Balancing The Rhetoric And Reality Of Workplace Stress, Carol Gill

Carol Gill

Workplace stress and its causes can pose a dilemma for HR practitioners

Use Of Hard And Soft Models Of Hrm To Illustrate The Gap Between Rhetoric And Reality In Workforce Management, Carol Gill

Carol Gill

At the rhetorical level many organisations espouse the "soft" version of Human Resource Management (HRM) that focuses on treating employees as valued assets and a source of competitive advantage. However, organisational reality appears "hard" with an emphasis on the quantitative, calculative and strategic aspects of managing a "head count". The dichotomy of soft and hard HRM (termed Developmental Humanism and Utilitarian Instrumentalism) has been identified by Legge (1989) in her critique of the normative model of HRM. Noon (1994) suggests that this dichotomy in HRM manifests itself as a gap between rhetoric and reality. Truss et al.'s (1997) study involving …