AimTo provide insights into how workplace violence has an impact on nurses and to inform human resource management about developing comprehensive strategies to manage and mitigate violence.DesignA systematic review of the literature to appraise contemporary studies, source data and synthesize findings for human resource management to implement practices to mitigate violence against nurses in the healthcare sector.Data SourcesSearches were conducted using ProQuest, Business Source Complete (EBSCO), Emerald Insight, PsycINFO (ProQuest), ScienceDirect, and Google Scholar. Our search was delimited to refereed journal articles and government reports over the last 15 years from 2004–2019 and included a total of 71 articles.Review MethodsThe research team systematically reviewed each article and relative reports, eliminating any not considered relevant to nurses. This systematic review is associated with and reflects contemporary issues around nurses, violence, and human resource management practice.ResultsIn the studies we found high incidents of violence against nurses in the workplace. However, human resource management fundamentally services as an administrator, managing compliance and does not do enough to methodically mitigate and manage acts of violence in the workplace and its effects on nurses’ mental health.ConclusionsThis systematic review contributes to the literature on violence in health care and proposes that human resource management must explore and implement practices towards mitigating violence against nurses.ImpactThis systematic review will influence how human resource management currently manages violence against nurses and the increasing number of persons requiring health care due to the ageing population and decline in the number of nurses. It will also have an impact on action research to engage in a cycle of continuous improvement that supports eliminating violence against nurses (and all others) in the healthcare sector.

This study examines the impact of human resource management (HRM) on workers with intellectual disability (WWID) across various industries in Australia. The research aims to identify HRM strategies for WWID by drawing on Thomas and Ely's (1996) managing diversity framework. A critical methodological case study approach was triangulated through participant interviews, focus groups and observations. The research identified three main factors that organisations must practice ensuring effective management of WWID; first, promoting workers’ well‐being through specific HRM wellbeing practices; second, valuing difference among all employees; and third, developing purposeful intervention strategies to support the inclusion of WID. The ways in which WWID are integrated into the workplace are important in ensuring workers’ well‐being and maximising their individual performance. We extend Thomas and Ely's (1996) learning and effectiveness paradigm to include ‘plural voices in diversity management’ at each stage of the paradigm and propose a re‐calibrated model of HRM for WWID.

PurposeThe purpose of the article is to examine the experiences of workers with intellectual disability (WWID) and subtle discriminatory practices that hold these workers back from thriving at the workplace.Design/methodology/approachThe research design employs the Shore et al. (2011) framework of inclusion supported by optimal distinctiveness theory (ODT) (Brewer, 1991). These theoretical frames are used to examine the potential for WWID to become members of a work group and experience the opportunity to develop their unique selves, negotiate and thrive through their work for purposeful career outcomes. A qualitative case study approach was adopted through interviews and focus groups with a total of 91 participants: 41 WWID, 5 human resource (HR) managers, 5 duty/department managers (DMs), 24 colleagues and 16 supervisors.FindingsThe authors found that enhancing inclusion is underpinned by the positive impact of human resource management (HRM) practices and line management support for WWID feelings of belongingness and uniqueness that enable them to thrive through their work activities. The authors demonstrate that WWID need manager support and positive social interactions to increase their learning and vitality for work to embrace opportunities for growth. However, when WWID do not have these conditions, there are fewer opportunities for them to thrive at the workplace.Practical implicationsThere is a need for formal HRM and management support and inclusive organisational interventions to mitigate discriminatory practices and better support WWID at work. There is an opportunity for HRM to design training and development around belongingness and uniqueness for this cohort of workers to maximise WWID opportunities to thrive through their work.Originality/valueThis study examines a cohort of WWID who are often forgotten and subtly discriminated against more so than other minority or vulnerable cohorts in the workplace, especially in terms of their development and reaching their full potential at work, which has an impact on their ability to thrive through their work. The paper makes an innovative contribution to the HRM literature through unpacking the processes through which Shore et al.'s (2011) conceptualisation of belongingness and uniqueness contributes to thriving for a marginalised and often overlooked cohort of workers.

PurposeThis study examines the management rostering systems that inform the ways medical scientists are allocated their work in the public healthcare sector in Australia. Promoting the contributions of medical scientists should be a priority given the important roles they are performing in relation to COVID-19 and the demand for medical testing doubling their workloads (COVID-19 National Incident Room Surveillance Team, 2020). This study examines the impact of work on medical scientists and rostering in a context of uncertain work conditions, budget restraints and technological change that ultimately affect the quality of patient care. This study utilises the Job-Demands-Resources theoretical framework (JD-R) to examine the various job demands on medical scientists and the resources available to them.Design/methodology/approachUsing a qualitative methodological approach, this study conducted 23 semi-structured interviews with managers and trade union officials and 9 focus groups with 53 medical scientists, making a total 76 participants from four large public hospitals.FindingsDue to increasing demands for pathology services, this study demonstrates that a lack of job resources, staff shortages, poor rostering practices such as increased workloads that lead to absenteeism, often illegible handwritten changes to rosters and ineffectual management lead to detrimental consequences for medical scientists’ job stress and well-being. Moreover, medical science work is hidden and not fully understood and often not respected by other clinicians, hospital management or the public. These factors have contributed to medical scientists’ lack of control over their work and causes job stress and burnout. Despite this, medical scientists use their personal resources to buffer the effects of excessive workloads and deliver high quality of patient care.Originality/valueFindings suggest that developing mechanisms to promote sustainable employment practices for medical scientists are critical for the escalating demands in pathology.

This study examines the ethical management of workers with disability (WWD) employed at two social enterprises in Australia. Viewed largely through the spectrum of institutionally-based conflict in the employment relationship, this research draws on a framework of situated moral agency (Wilcox, 2012) to establish the ways in which WWD are afforded opportunities to engage in work and how managers and supervisors practise situated moral agency at the workplace. A qualitative case study approach is used with 62 participants through semi-structured interviews and focus groups. Key findings demonstrate supervisors constantly have to reshape and reinterpret human resource management (HRM) policies and practices to exercise and extend moral agency. This phenomenon suggests contradictions between moral agency and ethical management practice within current HRM regimes. The key message of the paper is that HRM does not always support the ethical management of WWD. Consequently, we question the ethical nature of contemporary HRM policy and practice for WWD, and argue for further research to unpack ethical ways to more effectively support WWD in the workplace. For WWD to be included at work, achieve life skills and their goals, managers and supervisors need to engage with their moral agency. Finally, we draw implications for management and employment relations theory and practice.