Looking East: diffusing high performance work practices in the southern Afro-Asian context

Abstract

Most cross-cultural international human resource management (IHRM) literature contains instructive comparative analyses of East Asian and Western countries and lessons from Japanese best operating practice. There is a paucity of literature extending this debate to the African context and of comparative IHRM work between East Asia and African countries. This article lls a contextual gap in offering a comparative analysis of diffusion and adoption of high performance work practices from East Asia in southern African rms. The continued relevance of 'context' is critically evaluated, given powerful forces for convergence in the global economy. However, much of the debate on the convergence/divergence framework appears to neglect process dynamics and cross-vergence in the development and implementation of hybrid practices as well as reverse diffusion. This article highlights the importance of considering certain variables of local distinctiveness and diversity as features of the notion of cross-vergence which shape particular human resource practices.

Theory building trends in international management research: an archival review of preferred methods

“…The latter observation is particularly significant for South African international management scholars suggesting that receptivity to qualitative methodology affords an opportunity for emic research rather than merely testing existing international management theories and constructs that may not capture local international management phenomena. Further, a number of authors indicate that managers working in a global context might experience disconnection between international management theory prescriptions and the imperatives of the local context unless international management theory is grounded in the realities of the local context (Ngambi, 2004;Horwitz, Kamoche & Chew, 2002). Tsui (2004) asserts that much of management knowledge today is the product of scholarly work by researchers in North America and by scholars in Western Europe and this continued reliance may suggest researchers and educators could be disseminating a body of management knowledge more appropriate for countries inside North America and Western Europe than management knowledge grounded on realities inside the contexts and cultures of other nations.…”

Building flexibility into multi-national human resource strategy: a study of four South African multi-national enterprises

“…Most firms wanted to adopt the latest management practices prescribed in American openUP literature and supported by business consulting firms across Europe, but could not because of varying regulative and political conditions. Some evidence is emerging that there exists a hybrid between divergence and convergence (Horwitz et al, 2002). This is defined as cross-vergence, which refers to cross-cultural diffusion of high performance work practices (HPWPs).…”

Chinese management practices in Kenya: toward a post-colonial critique

“…Blunt and Jones, 1992;Kamoche, 2002), there has been a growing body of research on the management of people and organisations in Africa. An exhaustive review of the scope of this corpus of knowledge would require a full paper.…”

“…Thus, while China's pursuit of economic development involves a process of learning, selective adaptation and innovation due to uncertainties in each country (Lin and Wang, 2012), there is a need to examine cross-vergence and possible hybridisation (e.g. Azolukwam and Perkins, 2009;Horwitz et al, 2002), in the formulation of blended business and human resource practices, thus fostering mutual learning.…”