Quality in Mixed Human Resource Management Research: Evidence from Published Literature

Abstract

The study focuses on several issues that affect methodological rigour of mixed research. The article aims at providing illumination and clarity on continued use of terminologies in mixed research in a confusing manner. Research paradigms should conduct from time-to-time inward introspection to ascertain quality of research papers. This article attempts to ascertain quality of published mixed research. The article investigates several dimensions of quality in mixed Human Resource Management (HRM) research and then gives recommendations to improve research practice. It dwells on ignored issues in quality of mixed research such as conceptual and theoretical framework, catapulting them to the high table of quality discourse in mixed research. As a pivotal divergence from previous studies, traceability as an integral mixed research quality dimension is given prominence. This article utilises quantitative and qualitative document review guides to collect data from published journal papers in HRM. The study found that there are areas of improvement in the conduct of mixed HRM studies and proposes a framework that can act as a guide in evaluating quality criteria. Mixed research is marginalised in HRM literature owing to the small percentage of published papers.