The impact of human resource management practices on operational performance: recognizing country and industry differences

Abstract

The interest in strategic human resource management (HRM) has spawned a number of empirical research studies that investigated the impact of HRM practices on organizational performance. However, very little attention has been paid to address the impact of HRM practices on operations management and to generalize the findings across countries and industries. Success of some business decisions (e.g. globalization and merger and acquisition) necessitates recognition and reconciliation of the differences among HRM practices in different countries and industries. This study attempts to generalize the efficacy of seven HRM practices proposed by Pfeffer in the context of country and industry, focusing primarily on the effects of these practices on operations. The findings provide overall support for Pfeffer’s seven HRM practices and empirically validate an ideal‐type HRM system for manufacturing plants.

Theory of reasoned action for continuous improvement capabilities: a behavioral approach

“…This attitude according to Ni & Sun (2009), Anand and others (2009) and Bessant and others (2001), is indispensable for the CI capability as well for the organizational performance (Ahmad and Schroeder, 2003). In this company, knowledge sharing was greatly encouraged and widely practiced through the idea suggestion system.…”

“…It also distinguishes between the thinking labor force and those that "execute", and this segregation represents a drawback since it does not allow the organization to fully explore all of its opportunities to increase productive efficiency. Barney (1991) argues that people can be considered to be the most important asset of an organization, and probably offer the key to generate new knowledge and thus provide the firm with a competitive advantage but very few organizations are able to fully harness this valuable resource (AHMAD, 2003;JENSEN and VINDING, 2003). The resource-based view suggests that it is difficult to draw on the tacit knowledge of people in a specific firm because of its attributes such as social complexity, specificity, path dependence and ambiguity (RUSSELL, 1997;AHMAD and SCHROEDER, 2003).…”

“…In Company B, in qualitative terms, a part of the relation between intention and CI behavior can be attributed to concepts mentioned by Ahmad and Schroeder (2003), where employment security is a means of obtaining employee loyalty and boosting motivation, while at the same time gearing employees toward competitive organizational goals, in this case, a longterm relationship, innovativeness and continuous improvement. Apart from the question of intention, the result of Company B, once again strengthens the notion that normative factors can also influence CI behavior.…”

“…However, this trend followed by researchers in the 1980s and 90s, changed when a conceptual foundation was introduced by the resource based view (RBV) (PETERAF and BARNEy, 2003;WERNERFELT, 1984). At the same time, new light was shed on the CI phenomenon and the importance of the human aspects of the prescriptive Operational programs, was brought back to the discussion (POWELL, 1995, AHMAD andSCHROEDER, 2003;SILA, 2007;MENEZES and others, 2010). Gino and Pisano (2008) and Bendoly and others, (2006) have supported this view by demonstrating that the way operating systems work, perform and respond to management interventions is significantly influenced by people; thus it became necessary to incorporate social, cognitive and psychological theories in Operations Management Research.…”

Effets de certaines pratiques de GRH sur la performance de PME manufacturières : vérification de l’approche universaliste

“…Parmi les indicateurs de performance proximaux, cʼest-à-dire pouvant être rattachés plus directement aux pratiques de GRH, mentionnons la satisfaction, lʼabsentéisme et le taux de renouvellement des employés (Guzzo, Jette et Katzell, 1985 ;Liouville et Bayad, 1995 ;Arcand, Bayad et Fabi, 2002) (Huselid, 1995 ;Delery et Doty, 1996 ;Bryson, 1999 ;Welbourne et Cyr, 1999) ; des indicateurs tels que la productivité, la flexibilité, lʼinnovation et la satisfaction des clients, que lʼon qualifie aussi dʼintermédiaires, se situent pour leur part entre les plus rapprochés et les plus lointains (Delaney et Huselid, 1996 ;Ahmad et Schroeder, 2003 ;Way, 2002).…”