Best practices in developing,conducting, and evaluating inductive research

This editors' introductory article to the Human Resources Management Review special issue on inductive research methods aims not only to provide an overview of the four main articles, but to provide guidance to researchers and gatekeepers about how best to conduct such research. We address four specific goals in the current article. First, we present a brief overview of each of the four papers. Second, we provide a general background on deduction, induction, and abduction: what they are, how they are distinguished from one another and should be used in a complementary manner, and how our field has moved away from inductive toward deductive paradigms over the last five decades. Third, we shed further light on the current representations of deductive versus inductive approaches in our collective published works, and what can/should be done to achieve a better balance between them as we move forward. Fourth, we offer several “best-practice” recommendations for how best to conduct and evaluate research that does not conform to the prevailing hypothetico-deductive model.     

In Search of Theory Development in Grounded Investigations: Doctors' Experiences of Managing as an Example of Fitted and Prospective Theorizing

This article draws on a study of doctors’ experiences of clinical managing to highlight research conventions that limit the development and use of middle range theories in grounded studies. Using sensemaking and the psychological contract as example frameworks, we illustrate how customary deductive evaluations of middle range theories turn grounded researchers away from theory building. As a correction to these conventions, we offer an inductive approach to building existing theory in grounded investigations that does not depend solely on working with frameworks under different empirical conditions. We suggest that forward theorizing is most likely to progress from a synthesis of fitted explanation and prospective thinking that presses at the limits of the data's usefulness. To illustrate this approach, trialled thinking about novel theoretical juxtapositions and alternative sources was used in conjunction with our clinical director data. The value of this approach was supported in two ways. First, a number of fitted and prospective conjectures are offered about how social identity articulates with psychological contracts and sensemaking in role change situations. Second, new light is shed on the process by which particular social conditions differentially modify employees’ social categorizations, and how these inform employee responses to the evolving experience of role change. The article concludes with some tentative proposals for promoting more discussion of theory building in grounded investigations.     

HR and IT capabilities and complementarities in knowledge-intensive services

The main premise of this article is that human resources (HR) and information technologies (IT) are central rather than support functions in knowledge-intensive services. By building management capabilities in both HR and IT, knowledge-intensive services can transform their business processes that, in turn, enable them to provide exemplary services to the customers. Our arguments are grounded in the three related theoretical frameworks of the resource-based view, organizational capabilities, and the theory of complementarities. We suggest that the research and practice in HR and IT fields may have to focus on HR and IT capabilities rather than HR practices or IT investments as the sources of sustainable competitive advantage since capabilities better fit the definition of a ‘resource’ than HR practices or IT investments. Further, organizational capabilities in both HR and IT may enable knowledge-intensive services to transcend the inherent tradeoff between cost and responsiveness. We also discuss the role of HR and IT in knowledge management.     

A person-centered approach to the study of commitment

Theories of workplace commitment have become increasingly complex with propositions regarding its multiple-component structure (e.g., affective, normative, continuance) and multiple foci (e.g., organization, supervisor, team). To date, most research has taken a variable-centered approach (e.g., regression, SEM) to address the additive and interactive effects of commitment components and foci on behavior and well-being. This assumes that research samples are homogeneous and that the same theoretical framework and empirical findings apply uniformly to employees in general. More recently, it has been proposed that a sample can contain subgroups and that the variables of interest (e.g., commitment components or foci) might combine and relate differently to other variables within these subgroups. Consequently, there has been an increase in the use of person-centered strategies (e.g., cluster analysis, latent profile analysis) to identify and compare these subgroups. We provide an overview of commitment theory and research to demonstrate how use of a person-centered research strategy can provide new insights into the nature and implications of commitment. We also provide a critical evaluation of person-centered strategies with the objective of encouraging greater use of more advanced analytic procedures in future research. Finally, we discuss the benefits of person-centered research for theory and practice.     

Algorithms as work designers: How algorithmic management influences the design of jobs

We review the literature on algorithmic management (AM) to bridge the gap between this emerging research area and the well-established theory and research on work design. First, we identify six management functions that algorithms are currently able to perform: monitoring, goal setting, performance management, scheduling, compensation, and job termination. Second, we show how each AM function affects key job resources (e.g., job autonomy, job complexity) and key job demands (e.g., workload, physical demands); with each of these resources and demands being important drivers of worker motivation and their well-being. Third, rejecting a deterministic perspective and drawing on sociotechnical systems theory, we outline key categories of variables that moderate the link between AM on work design, namely transparency, fairness and human influence (e.g., whether workers can control the system). We summarize our review in the form of a model to help guide research on AM, and to support practitioners and designers in the creation and maintenance of meaningful jobs in the era of algorithms.     

THE USE OF GROUNDED THEORY FOR THE QUALITATIVE ANALYSIS OF ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOUR

Qualitative social research generates large amounts of non-standard data which make analysis problematic. This discussion advocates the use of grounded theory as a way of handling these problems. The approach is illustrated, in the context of organizational research, by three cases of grounded theoretical analyses: (a) a study of face-to-face interaction in a hospital between nurses and patients’ relatives; (b) a field-study based on the complex organizational interrelationships associated with small batch production manufacturing; and (c) a documentary-based analysis of the organizational pre-conditions of large-scale accidents. The discussion of the cases stresses the manner in which the qualitative data collected were manipulated in order to give them theoretical shape.     

Exploratory data analysis as a foundation of inductive research

Across academic disciplines, scientific progress is maximized when there is a balance between deductive and inductive approaches. To promote this balance in organizational science, rigorous inductive research aimed at phenomenon detection must be further encouraged. To this end, the present article discusses the logic and methods of exploratory data analysis (EDA), the mode of analysis concerned with discovery, exploration, and empirically detecting phenomena in data. We begin by first describing the historical and conceptual background of EDA. We then discuss two issues related to EDA and its relationship to scientific credibility. First, we argue that EDA fosters a replication-based science by requiring cross-validation and by emphasizing the natural uncertainty of data patterns. Second, we clarify that EDA is distinguishable from other exploratory practices that are considered scientifically questionable (e.g., “p-hacking”, “data fishing” and “data-dredging”). In the following section of the paper, we present a final argument for EDA: that it helps maximize the value of data. To illustrate this point, we present several graphical methods for detecting data patterns and provide references to further techniques for the interested reader.     

Is Strategic Human Resource Management Socially Responsible? The Case of Wegmans Food Markets, Inc.

In 2005, Wegmans Food Markets Inc., the family-owned supermarket chain, was awarded the number one spot on the Fortune “100 Best Companies To Work For.” Wegmans’ recognition illustrates an exemplary case of strategic human resource management embedded in an overall culture of social responsibility, amidst a highly competitive and low margin industry. We detail Wegmans’ human resource practices and its overall stakeholder orientation, arguing that the treatment of employees as strategic assets constitutes an effective approach to social responsibility. In other words, strategic human resource management can help organizations reconcile the often cited conflict between profits and principles. We therefore begin with an overview of the contemporary supermarket industry, provide a brief history of Wegmans, and showcase the supermarket chain’s human resource practices. In closing, we discuss Wegmans’ stakeholder orientation and comment on the divide between strategic human resource management and social responsibility research.     

Building Better Theory by Bridging the Quantitative–Qualitative Divide*

abstract Qualitative methods for data collection and analysis are not mystical, but they are powerful, particularly when used to build new or refine existing theories. This article provides an introduction to qualitative methods and an overview of tactics for ensuring rigor in qualitative research useful for the novice researcher, as well as more experienced researchers interested in expanding their methodological repertoire or seeking guidance on how to evaluate qualitative research. We focus our discussion on the qualitative analytical technique of grounded theory building, and suggest that organizational research has much to gain by coupling of use of qualitative and quantitative research methods.     

Artificial Intelligence–HRM Interactions and Outcomes: A Systematic Review and Causal Configurational Explanation

Artificial intelligence (AI) systems and applications based on them are fast pervading the various functions of an organization. While AI systems enhance organizational performance, thereby catching the attention of the decision makers, they nonetheless pose threats of job losses for human resources. This in turn pose challenges to human resource managers, tasked with governing the AI adoption processes. However, these challenges afford opportunities to critically examine the various facets of AI systems as they interface with human resources. To that end, we systematically review the literature at the intersection of AI and human resource management (HRM). Using the configurational approach, we identify the evolution of different theme based causal configurations in conceptual and empirical research and the outcomes of AI-HRM interaction. We observe incremental mutations in thematic causal configurations as the literature evolves and also provide thematic configuration based explanations to beneficial and reactionary outcomes in the AI-HRM interaction process.     

Antecedents to supplier integration in the automotive industry: A multiple-case study of foreign subsidiaries in China

Supplier integration has become an important concept for improving supply chain performance. The aim of this paper is to identify factors that facilitate and inhibit supplier integration in the context of the Chinese automotive industry. An inductive approach based on grounded theory was chosen as the research methodology, where data was collected through 30 detailed case interviews with subsidiaries of foreign automotive companies operating in China. The results indicate that buyer-side leadership is an important antecedent for building motivation, trust, and commitment among suppliers and for shaping their mindsets. This, in turn, facilitates strategic alignment and enables suppliers to build collaborative capabilities, which are finally shown to be a key enabler for successful supplier integration.     

Emergent clustering methods for empirical OM research

To date, the vast majority of cluster analysis applications in OM research have relied on traditional hierarchical (e.g., Ward's algorithm) and nonhierarchical (e.g., K-means algorithms) methods. Although these venerable methods should continue to be employed effectively in the OM literature, we also believe there is a significant opportunity to expand the scope of clustering methods to emergent techniques. We provide an overview of some alternative clustering procedures (including advantages and disadvantages), identify software programs for implementing them, and discuss the circumstances where they might be employed gainfully in OM research. The implementation of emergent clustering methods in the OM literature should enable researchers to offer implications for practice that might not have been uncovered with traditional methods.     

Integrating development and operations teams: A control approach for DevOps

Information systems (IS) literature has predominantly studied IS project control with a focus on software development projects. However, by virtue of digital transformation, an increasing number of organizations are implementing cross-functional teams, combining software development with software operations tasks. The goal is to react quickly to the ever-changing market requirements.The DevOps concept aims to effectively orchestrate development and operations activities and smoothly manage tensions within teams, resulting from the heterogeneous composition of skills, responsibilities, and working styles.In contrast to the predominant project management view of control of prior research, which focuses on software development, this study investigates a different perspective: focusing on exerting control in DevOps teams and simultaneously navigating tensions between software development and operations. Utilizing an inductive theory-building approach, we first identify the four tensions discussed in prior literature—namely, goal conflict, method discomfort, decision rights, and time rhythm—and then empirically derive corresponding resolutions.Integrating our findings, we present an empirically derived model that can serve as a DevOps control approach for navigating the tensions between development and operations teams. This model extends our theoretical knowledge about control in DevOps teams and serves to inform IT practitioners, helping them successfully implement and manage DevOps teams.     

Communicative power: A linguistic approach to the study of the microdynamics of organizations

This article addresses the question of how communicative power is exercised in an organizational setting which is characterized according to its members as a “feminine” culture type (Hofstede, 1980, Organizational Dynamics, 9(1), 42–63). The purpose is threefold: firstly, to operationalize the concepts of “dominance” and “control” in an organizational setting by using a linguistic approach; secondly, to investigate the contribution of a linguistic approach to organizational research in exploring social interaction and, thirdly, to discuss some practical and theoretical implications for managerial work. The linguistic approach, involving a microanalysis, provided an analytical basis for understanding the fine web of interaction in the organization. In this way it served as an instrument for rendering visible the various steps in the interpretation, and the links between them. Against our theoretically grounded expectations, the empirical results suggest that the distribution of power cannot alone explain the extent to which institutional and cultural resources can be mobilized and organizations changed.     

Six Sigma: Definition and underlying theory

Six Sigma has been gaining momentum in industry; however, academics have conducted little research on this emerging phenomenon. Understanding Six Sigma first requires providing a conceptual definition and identifying an underlying theory. In this paper we use the grounded theory approach and the scant literature available to propose an initial definition and theory of Six Sigma. Our research argues that although the tools and techniques in Six Sigma are strikingly similar to prior approaches to quality management, it provides an organizational structure not previously seen. This emergent structure for quality management helps organizations more rigorously control process improvement activities, while at the same time creating a context that enables problem exploration between disparate organizational members. Although Six Sigma provides benefits over prior approaches to quality management, it also creates new challenges for researchers and practitioners.     

Mapping sexual orientation research in management: A review and research agenda

Attitudes, norms, and laws regarding sexual orientation are undergoing a worldwide revolution. Managers and HR professionals play a key role in responding to these changes, and managing issues related to sexual orientation diversity in organizations. As such, the amount of management scholarship on sexual orientation has been rapidly growing to help inform practice. However, at present, the literature is fragmented across management specialty areas. This makes it difficult to have an overview of what has been learned to date, and detect research opportunities. Thus, this article aims to provide the first integrative review of sexual orientation research across the management field over 23 years. We use bibliometric techniques to (a) systematically identify and map 111 topics in this literature (map downloads from: https://bit.ly/SOTopicMap ), (b) identify topic trends and topic citation rates, and (c) derive an inductive taxonomy of major topic clusters. We then identify key theories and relationships in the literature, review key findings for scholars and practitioners, and identify future research directions. Among these, we highlight the need to incorporate sexual orientation as a standard demographic question in management research, and highlight best practices for doing so from other scientific fields.     

Emerging organizations' characteristics as predictors of human capital employment mode: A theoretical perspective

Entrepreneurship is important to capitalistic economies, and in management studies. Additionally, organizations recognize that human resources are imperative to survival. Although human resources is an important field, sparse theory has been applied to human resources in emerging organizations. Recognizing that emerging organizations are different from established organizations, we expand prior work in human resources and emerging organizations to introduce a human resource architecture of emerging organizations. We introduce a model for the employment mode of emerging organizations based on intentionality, resources, boundary, and exchange. We present propositions drawn from our theory, and conclude with implications and suggestions for research.