The Employee as ‘Dish of the Day’: The Ethics of the Consuming/Consumed Self in Human Resource Management

This article examines the ethical implications of the growing integration of consumption into the heart of the employment relationship. Human resource management (HRM) practices increasingly draw upon the values and practices of consumption, constructing employees as the ??consumers?? of ??cafeteria-style?? benefits and development opportunities. However, at the same time employees are expected to market themselves as items to be consumed on a corporate menu. In relation to this simultaneous position of consumer/consumed, the employee is expected to actively engage in the commodification of themselves, performing an appropriate organizational identity as a necessary part of being a successful employee. This article argues that the relationship between HRM and the simultaneously consuming/consumed employee affects the conditions of possibility for ethical relations within organizational life. It is argued that the underlying ??ethos?? for the integration of consumption values into HRM practices encourages a self-reflecting, self-absorbed subject, drawing upon a narrow view of individualised autonomy and choice. Referring to Levinas?? perspective that the primary ethical relation is that of responsibility and openness to the Other, it is concluded that these HRM practices affect the possibility for ethical being.     

Towards an Ethical Research Agenda for International HRM: The Possibilities of a Plural Cosmopolitan Framework

In this conceptual paper, we aim to develop a much needed ethical research agenda for international Human Resource Management (HRM), given that the changing geopolitical dynamics interrogate the political role of multinational companies and the ethical stance they take in their HRM practices. To theoretically ground this agenda, we turn to cosmopolitanism and distinguish three main perspectives??political, cultural, and social??each of which implies a different understanding of the self?Cother relation in the context of the global world. We translate the core and ethical stance of each perspective to the field of international HRM, presenting three different foci of an ethical research agenda in terms of the ethical implications for multinational companies, research focus, methodological suggestions, and inherent limitations.     

HRM in Hong Kong since 1997

A diverse set of human resource management (HRM) practices became institutionalized during Hong Kong's industrialization from the 1950s through the 1970s within the context of an open economy, a government disinclined to intervene in business decisions or the labour market and a weak trade union movement. Economic restructuring, labour market changes and rising labour costs during the 1980s and 1990s pressured employers to find more effective ways of using their human resources. We focus on how the economic downturn following the Asian Financial Crisis has impacted on employment practices including employment security, compensation, skill formation, work reorganization and employment relations. We discuss changes in the public as well as private sector and argue that reforms in the former are loosening the rigidities of its highly structured internal labour market system. Public sector employment practices are thus likely to converge increasingly with the ‘best practices’ of private sector and overseas government HRM systems.     

Ethics and HRM: Theoretical and Conceptual Analysis

Despite the ongoing consideration of the ethical nature of human resource management (HRM), little research has been conducted on how morality and ethics are represented in the discourse, activities and lived experiences of human resource (HR) professionals. In this paper, we connect the thinking and lived experiences of HR professionals to an alternative ethics, rooted in the work of Bauman (Modernity and the Holocaust, Polity Press, Cambridge, 1989; Theory, Culture and Society 7:5?C38, 1990; Postmodern Ethics, Blackwell, Oxford, 1991; Approaches to Social Enquiry, Polity Press, Cambridge, 1993; Life in Fragments, Blackwell, Oxford, 1995) and Levinas (Otherwise than Being, or, Beyond Essence, Duquesne University Press, Pittsburgh, PA, 1998). We argue that the study of HRM and ethics should be contextualized within the discourses used, the practices and activities of HR professionals. Through the analysis of interview data from 40 predominantly Canadian HR practitioners and managers we experiment with Bauman??s notion of ??moral impulse?? to help us understand how HRM is both a product and perpetuator of moral neutralization in organizations. We suggest that HRM as it is practiced is concerned with distancing, depersonalizing, and dissembling, and acts in support of the ??moral?? requirements of business, not of people. However, we also recognize that HR practitioners and managers are often confronted with and conflicted by actions and decisions that they are required to take, therefore opening possibilities and hope for an alternative ethical HRM.     

Human Resource Management in a Compartmentalized World: Whither Moral Agency?

This article examines the potential for moral agency in human resource management practice. It draws on an ethnographic study of human resource managers in a global organization to provide a theorized account of situated moral agency. This account suggests that within contemporary organizations, institutional structures??particularly the structures of Anglo-American market capitalism??threaten and constrain the capacity of HR managers to exercise moral agency and hence engage in ethical behaviour. The contextualized explanation of HR management action directly addresses the question of whether HRM is inherently unethical. The discussion draws on MacIntyre??s (Philosophy 74:311?C329, 1999, After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory, Duckworth, 2000) conceptualization of moral agency within contemporary social structures. In practice, HR managers embody roles that may not be wholly compartmentalized. Alternative institutional structures can provide HR managers with a vocabulary of motives for people-centred HRM and widen the scope for the exercising of moral agency, when enacted within reflective relational spaces that provide milieus for critical questioning of logics and values. This article aims to contribute to and extend debate on whether HRM can ever be ethical, and provide a means of reconnecting business ethics with longstanding concerns in critical management studies.     

“Equality Theory” as a Counterbalance to Equity Theory in Human Resource Management

This conceptual paper revisits the concept of equality as a base of distributive justice and contends that it is underspecified, both theoretically and in terms of its ethical and pragmatic application to human resource management (HRM) within organizations. Prior organizational literature focuses primarily upon distributive equality of remunerative outcomes within small groups and implicitly employs an equity-based conception of inputs to define equality. In contrast, through exposition of the philosophical roots of equality principles, we reconceptualize inputs as de facto equal and consider the systemic application of distributive equality in the form of status leveling practices. Ethical ramifications of distributive equality so viewed are explored. We conclude by arguing that, to implicitly insert a stronger ethics focus into the study and practice of HRM, perhaps there should be ??equality theory?? competing with equity theory for recognition in managerial and scholarly discourse.     

Graduate Employability and the Principle of Potentiality: An Aspect of the Ethics of HRM

The recruitment of the next generation of workers is of central concern to contemporary HRM. This paper focuses on university campuses as a major site of this process, and particularly as a new domain in which HRM??s ethical claims are configured, in which it sets and answers a range of ethical questions as it outlines the ??ethos?? of the ideal future worker. At the heart of this ethos lies what we call the ??principle of potentiality??. This principle is explored through a sample of graduate recruitment programmes from the Times Top 100 Graduate Employers, interpreted as ethical exhortations in HRM??s attempt to shape the character of future workers. The paper brings the work of Georg Simmel to the study of HRM??s ethics and raises the uncomfortable question that, within discourses of endless potentiality, lie ethical dangers which bespeak an unrecognised ??tragedy of culture??. We argue that HRM fashions an ethos of work which de-recognises human limits, makes a false promise of absolute freedom, and thus becomes a tragic proposition for the individual.     

The Question of Ethical Hypocrisy in Human Resource Management in the U.K. and Irish Charity Sectors

Whilst there is a growing volume of literature exploring the ethical implications of organisational change for HRM and the ethical aspects of certain HRM activities, there have been few published U.K. studies of how HR managers actually behave when faced with ethical dilemmas in their work. This paper seeks to enhance the foundations of such knowledge through an examination of the influence of organisational values on the ethical behaviour of Human Resource Managers within a sample of charities in the U.K. and the Republic of Ireland. A qualitative research design is adopted utilising semi-structured interviews. Findings highlight ethical inconsistency in people management in the charity sector arising from the clear application of strong and explicit organisational values to external client groups but their limited influence on people management strategies and practices within the organisation. Many of the ethical issues faced by HRM professionals in both countries arise from this inconsistency. In their handling of ethical dilemmas, the HRM professionals exhibit a combination of a care ethic and a concern for justice but it is also clear that in situations of management intransigence, a desire to be conscience driven often gives way to a contingent approach. Whilst respondents considered it inappropriate for the HRM function to be the conscience of the organisation, it is seen to have a key role in providing management with advice on ethical action. However, the ability of HRM to influence ethical behaviour is highly dependent on the status of the function within the organisation.     

Differentiating the workforce: The performance effects of using contingent labor in a context of high-performance work systems

In this study we focus on the impact of contingent labor on the outcomes of high-performance work systems (HPWS). Building on the emerging research on the social mechanisms linking HRM to organizational effectiveness, we argue that a higher incidence of contingent labor diminishes the productivity payoff associated with the use of HPWS for managing standard employees. We test these arguments using a sample of 229 British firms of different industries. The results support our arguments and help develop a more holistic and critical viewpoint in the analysis of workforce differentiation.     

Agonism and the Possibilities of Ethics for HRM

This paper provides a critique and re-evaluation of the way that ethics is understood and promoted within mainstream Human Resource Management (HRM) discourse. We argue that the ethics located within this discourse focuses on bolstering the relevance of HRM as a key contributor to organizational strategy, enhancing an organization??s sense of moral legitimacy and augmenting organizational control over employee behaviour and subjectivity. We question this discourse in that it subordinates the ethics of the employment relationship to managerial prerogative. In response, we suggest a different model of the relationship between ethics and HRM??one that finds the possibility of ethics in the contestation and destabilization of HRM. Such ethics arises through resistance to moral normalization and the constraint of freedom and difference. The contribution of our paper is in theorising the possibilities of a relationship between ethics and HRM that does not place HRM at its centre, as chief intermediary of the ethics of the employment relationship, but rather sees HRM as being a powerful player in a set of what Mouffe calls ??agonistic?? socio-ethical relations.     

Good Neighbors but Bad Employers: Two Faces of Corporate Social Responsibility Programs

Using two firm-level datasets in Korea, we analyzed the effects of corporate social responsibility (CSR) on employment relations. We propose that participation in corporate social activity may not necessarily reflect an ethical commitment to do “the right thing,” but instead can be associated with mobilizing internal resources to offset the costs imposed by external CSR involvement undertaken because of social pressure. Analysis of the two datasets showed similar results. The results demonstrate that socially responsible actions facilitate employer tendency to use performance-based pay and efficiency-based work practices. We also find that CSR has a negative association with employment growth and increased labor flexibility through contingent employment. These findings shed light on the internal impact of CSR involvement on a firm’s employment policies with respect to resource allocation.     

Exploring the Boundaries of Human Resource Managers’ Responsibilities

This article addresses two longstanding challenges for human resource (HR) managers; how far they can and should represent the interests of both management and workers and how they can gain the power to do so. Adopting a Kantian perspective, it is argued that to pursue an ethical human resource management (HRM), HR managers need to go some way to resolving both. Three possible avenues are considered. Contemporary approaches to organisation of the HR role associated with the work of Ulrich are explored as a means of enhancing power, but rejected on the basis of research evidence as unlikely to succeed. Promotion of worker outcomes in the context of developing the link between HRM and performance offers the potential for a more ethical HRM but has not been seized by most HR managers. Finally, implementation of legislative and moral requirements to promote quality of working life is explored through the case of bullying at work. This highlights the boundaries of the HR role in a context of limited power and leads to the conclusion that it is unrealistic to look to HR managers, or at least HR managers alone, to achieve an ethical HRM.     

Strategic Choice and Organisational Context in HRM in the UK Hotel Sector

Human resource management in the UK hotel industry is typically held to be informal, instrumental and associated with poor employment relations. Some studies, however, have identified incidences of more formal, high-commitment HRM indicating greater diversity in employment practices. Using original research undertaken in south-west England, this article examines this diversity and the influence of organisational context in the formation of HRM strategy. By identifying patterns of employee relations practice it is possible to examine the influence of market factors and establishment size and the extent to which there is scope for strategic choice in HRM. The research indicates that whilst larger hotels operating in stable product markets might be more likely to display formal or strategic approaches to employee relations compared to the industry as a whole, this sub-sector still appears significantly divided in the extent to which managers feel able, willing or compelled to invest in associated practices.     

Issue-Contingent Effects on Ethical Decision Making: A Cross-Cultural Comparison

This experiment examined the effects of three elements comprising Jones' (1991) moral intensity construct, (social consensus, personal proximity, and magnitude of consequences) in a cross-cultural comparison of ethical decision making within a human resource management (HRM) context. Results indicated social consensus had the most potent effect on judgments of moral concern and judgments of immorality. An analysis of American, Eastern European, and Indonesian responses also indicted socio-cultural differences were moderated by the type of HRM ethical issue. In addition, individual differences in personal ethical ideology (relativism and idealism) varied reliably with moral judgments after controlling for issue characteristics and socio-cultural background.     

HRM in Thailand: a post-1997 update

This essay updates an earlier study of human resource management (HRM) practices in Thailand, focusing specifically on HRM in the post-1997 Asian financial crisis. HRM in Thailand has undergone gradual, but significant, change, with movement away from more traditional styles of HRM and management rooted in personalism and social relationships, toward more flexible employment systems in which employment opportunities are based on merit and performance rather than connections and personal characteristics. These changes are clearly more pronounced in subsidiaries of multinational corporations, particularly those based in Western countries.     

The Importance of Sectoral Differences in the Application of Complementary HRM Practices for Innovation Performance

Recent theoretical and empirical analysis in the field of economic organization has focused almost exclusively on identifying organizational practices and complementarities between such practices, without regard for the type of activity in question. However, organizational theory suggests that more knowledge-intensive production activities often involve higher degrees of strategic uncertainty for firms and performance ambiguity in relation to individual employees. Therefore, the 'organic' or 'clan' form of organization - involving the application of 'new' HRM practices - is expected to perform better within knowledge-intensive sectors of the economy, as compared to other sectors. A sample of 726 Danish firms with more than 50 employees in manufacturing and private services is studied. The results show that HRM practices are more effective in influencing innovation performance when applied together, as compared with situations in which individual practices are applied alone. In other words, organizational complementarities obtain. Moreover, the application of complementary HRM practices is more effective for firms in knowledge-intensive industries ('high' and 'medium' knowledge-intensive industries).     

HRM in Thailand: Eroding Traditions

This study explores the changing HRM practices in Thailand, especially over the past decade, during which the country has undergone substantial economic growth. It begins by examining the employment practices of traditional family-owned enterprises, which differ substantially from what have become thought of as ‘best practice’ in Western firms. It then analyzes the professionalization of employment practices in large-scale, publicly held Thai corporations. The final sections of the consider the nature of employment practices in the subsidiaries of multinational firms, which play a major role in the Thai economy.     

The Roles of HRM in CSR: Strategic Partnership or Operational Support?

As the implementation of corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategy requires promoting employee participation and initiating meaningful changes in organisational culture, the involvement of the human resource management (HRM) function in policy formulation and implementation is highly desirable. The relationship between the HRM and CSR functions is, however, under-investigated than other areas. Hence, there is a lack of clarity concerning HRM roles and the conditions under which they may be strategic or operational in nature. By drawing on data from interviews with 29 CSR and HRM professionals of large organisations in New Zealand, this paper argues that the role and contribution of the HR function in CSR is contingent on organisational variables such as the CSR structure, the scope and application of CSR and the nature of the HR functions. It concludes that in such contexts HRM is more likely to offer operational support in executing CSR rather than strategic input.     

The Influence of Business Ethics Education on Moral Efficacy,Moral Meaningfulness,and Moral Courage: A Quasi-experimental Study

The research described here contributes to the extant empirical research on business ethics education by examining outcomes drawn from the literature on positive organizational scholarship (POS). The general research question explored is whether a course on ethical decision-making in business could positively influence students’ confidence in their abilities to handle ethical problems at work (i.e., moral efficacy), boost the relative importance of ethics in their work lives (i.e., moral meaningfulness), and encourage them to be more courageous in raising ethical problems at work even if it is unpopular (i.e., moral courage). Specifically, the study used a rigorous quasi-experimental pretest–posttest research design with a treatment (N = 30) and control group (N = 30) to investigate whether a graduate-level course in business ethics could influence students’ levels of moral efficacy, meaningfulness, and courage. Findings revealed that participants in the business ethics treatment course experienced significant positive increases in each of the three outcome variables as compared to the control group. The largest increase was in moral efficacy, followed by moral courage, and finally, moral meaningfulness. These findings are discussed in the context of the current research on business ethics education and POS. Implications for future research are discussed.     

Strategic Human Resource Management as Ethical Stewardship

The research about strategic human resource management (SHRM) has suggested that human resource professionals (HRPs) have the opportunity to play a greater role in contributing to organizational success if they are effective in developing systems and policies aligned with the organization??s values, goals, and mission. We suggest that HRPs need to raise the standard of their performance and that the competitive demands of the modern economic environment create implicit ethical duties that HRPs owe to their organizations. We define ethical stewardship as a model of governance that honors obligations due to the many stakeholders and that maximizes long-term organizational wealth creation. We propose that if HRPs adopt an ethical stewardship framework and the qualities of transformative leaders, they will be more aware of their ethical duties to their organizations and more effective in helping their organizations to create increased wealth, achieve desired organizational outcomes, and establish work environments that are more satisfying to employees.