It's a small world:managing human resources in small businesses

It has become widely acknowledged that, during the past decade or so, large mainstream companies in the UK have adopted a new agenda for managing people. Relatively little is known about the impact of this new agenda on small businesses. The small business sector has been long regarded as the natural home for ‘bleak house’ employment relations practices typified by direct management control, poor terms and conditions, high staff turnover and little training. In March 1993, however, a large survey of 560 companies in Leicestershire revealed a surprisingly high take-up and awareness of new management ideas among small business managers. These findings are at odds with a crude ‘bleak house’ scenario. This large-scale telephone survey was then followed up with detailed case study research. This article presents and reflects upon the evidence and reformulates ideas about people management in small businesses.     

Managerial style and the strategic choice of executive incentives

This paper analyzes a two-stage duopoly model where owners provide incentives to managers who then select output levels. Unlike the previous Cournot models on the strategic use of incentives (e.g. Fershtman and Judd, 1987; Sklivas, 1987), managers hold different beliefs about their rivals. Managers and executives are classified by ‘management style’ based on the aggressiveness of their beliefs. It is shown that many of the standard results of the strategic managerial incentive literature no longer hold when executives have differing managerial styles. For example, owners may ‘penalize’ their managers for sales, or they may optimally instruct their managers to maximize profits, in contrast to the standard Cournot findings. Indeed, the model yields a necessary and sufficient condition for compensation contracts to specify pure profit-maximizing behavior when managers have differing managerial styles. Thus, the analysis suggests that when ownership and control are separated, owners must carefully assess the belief structure (management style) of their executives before designing the compensation package.     

工程项目管理策略探析

工程项目管理是一个复杂的系统过程,是管理者运用系统的理论和方法,对工程项目进行计划、组织、指挥、协调、控制和评价等管理.文章通过分析项目管理的特点和机制,结合项目管理过程中的常见问题阐述工程项目管理的有效策略.     

Antecedents and consequences of performance management enactment by front-line managers. Evidence from Belgium

Although researchers have extensively stressed the critical role of line managers in the effective implementation of HR practices, little is known about what exactly causes managers to enact these practices. In this paper, we draw from signaling theory, theory of planned behavior and social exchange theory to investigate both the antecedents and the outcomes of front-line management’s enactment of performance management (PM) activities. Results from two Belgian samples of 731 front-line managers and 425 employees show that line management’s beliefs regarding the usefulness of PM activities mediate the relationship between HR support and line management’s implicit person theory, on the one hand, and PM enactment, on the other. This relationship is moderated by the manager’ span of control. Furthermore, line management enactment shows to be positively related to employee engagement and job satisfaction.     

Practices and strategies for sustainability-related risk management in multi-tier supply chains

This study investigates how sustainability-related risks are managed in multi-tier supply chains. It focuses on the strategies and practices that companies use to manage sustainability-related risks and how these differ between supply chains and supply chain tiers. We use a multiple-case study with 25 companies forming 5 multi-tier supply chains. As a result of this study, we present a conceptual framework for sustainability-related risk management practices in multi-tier supply chains and apply it empirically by defining sustainability-related risk management profiles for the case supply chains. We show that in multi-tier supply chains, companies need direct and indirect collaboration and direct and indirect monitoring practices for managing sustainability-related risks emanating from not only their first-tier suppliers but also lower-tier suppliers. Our framework helps purchasing and supply chain managers understand the dimensions of sustainability-related risk management in a multi-tier setting and develop strategies and practices for mitigating and managing those risks. We also empirically show the challenge of extending sustainability-related risk management practices beyond first-tier suppliers due to the different practices in different supply chain tiers.     

Trapped in the hierarchy: the craft of Dutch city managers

The position of top public managers implies management in three directions: up (political office holders), down (creating organizational capacity), and out (boundary spanning). We know however, little about what these managers do. I present a close-up analysis of city managers using diary analysis, shadowing, and interviews with stakeholders. The analysis interprets their craft as managing up, down, and out. It finds that despite the contemporary emphasis on collaborative public management, the prevalence of boundary spanning activities in top managers’ activity patterns is easily overestimated. Working in the governmental hierarchy consumes most of the managers’ attention.     

The Role of Overbilling in Hospitals’ Earnings Management Decisions

Abstract

This paper examines the role of overbilling in hospitals’ earnings management choices. Overbilling by hospitals is a form of revenue manipulation that involves misclassifying a patient into a diagnosis-related group that yields higher reimbursement. As overbilling allows hospitals to increase revenues without altering operations, affecting costs, or having to reverse such behavior in the future, I propose and find that overbilling reduces hospitals’ use of managing accruals or cutting discretionary expenditures. Next, I find that hospital managers prefer overbilling to managing accruals (cutting discretionary expenditures) when cutting discretionary expenditures (managing accruals) is constrained, and vice versa. Collectively, my findings suggest that overbilling is an important alternative manipulation tool in hospitals.     

论管理人员的培训管理

管理人员培训是企业培训的难点和重点,是提升管理人员素质的重要途径。企业在进行管理人员培训管理时,应根据管理人员的类型选择不同的培训管理对策、培训内容及方式,做到培训管理有针对性和实效性。     

‘Change or hold: reexamining HRM to meet new challenges and demands’: the future of people at work: a reflection on diverging human resource management policies and practices in Dutch organizations

As a consequence of continual change pressures on everyday organizations, a gradual but noticeable shift is taking place in the way managers and employees view the employment relationship. Expectation patterns between both parties are starting to diverge into what seems to be new forms of managing people, based on different assumptions regarding their importance in the (knowledge based) economy. Traditional differences in employment expectations between superiors and their subordinates, between higher and lesser educated and between intrinsically and extrinsically motivated employees, are currently making place for differences between younger and older knowledge workers and for diversity and professionalism. In this article, HRM is contrasted against two emerging approaches towards the management of people, which are currently subsets of HRM, but gaining momentum as potential replacements for HRM. First, we identify ‘Transaction-based Management of People (TM)’ in which the employment relationship mirrors that of a financially driven exchange relationship, similar to transaction economics. We refer to the second approach as ‘Professional-based Management of People (PM)’ in which the nature of the employment relationship reflects the recognition of people in organizations as ‘true’ professionals who know best what constitutes superior business performance. These approaches have been empirically examined by means of a representative survey among Dutch directors and managers.     

The Denial of Slavery in Management Studies

abstract American slavery has been wrongfully excluded from histories of management. By 1860, when the historical orthodoxy has modern management emerging on the railroads, 38,000 managers were managing the 4 million slaves working in the US economy. Given slaves’ worth, slaveholders could literally claim ‘our people are our greatest asset.’ Yet a review of histories of management shows ante‐bellum slavery excluded from managerial modernity as pre‐capitalist, unsophisticated in practice, and without non‐owner managers identified as such. These grounds for exclusion are challenged. First, it is shown slavery is included within capitalism by many historians, who also see plantations as a site of the emergence of industrial discipline. Second, ante‐bellum slavery is demonstrated to have been managed according to classical management and Taylorian principles. Third, those doing the managing are shown to have been employed at the time as ‘managers’. In the idea of the manager, and of scientific and classical management slavery has therefore left an ongoing imprint in management practice and thought. A strong argument is made for not just for postcolonialist accounts of management, but for management histories in which anti‐African‐American racism is a continuing strand. The fundamental significance of the article however is its identification of slavery as of intrinsic, but hitherto denied, relevance to management studies.     

关注电子商务环境下供应链的管理有效性评价

电子商务环境赋予了供应链管理全新的内涵，它要求供应链的绩效评价必须确立新的视角。管理有效性是突出答的知本性的一种管理理念，值得引起关系到企业竞争力的决策者与管理者们的关注。     

Computerizing Barriers in Quality Management in Poland

Speed and flexibility in managing the information is of bigger and bigger importance in management at present. Efficient management of a company requires an access to current information which constitutes the key potential of a company, difficult to forge and of a unique character, thanks to which an appropriate managing the information is an important factor of competitive domination. The best way to achieve such an effect is to computerize the management. The application of computer equipment facilitates the information flow and therefore it dispenses managers from mechanical duties and allows them to focus on conceptual work connected with using the gathered information, whereas a tedious effort of its processing is done by a computer system.     

The role of technology in the project manager performance model

Technology assumes importance in the context of project management due to greater challenges in today's technology‐enabled work environment, where technology tools are routinely used for collaboration, communication, and deployment of project management practices. It is becoming common practice for even co‐located project teams to use the electronic medium for these purposes. Notwithstanding the importance of technology, research has shown that it is difficult to associate the use of technology with business performance and the absence of such relation can be extrapolated to project performance as well. However, technology can play a major role in supporting project managers in managing projects effectively and efficiently. Several studies have addressed the importance and leadership style of project managers. However, specific roles and responsibilities of a project manager toward the project team is an area that needs further study. In this research effort, using the literature review, important people‐related factors of project performance are identified. Then structured personal interviews were used to gather data for understanding relations among these factors in order to develop a project manager performance model. The model was developed employing the interpretive structural modeling (ISM) methodology. The model was used to determine the role of the project manager in managing the project team and improving the project performance. Results show that both leadership and management roles are important. This study helped to analyze underlying interactions among these factors and, consequently, understand the supportive function of technology to the project manager in improving project performance.     

绩效管理浅析

绩效管理是“以人为本”理念下促进人与企业融合的理想的工具,企业的管理者通过发现员工的绩效表现来了解管理的效果,文章主要对绩效管理的一些基本定义进行初步的探讨。     

Employability and the psychological contract in European ICT sector SMEs

This article explores the employability of information and communication technology (ICT) professionals from the perspective of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The first stage of analysis, based on over 100 interviews with managers of ICT supplier companies in seven European countries (Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland and the UK), showed most SMEs to have a generally ad hoc approach to managing the employability of their ICT professionals. Assessment and development plans were used primarily to keep skills current to business needs; however, the more developed northern European markets showed greater awareness of the ‘high commitment’ benefits of a more sophisticated approach towards career management (e.g. through mentoring or career planning). A second stage of analysis based only on UK interviews builds on this to propose a model of positive employer influence on psychological contracts through career and employability management practices.     

Public Managers’ Skills Development for Effective Performance Management: Empirical evidence from Italian local governments

Performance management has become an important element of the reform agenda of public sector around the world. However, scholars and practitioners highlight that many public administrations do not manage performance very well. A ‘litmus test’ of the success of a performance-based reform is observing whether public managers use performance information to make better-informed decisions. Having said that, the aim of this article is to see whether public managers of Italian local governments in the Apulia region (the South of Italy) use performance information after the last performance-based reform (Brunetta’s Reform: decree No. 150/09). The learning purpose is analysed and discussed. The research may suggest scholars, practitioners and policy makers the routes for developing performance utilization in difficult organizational contexts where performance management systems do not work.     

PUBLIC SERVICES MANAGEMENT: ACTIVITIES, INITIATIVES AND LIMITS TO LEARNING

Private sector-style management initiatives to ensure UK public services managers’ learning from private sector management practice are examined, and their rationale questioned. The lack of a coherent, systematic and agreed view of what constitutes ‘management’ and ‘managerial work’ in the private sector is discussed. It is argued that there are reasons for believing that the particular character and organizational contexts of public services will require different managerial behaviours. The manner in which experimental managerial initiatives in some public services have shifted into mandatory innovations is examined. Such innovations can be incompatible with the values of those managing in the public service, who frequently fail to recognize the advantages of late innovation, incrementalism and circumspection. In public services particularly, many managerial activities are the province of ‘non managerial’ staff. Though frequently not considered, the values of these de facto managers may be central to the progress of such innovations. It is further argued that risk-taking as applied in a business context is inappropriate to the degree that public services managers must be concerned with the common weal, equity and accountability. The article concludes with a detailed research agenda to support the need to recognize public services management as a rich and varied area of managerial behaviour in its own right. Its character and variation warrants further investigation as a basis for formulating more appropriate management concepts against which to measure public services managers’ behaviour and performance.     

The relative importance of the PMBOK® Guide's nine Knowledge Areas during project planning

Although A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK® Guide)—Fourth Edition identifies nine Knowledge Areas that project managers should focus on while managing projects, it does not indicate the relative importance of each of these Knowledge Areas. However, such information can be of great significance in helping project managers determine how to use their available resources most effectively. This article investigates the relative importance of the project management Knowledge Areas used during the planning phase of a project and their impact on project success. Results presented in this article are based on a field study that involved 783 project managers from different countries and industries. The study revealed that the Knowledge Areas with the greatest impact on project success were Time, Risk, Scope, and Human Resources. However, these results have been found to be sensitive to the industry in which projects were undertaken. Differences among industries are described and discussed in the article.     

People management: developing and testing a measurement scale

Abstract

The central concept in this study is people management, referring to line managers’ implementation of HR practices and their leadership behaviour oriented at supporting the employees they supervise at work. In this study we conceptualize people management and develop a multidimensional scale to measure it from the perspectives of both employees and line managers. Using a Study 1/Study 2 design, including two-wave multilevel data from employees and line managers of a financial service provider, and cross-sectional data from teachers, educational support staff, and supervisors, we demonstrate the scale’s reliability and multidimensionality across samples and over time. We provide evidence of the convergent validity by showing that employees’ and line managers’ perceptions of people management are significantly related, and that people management is significantly related to transformational and transactional leadership. Also, we demonstrate that people management adds explained variance above and beyond transformational and transactional leadership in predicting team performance. We demonstrate criterion-related validity through people management’s relationship with job satisfaction, commitment, and work engagement. We discuss the implications of our measure for theory and research on people management, its antecedents, and its effects.     

Organizational change techniques: their present, their future

To help carry out their responsibility of managing rapid and often unexpected change, managers have an available set of techniques: organizational behavior modification, management by objectives, management development, organization development, management auditing, and a control cycle of planning, implementation, and control. Each of these has a format that species the procedures to be followed to bring about organizational change. Michael emphasizes that such formats are preferable to a haphazard, trial-and-error approach that may produce unanticipated results. In part because some techniques are newer than others, data from a research project of planning and control that Michael conducted show different rates of usage by a sample of Fortune 500 companies. The control cycle is the most widely used; organizational behavior modification the least widely used. The use of these techniques of organizational change is likely to vary in some ways and experience may bring about changes in the techniques. Michael concludes that the newer breed of managers who are versed in the social sciences, mathematics, and the computer are likely to spread new techniques in the organizational world.