Mind the Intended‐Implemented Gap: Understanding Employees’ Perceptions of HRM

This study aims to shed light on the implementation of HR practices as a key piece of the human resource management (HRM)–performance puzzle. Although the literature suggests that discrepancies between the organization's intended and implemented HR practices are essential to understanding employees’ perceptions of and reactions to HRM, little attention has been devoted to this issue. Drawing upon a multiple‐case study of German health and social services organizations, we therefore explore the linkages (and potential gaps) between intended, implemented, and perceived HR practices. Our study provides new insights into the underlying mechanisms of this relationship, highlighting an organization's ability to leverage its resources as playing a crucial moderating role in implementing intended HR practices, while employees’ expectations of HRM moderate the link between implemented and perceived HR practices. We advance a set of propositions that contributes to a more nuanced, multilevel understanding of the complex phenomenon of HRM implementation. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Possible consequences of nutritional improvements for the economic development

Studies of the relationship of nutrition and economic development have hitherto largely focused on the question how the state of nutrition has changed in consequence of economic developments. The analysis concentrated on the “passive role of nutrition”. In the following article the question is reversed: what possibilities exist for influencing the development process by measures of nutrition policy?     

What determines the success or failure of german bilateral financial aid?

This paper explores the causes of success or failure of German bilateral financial aid, using data on 1,003 Financial Cooperation (FC) projects and programs performed by the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW). The authors find that the success or failure of financial aid loans disbursed under FC depends on project characteristics and macroeconomic conditions in the recipient country. Supervision time is also highly negatively correlated with the probability of success. While the relationship disappears once endogeneity is taken into account, the existence of an institutional bias toward a disproportionate allocation of supervision resources in unsuccessful projects cannot be rejected. These results show that some recent evidence on multilateral policybased aid holds also for the case of German bilateral project-based aid.