Scholars and practitioners have given extensive consideration to the development of the HRM discipline. Over the past century, HRM was initially identified as employment management, and then personnel management (Hotchkiss, 1923), which was regarded as the execution of personnel policy to control employees (Donald & Donald, 1929). Personnel management included practices such as finding and training employees, salary administration, handling work-related issues and solving problems (Hotchkiss, 1923). It was basically concerned with “the optimum utilisation of human resources in pursuit of organisational goals” (Legge, 1995, p. 3). In other words, personnel management was visible at the shop floor level, where the motive was to attain productivity.
Due to the increasing attention given to social movements, public policies and product-labour market developments, behavioural aspects such as employee motivation and commitment were included under the scope of personnel management (Bratton & Jeffery, 2003). The 1960s and 1970s especially were acknowledged as the period of the new legislation on employment standards and quality of work life, which enhanced the application of personnel functions (Armstrong, 2003). This gradual development of personnel management in response to ever-changing organisations evolved the term HRM in the 1980s (Torrington, 1989). HRM involves processes and practices that aim to attract, develop and retain
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the human resources of an organisation (Guest, 1997). Increasing deregulation and competition during the 1980s required organisations to strategically manage human resources (Armstrong, 2009). In this regard, Storey (1995) defines HRM as “a distinctive approach to employment management which seeks to achieve competitive advantage through the strategic deployment of a highly committed and capable workforce using an array of cultural, structural and personnel techniques” (p. 5). In other words, HRM was used as a differentiation strategy – a combination of human resource techniques to strategically manage and retain talented and dedicated employees.
HRM was gradually redefined in terms of strategic human resource management (SHRM) in the late 1980s (Storey, 1989). The recognition of HRM changed from being merely an administrative and supportive function to a potentially strategic business operation and a source of competitive advantage (Huselid, Jackson, & Schuler, 1997). The driving force was to associate HRM with the strategic objective of the organisation by linking external considerations with HRM policies and practices (Schuler & Jackson, 1987; Wright & McMahan, 1992). Putting this in slightly different words, SHRM is concerned with the alignment of HRM functions with strategic imperatives in order to increase effectiveness and organisational performance (Boxall & Purcell, 2008). Hence, the last few decades witnessed a two- fold transformation, from personnel management to HRM and from HRM to SHRM, as indicated by Schuler and Jackson (1999).
From the era of personnel management through to SHRM the aim was to utilise people skills to improve organisational performance (Bolton & Houlihan, 2007). In
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striving to become a strategic partner with top management and its emphasis on enforcing productivity and profitability, it has been argued that HRM lost sight of its roots in employee welfare (Pinnington, Macklin, & Campbell, 2007). Guest (2007) argues that HRM considers employees as assets “to be managed, utilized, or possibly exploited to improve organisational performance” (p. 52). Thus, HRM has been often criticised as a rhetorical and manipulative tool to utilise employees (Guest, 1997; Legge, 1995).
Due to the increasing complexity of managing, retaining and motivating human resources, different HRM concepts have been developed. In this regard, Storey (1989) differentiates the ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ approach of HRM. The hard HRM, which is attributed to the Michigan model developed by Fombrun, Tichy and Devanna (1984), considers employees as an instrument to achieve organisational goals. It emphasises the quantitative, calculative and business-strategic approach of managing human resource in the same rational way as any other resource (Armstrong, 2009). Consequently, this model has been strongly criticised on the grounds that it is a reiteration of management controls under a new name which prioritises rational profit maximising (Legge, 1995). Guest (1999) also claimed that the model views employees as resource to be used for the organisational interest and does not consider the wellbeing concerns of employees.
On the contrary, the ‘soft’ approach, originally associated with the Harvard model (Beer, Spector, Lawrence, Quinn Mills, & Walton, 1984), reflected the view that employees are assets. The success of an organisation depends on its employees, therefore they should be provided with a high quality of life, valuable rewards and
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training-development to achieve employee commitment and wellbeing (Druker, White, Hegewisch, & Mayne, 1996; Guest, 1987). It has, however, been debated that the soft HRM model appears humanistic on the surface but it limits the ethical application of HRM. This is because the interests of the organisation will always prevail over those of individual employees (Truss, Hope Hailey, McGovern, & Stiles, 1997). The soft approach to HRM is often considered “a wolf in sheep’s
clothes” (Greenwood, 2002, p. 272), and manipulative management in the name of paternalism (Legge, 1995). Thus, the reality of soft HRM is also hard as it does not completely manage the wellbeing concerns of employees.
Another innovative HR concept is high-performance work systems. This deals with a ‘bundle’ of HR practices which aims to maximise productivity along with employee competencies and commitment (Appelbaum, Bailey, Berg, & Kalleberg, 2000). High-performance work systems includes practices such as employee involvement, team work, training and growth of employees, employment security, autonomous work teams, quality circles, empowerment, flat structure and innovative compensation (Becker & Huselid, 1998; Harley, 2002). Yet the focus remains on organisational outcomes and employees’ concerns are not given priority. It may look like a mutual gain model (Appelbaum et al., 2000); albeit, it is also considered a sophisticated method for the implicit manipulation of the workforce (Legge, 1995), which fails to incorporate ethical and social issues related to employees.
Within the literature of high-performance work systems, another approach is high- commitment work systems. This is often considered similar to high-performance work systems; although some scholars prefer to differentiate it on the grounds that it
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emphasises individual wellbeing along with organisational outcomes (Farndale, Hope Hailey, & Kelliher, 2010). High-commitment work systems comprise any sets of HRM policies and procedures that influence employee commitment, such as team working, functional flexibility, employee involvement and skill-based pay (Wood, 1996). However, some practices such as team work may also negatively affect employees’ commitment, trust and satisfaction (Boxall & Macky, 2009). In other words, there is no logical connection between organisational outcomes and individual wellbeing in such innovative approaches (Legge, 1995), but there may be tension in balancing both organisation and individual interests (Kramar, 2006).
Hence, there is significant development in HRM discipline in the last few decades. Nonetheless, HRM and its innovative concepts are frequently criticised for their foremost concern for organisational productivity (Legge, 1995), with least emphasis on wellbeing (Guest, 2007) and the ethical concern of employees (Pinnington et al., 2007). Guest (2002) suggests that organisations should consider employees’ wellbeing and satisfaction as ‘ends’ in the implementation of HRM practices. Similarly, it is advocated that HR professionals should systematically integrate ethical inputs into policy design, and consider human rights and justice in the implementation of such policies (Legge, 1995).
This growing attention to the ethical concerns of employees has given rise to employee-centred concepts such as ethical HRM (Greenwood, 2002; Winstanley & Woodall, 2000) and socially responsible HRM (Becker, 2011; Bierema & D'Abundo, 2004; Ezzedeen, Hyde, & Laurin, 2006; Shen, 2011). These concepts advocate integrating ethical concerns in HR policies and functions. Nevertheless, there is a
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lack of any standard framework to incorporate ethical concerns in HRM systems (Winstanley & Woodall, 2000). Furthermore, without formal structures and frameworks these concepts often fail to attach employees’ ethical considerations to the strategic orientation of the organisation (Schoemaker, Nijhof, & Jonker, 2006). Therefore, Guest and Woodrow (2012) urge a strong system to incorporate ethical concerns for employees in HRM.
It is proposed that the integration of CSR in HRM may help to value the ethical- social concerns of employees in organisations (Orlitzky & Swanson, 2006; Shen, 2011). The alignment of CSR principles seeks to incorporate the ethical issues of employees in HRM polies and practices (Boyd & Gessner, 2013), and helps evolve socially responsible HR practices (Mason & Simmons, 2011; Shen, 2011). Despite such a promising view on the implications of CSR for HRM (Cohen, 2010), the HR literature has seldom attempted to apply ethical theories and CSR directly to HRM practices (Greenwood, 2002). How CSR can be aligned with HRM is relatively unknown due to the lack of conceptual clarity and adequate empirical support. This study, in an attempt to investigate the implications of CSR for HRM, would help to address this research gap.