GUEST EDITORIAL. Chris Brewster School of Management, Henley Business School, University of Reading, Reading, UK, and

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1 The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at wwwemeraldinsightcom/ htm GUEST EDITORIAL In search of balance managing : an overview of the issues Paul Boselie Human Resource Studies, Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands Chris Brewster School of Management, Henley Business School, University of Reading, Reading, UK, and Jaap Paauwe Human Resource Studies, Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands 461 Abstract Purpose The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the human resource management (HRM) literature that builds up to our current concern with dualities, paradoxes, ambiguities, and balance issues; and to introduce the six papers in this special issue on managing in HRM Design/methodology/approach The paper presents a literature review taking a historical look at the development of the HR field up to the present awareness of the complexity of the concept and practice Findings Almost 30 years on, is being found now increasing evidence of, paradoxes, and ambiguities entailed in HRM Research limitations/implications The literature review starts with the personnel management (PM)-HRM and industrial relations-hrm debates in the 1980s Earlier work on traditional PM is not debated in this paper Practical implications After reading this general review practitioners might gain more insights in the potential tensions, ambiguities, and conflicts of interest that are characteristic for the field in practice Originality/value First, this paper highlights the interest of the pluralist perspective in contrast to the dominating unitarist approaches in contemporary human resource studies Second, this overview presents methodological challenges for example, with regard to multi-level and multi-actor research Finally, the paper presents alternative theories for future research including new institutionalism, strategic balance theory, and health psychology theories Keywords Human resource management, Human resource strategies Paper type General review The authors would like to thank the convenors of the Dutch HRM Network Conference 2007 for selecting the best papers of their tracks, the authors of which are invited to submit a paper to this special issue, and the authors would also like to thank the reviewers of the papers: Nick Bacon, Michal Biron, Neil Conway, Lei Delsen, Paul Evans, Elaine Farndale, Fred Huijgen, Paul Jansen, Karen Jehn, Jan De Kok, Jan Kees Looise, Eric Molleman, Willem De Nijs, Riccardo Peccei, Rob Poell, John Purcell, Karin Sanders, Helen Shipton, Luc Sels, Lidewey van der Sluis, Paul Sparrow, Juani Swart, and Marc Van Veldhoven Personnel Review Vol 38 No 5, 2009 pp q Emerald Group Publishing Limited DOI /

2 PR 38,5 462 The issues of duality, paradox, ambiguity, and balance dominate the human resource literature Arguably, it was Legge (1978) who started this debate back in 1978 with her focus on human resource ambiguities and in her later work on rhetorics and realities in human resource management (HRM; Legge, 1995, 2005) Almost 30 years on we are finding increasing evidence of, paradoxes, and ambiguities entailed in HRM today This special issue will hopefully further the debates in this field, encouraging a constructive review theories The papers in the special issue were all presented at the Dutch HRM Network Conference 2007, hosted by Tilburg University, Department of HR Studies The theme of this two-yearly international conference was: In search of balance managing We were very pleased by Personnel Review s willingness to sponsor one of the awards at this conference and to offer the opportunity for a special issue incorporating papers presented in different tracks of this conference The aim of this introduction article is twofold First, we provide a brief overview of the HRM literature that builds up to our current concern with dualities, paradoxes, ambiguities, and balance issues We do this by taking a (perhaps not entirely) historical look at the development of the field up to the present awareness of the complexity of the concept and practice Second, we briefly introduce the six papers in this special issue and their linkages to the special issue theme HRM versus personnel management, and industrial relations The elaboration of academic theories in the 1980s led to a discussion on the nature Two main questions in this early debate were: (1) Is HRM different from personnel management (PM)? (2) Is HRM different from industrial relations (IR) models? In theory a distinction was made between HRM and PM (Guest, 1987) However, there was little or no empirical evidence from practice that people management had radically changed with the emergence of the HRM field (Legge, 1995) Guest s (1987) overview of HRM and PM is valuable because it shed light on the development of a new people management paradigm we now call HRM In its best practice form it is, he argued, characterized by a long-term scope, a heavy emphasis on employee commitment, special attention to self-control, a unitarist employee relations perspective, an organic systems approach, a crucial role for line managers and maximum utilization of human assets This is in contrast to the earlier PM approaches that Guest (1987) characterized by a short-term scope, an emphasis on compliance, external controls, a pluralist employee relations perspective, a bureaucratic/mechanistic systems approach, PM by personnel managers, and a main focus on cost minimization Storey (1992) gives an overview of the distinction between PM and IR on the one hand and the emerging HRM concept on the other hand He also perceives a shift from a pluralist to a unitarist employee perspective, from personnel departments to HRM enacted by line managers, from rules and procedures to business orientation, and from control to commitment The managerialism in the emergence in the 1980s has overthrown the industrial democracy perspectives of the previous PM and IR approaches The unitarist employee perspective, often represented as what is good for the employee is good for the employer, and the other way around, is probably one of the major changes caused by the HRM transition Recently, a growing number of authors dispute this unitarist perspective, stressing the often conflicting interests of employees

3 and employers (Boxall and Purcell, 2008; Janssens and Steayaert, 2009; Keenoy, 1997; Paauwe, 2004) Soft and hard HRM The introduction in the 1980s also led to the distinction between two early HRM best practice approaches: the Harvard approach (Beer et al, 1984) and the Michigan approach (Fombrun et al, 1984) The Harvard approach also called the developmental humanism model by Legge (1995) is centered on the development of all aspects of an organizational context that will encourage and even direct managerial behaviour with regard to people The approach also acknowledges multiple goals as long-term consequences of an organization s actions: individual well-being, organizational effectiveness, and societal well-being The Michigan approach (dubbed the utilitarian instrumentalism model by Legge (1995)) is primarily based on principles that stem from strategic management The model is much more shareholder oriented and pays little or no attention to what Beer et al (1984) call situational factors The Harvard approach is also known as the soft HRM model, in contrast to the Michigan approach that is also called hard HRM model The soft model is more geared towards employee development for all and based on the premise of a stakeholder approach The hard model is built on employee incentives towards optimal performance (eg performance related pay) and based on a shareholders perspective 463 Control and commitment HR systems The contrast between soft, developmental HR approach and the hard, utilitarian HR approach can also be found in Walton s (1985) distinction between commitment and control strategies Arthur (1994) was one of the first who applied Walton s (1985) high-commitment and direct control propositions to the field His control HRM systems are characterized by centralization, little or no employee participation, limited employee development, individual performance related pay, and direct supervision of employees activities In contrast, the commitment HRM systems are characterized by decentralization of responsibilities, high levels of employee involvement, extensive employee development opportunities, team performance related pay, high-wages, and no direct supervision Empirical research in the HRM and performance debate of the 1990s supports the proposition that high-commitment HRM systems outperform control HRM systems (Arthur, 1994) The findings suggest the relevance of employee involvement in decision making and employee development for creating organizational suggest, in contrast to traditional direct supervision of employees and an emphasis on individual performance (Heinsman et al, 2008; Luna-Arocas and Camps, 2008) Rhetorics and realities Legge s (1995) book is entitled: Human Resource Management Rhetorics and Realities In the mid 1990s the field was characterized and dominated by conceptual studies on the nature and its potential added value to organizations, employees, and societies What about HRM in practice? Was not the field just merely rhetorics without empirical evidence supporting the previous models? One new stream emerged with the publications of Arthur (1994), Huselid (1995) and MacDuffie (1995) in what is now called the HRM and performance debate This resulted

4 PR 38,5 464 in numerous special issues in international academic journals, including the Academy of Management Journal (1996), Industrial Relations (1996), the International Journal of Human Resource Management (1997, 2001), Human Resource Management (1997), and the Human Resource Management Journal (1999), and, and over 100 empirical articles in leading international journals (Boselie et al, 2005) And the debate is ongoing (Paauwe, 2009) The majority of empirical research in the HRM and performance debate takes a single-country, best-practice view, builds on unitarist notions built on the interests of the organizations managers or share-holders, lacks a critical attitude towards effects on other stakeholders and mainly focuses on the core employees (managers and knowledge workers) of organizations (Janssens and Steayaert, 2009; Keegan and Boselie, 2006; Paauwe and Boselie, 2005) Overall, there is a general agreement that HRM can have a positive impact on performance (Paauwe, 2009), although there is a general lack of attention to potential negative outcomes, for example, those caused by labour intensification (Godard, 2001; Ramsey et al, 2000) The early 1990s introduced a contrasting stream in the field that received less attention (Keegan and Boselie, 2006): a more critical school of thought These critical HRM approaches examine, for instance, HRM (which they usually mean one of the best practice approaches) from an employee perspective, which they argue is very different to a managerial one (eg Janssens and Steayaert, 2009; Keenoy, 1999) Generally, they draw on detailed case studies or discourse analysis and in doing so they tend to point to the competing objectives and practices that are subsumed within the term HRM Evans (1999, p 333), for example, argues that ambiguity is the reactive face of the HRM subject to the propositions of duality For him, ambiguities are the reaction of individuals to tensions Legge (2005, p 64) suggested that HR managers see themselves as victims of ambiguity between capitalism and patriarchy Keenoy (1999) is a critical HRM scholar who has made valuable conceptual and empirical contributions highlighting HRM s normative underlying assumptions and its managerial dominance The HRM and performance stream of research and the critical HRM stream represent two completely different worlds that, generally, have little interaction In a literature study Keegan and Boselie (2006) show the lack of impact of critical HRM studies on mainstream HRM research The editorial response to the contributions by Paauwe (2009) and Janssens and Steayaert (2009) in the point-counter-point contributions in the Journal of Management Studies is that the two fields main stream HRM and performance and the critical management school in HRM seem to be growing closer together Both Paauwe (2009) and Janssens and Steayaert (2009) point to a need for small-scale, contextual studies and a more inclusive, value-based understanding of employees, managers and other stakeholders of the organization Pluralist versus unitarist approaches The introduction in the 1980s and the empirical focus on the added value in the 1990s emphasized the dominance of the unitarist approach The high-performance work systems approaches, supported by the AMO-theory[1] (Bailey, 1993), built mainly on the notion that certain HRM practices such as sophisticated recruitment and selection, extensive employee development, individual pay for performance, employee involvement in decision making, performance evaluation and teamwork, are in the interest of both the employee and the employer

5 Similar critiques can be targeted at much of the HRM research in specific fields Thus, the international HRM research, though a thin strand of it has always been concerned with the responses of expatriates to being moved around the world, has generally taken a unitarist approach, heavily focused on the assumption that what is of interest is effective people management (Brewster, 2007; Dowling et al, 2008; Harzing and van Ruysseveldt, 2004) Guest (1999) and Purcell (1999) were amongst the first to emphasize the lack of attention to the individual employee and the potential negative impact of high-performance work systems on employees, causing dissatisfaction, stress, burnout, and fatigue The empirical work by Ramsey et al (2000) and Godard (2001) supports these notions and led to a renewed attention to a pluralist perspective Paauwe (2004) builds on this pluralist perspective, stressing HRM s duality in its focus on added value and economic rationality versus moral values and relational rationality A more balanced HRM approach takes into account the economic side of organizing and the human side of organizing Sometimes these mechanisms coincide and in some cases these mechanisms are conflicting This is typical for the field in both theory and practice (Paauwe, 2004) However, the majority research (as, for example, represented by Becker and Huselid, 2006; Combs et al, 2006) is still mainly built on the unitarist perspective The pluralist perspectives in HRM appear to be much more supported outside the USA (Brewster, 2007; Hesketh and Fleetwood, 2006) 465 Multi-level and multi-actor issues The new millennium for the field has seen a focus on methodological aspects within HRM research Gerhart et al (2000) show the reliability relevance of multiple raters in HRM research and reveal the differences in perceptions between HRM respondents and line management respondents Wright and Nishii (2007) make a distinction between three different types of HR practices: (1) intended HRM practices reflecting HRM strategy and policies, often designed and initiated by HRM professionals; (2) actual HRM practices reflecting the enacted practices by line managers; and (3) perceived HMR practices reflecting the employee perceptions of the actual HRM in an organization The perceptions professionals, line managers, top managers, and employees not only differ because of their position/perspective, but also because of different interests Wright and Boswell (2002) show the relevance of multi-level issues in HRM research The majority of previous research is on either the organization level focused on multiple HRM practices or on individual employee level focused on one single HRM practice (Boselie et al, 2005) There is a lack research on: single HRM practices at the organization level, for example, with regard to the impact of performance related pay on firm performance; multiple HRM practices at the individual employee level in line with psychological contract research; HRM research into practices above the organizational level at the country, sector or size level;

6 PR 38,5 466 research comparing HRM concepts, policies, and practices between national business systems; and multiple level research looking at the impact on employees and the aggregated effects at the organization level Broadly speaking the later named research is more challenging because of methodological issues that need to be solved (Croon and van Veldhoven, 2007) Multi-level research in HRM in particular almost automatically calls for a pluralist perspective taking into account potential different interests and perceptions of those involved (employees, line managers, HRM professionals, top managers, and employee representatives) and potentially conflicting or opposing outcomes, for example, labour productivity versus employee well-being (Peccei, 2004) Competing theoretical frameworks Strategic management theories, including strategic contingency approaches (Porter, 1985), stakeholder theory (Freeman, 1985), and the resource-based view (Barney, 1991) have dominated the HRM research agenda for almost two decades (Boselie et al, 2005) However, these theoretical frameworks often neglect the individual employee perspective Therefore, new multi-level research arenas employing, for example, psychological contract theory (Rousseau, 1995) and social exchange theory (Blau, 1964), are attracting more attention However, the strategic management theories and the psychological theories can be conflicting and cause new challenges for further theoretical development in the field Psychological theories have mostly found their way to the HRM field through research in organizational behaviour (OB), a discipline closely related to HRM (reflected at the Academy of Management in the close connection between the HR Division and the OB Division) But there are other sciences that can serve as inspiration for alternative approaches in future HRM research: First, new institutionalism (DiMaggio and Powell, 1983; Zucker, 1977) has found its way into HRM as an alternative for analyzing the shaping in different organizational contexts (Paauwe and Boselie, 2003) A further extension of new institutionalism is the strategic balance theory (Deephouse, 1999; Oliver, 1997) focused on blending market and institutional mechanisms in an attempt to find balanced approaches in organizations The strategic balance theory is applied on organizational level The developing comparative HRM field has used cultural theories (Easterby-Smith et al, 1995; Sparrow et al, 1994; Tayeb, 1988) as well as institutionalism, often built on the business systems or varieties of capitalism literature (Brookes et al, 2005; Farndale et al, 2008; Gooderham et al, 1999; Thelen, 2001), but increasingly adopting the more critical institutionalism (Brewster et al, 2008a, b) Second, health psychological theories (Bakker et al, 2004) represent balanced approaches on the individual employee level paying special attention to job demands and job resources These models blend the organization s goals and the individual employee well-being in terms of stress, burnout and vitality Future HRM research could benefit from strategic balance theory on how to create organizational agility in combination with input from the health psychological theories on how to create employee vitality within the organization (Table I)

7 1 HRM versus personnel management 2 HRM versus IR 3 The Harvard approach versus the Michigan approach 4 soft HRM versus hard HRM 5 Stakeholder approaches versus shareholder approaches 6 Multi-dimensional performance versus financial performance 7 Commitment HRM systems versus control HRM systems 8 Rhetorics versus realities 9 Pluralist approaches versus unitarist approaches 10 Multi-level versus single level 11 Multi-actor versus single respondent 12 Longitudinal research design versus cross-sectional research design 13 Qualitative methods versus quantitative methods 14 Perceived HRM practices versus actual HRM practices 15 Actual HRM practices versus intended HRM practices 16 Psychological theories versus strategic management theories 17 The employee versus the employer 18 People versus business 19 Best fit versus best practice 20 Convergence versus divergence 467 Table I In search of balance Overview of this special issue This special issue on In search of balance managing contains six empirical papers Three papers are based on quantitative data and the other three use qualitative data All the papers can be characterized by dualities in HRM for example, reflected in contrasting economic and institutional theory (Boon et al, 2009; van Gestel and Nyberg, 2009), individual employee level and organization level analysis (Kroon et al, 2009; van Woerkom and Croon, 2009), perceptions professionals and perceptions of line managers (Bondarouk et al, 2009) and different types of flexibility in the shaping of the employment relationship (van der Meer and Ringdal, 2009) Overall, multi-level analysis (including for example, individual employees and organizational level data), multi-actor approaches (using input from different stakeholders such as employees, line managers, employee representatives, and HRM professionals) and a more pluralist perspective on HRM are key to the papers presented in this special issue Bondarouk et al (2009) study the implementation innovation using data from HR professionals and line managers in a construction company The results support the previous notions of Gerhart et al (2000) and Wright and Nishii (2007) on perception differences between HRM respondents and line management respondents Another interesting finding relates to the general lack of attention in the field to strategy implementation (Becker and Huselid, 2006) Strategy implementation is crucial for HRM innovation, emphasizing the relevance of intended practices and actual practices Boon et al s (2009) paper focuses on the institutional alignment between HRM and the institutional environment of an organization The findings of their paper support a more balanced approach for the shaping in organizations as suggested by Deephouse (1999) in the strategic balance theory The findings also suggest that organizations have a certain degree of leeway, human agency, and strategic choice in response to institutional pressures

8 PR 38,5 468 The paper by Kroon et al (2009) studies the multi-level effects of high-performance work practices on potential negative HRM outcomes, in particular employee burnout Their results support a critical employee exploitation oriented perspective on high-performance work practices comparable to previous work by Ramsey et al (2000) and Godard (2001) The findings are in line with a more pluralist perspective that acknowledges the sometimes conflicting interests of employers and employees The paper by van der Meer and Ringdal (2009) builds on a large national dataset Their study is focused on the impact of flexibility practices on organizational performance The findings in this research show a balance between the application of numerical flexibility practices and functional flexibility practices In contrast to the theoretical proposition that numerical flexibility is automatically linked to cost reduction and functional flexibility to quality/differentiation, the findings in this study support a mixed picture The paper by van Gestel and Nyberg (2009) focuses on the translation of national policies into HRM practices taking into account the institutional perspective and its impact on organizations and HRM as suggested by DiMaggio and Powell (1983) Their findings suggest a distinction between national policy rhetorics and HRM realities perceived by HR managers (Legge, 1995) Finally, the paper by van Woerkom and Croon (2009) focuses on the relationship between team learning activities and team performance using a large dataset with more than 600 employees and 88 teams Their analysis includes input from both managers and employees The findings suggest differences between team-member performance ratings and managerial performance ratings Another finding shows that different team learning influences particular aspects of team learning Their paper is in line with a more pluralist perspective (Paauwe, 2004) suggesting that team members are mainly interested in creating a productive and pleasant atmosphere, while managers are primarily interested in output performance Note 1 AMO-theory represents the idea that specific human resource practices that enhance abilities, motivation, and opportunity to participate will lead to discretionary effort of employees and better firm performance (Boxall and Purcell, 2008) References Arthur, JB (1994), Effects of human resource systems on manufacturing performance and turnover, Academy of Management Journal, Vol 37 No 3, pp Bailey, T (1993), Organizational innovation in the apparel industry, Industrial Relations, Vol 32, pp Bakker, AB, Demerouti, E and Verbeke, W (2004), Using the job demands-resources model to predict burnout and performance, Human Resource Management, Vol 43 No 1, pp Barney, JB (1991), Firm resources and sustained competitive advantage, Journal of Management, Vol 17 No 1, pp Becker, B and Huselid, MA (2006), Strategic human resource management: where do we go from here?, Journal of Management, Vol 32 No 6, pp Beer, M, Spector, B, Lawrence, PR, Mills, DQ and Walton, RE (1984), Human Assets, Free Press, New York, NY Blau, PM (1964), Exchange and Power in Social Life, Wiley, New York, NY

9 Bondarouk, T, Looise, JK and Lempsink, B (2009), Framing the implementation innovation: HR professionals vs line managers in a construction company, Personnel Review, Vol 38 No 5 Boon, C, Paauwe, J, Boselie, P and Den Hartog, D (2009), Institutional pressures and HRM: developing institutional fit, Personnel Review, Vol 38 No 5 Boselie, P, Dietz, G and Boon, C (2005), Commonalities and contradictions in HRM and performance research, Human Resource Management Journal, Vol 15 No 3, pp Boxall, P and Purcell, J (2008), Strategy and Human Resource Management, 2nd ed, Palgrave MacMillan, New York, NY Brewster, C (2007), Comparative HRM: European views and perspectives, International Journal of Human Resource Management, Vol 18 No 5, pp Brewster, C, Sparrow, P and Dickmann, M (Eds) (2008a), International Human Resource Management: Contemporary Issues in Europe, 2nd ed, Routledge, London Brewster, C, Wood, G and Brookes, M (2008b), Similarity, isomorphism or duality: recent survey evidence on the HRM policies of multinational corporations, British Journal of Management, Vol 19 No 4, pp Brookes, M, Brewster, C and Wood, G (2005), Social relations, firms and societies: a study of institutional embeddedness, International Sociology, Vol 20 No 4, pp Combs, C, Yongmei, L, Hall, A and Ketchen, D (2006), How much do high-performance work practices matter? A meta-analysis of their effects on organizational performance, Personnel Psychology, Vol 59 No 3, pp Croon, MA and van Veldhoven, MJ (2007), Predicting group-level outcome variables from variables measured at the individual level: a latent variable multilevel model, Psychological Methods, Vol 12 No 1, pp Deephouse, DL (1999), To be different, or be the same? It s a question (and theory) of strategic balance, Strategic Management Journal, Vol 20, pp DiMaggio, PJ and Powell, WW (1983), The iron cage revisited: institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields, American Sociological Review, Vol 48 No 2, pp Dowling, PJ, Festing, M and Engle, AD (2008), International Human Resource Management: People in a Multinational Context, 5th ed, Cengage Learning, London Easterby-Smith, M, Malina, D and Yuan, L (1995), How culture-sensitive is HRM? A comparative analysis of practice in Chinese and UK companies, International Journal of Human Resource Management, Vol 6 No 1, pp Evans, PAL (1999), HRM on the edge: a duality perspective, Organization, Vol 6 No 2, pp Farndale, E, Brewster, C and Poutsma, E (2008), Co-ordinated vs liberal market HRM: the impact of institutionalisation on multinational firms, International Journal of Human Resource Management, Vol 19 No 11, pp Fombrun, C, Tichy, NM and Devanna, MA (Eds) (1984), Strategic Human Resource Management, Wiley, New York, NY Freeman, E (1985), Strategic Management: A Stakeholder Approach, Pitman, Boston, MA Gerhart, B, Wright, PM, McMahan, GC and Snell, SA (2000), Measurement error in research on human resources and firm performance: how much error is there and how does it influence effect size estimates, Personnel Psychology, Vol 53 No 4, pp

10 PR 38,5 470 Godard, J (2001), Beyond the high-performance paradigm? An analysis of variation in Canadian managerial perceptions of reform programme effectiveness, British Journal of Industrial Relations, Vol 39 No 1, pp Gooderham, P, Nordhaug, O and Ringdal, K (1999), Institutional and rational determinants of organizational practices: human resource management in European firms, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol 44, pp Guest, DE (1987), Human resource management and industrial relations, Journal of Management Studies, Vol 24 No 5, pp Guest, DE (1999), Human resource management: the workers verdict, Human Resource Management Journal, Vol 9 No 3, pp 5-25 Harzing, A-W and van Ruysseveldt, J (Eds) (2004), International Human Resource Management, 2nd ed, Sage, London Heinsman, H, De Hoogh, AHB, Koopman, PL and van Muijen, JJ (2008), Commitment, control, and the use of competency management, Personnel Review, Vol 37 No 6, pp Hesketh, A and Fleetwood, S (2006), Beyond measuring the human resources management-organizational performance link: applying critical realist meta-theory, Organization, Vol 13 No 5, pp Huselid, MA (1995), The impact of human resource management practices on turnover, productivity, and corporate financial performance, Academy of Management Journal, Vol 38, pp Janssens, M and Steayaert, C (2009), HRM and performance: a plea for reflexivity in HRM studies, Journal of Management Studies, Vol 43 No 1, pp Keegan, A and Boselie, P (2006), The lack of dissensus inspired analysis on developments in the field of human resource management, Journal of Management Studies, Vol 43 No 7, pp Keenoy, T (1997), Review article: HRMism and the languages of re-presentation, Journal of Management Studies, Vol 34 No 5, pp Keenoy, T (1999), HRM as hologram: a polemic, Journal of Management Studies, Vol 36 No 1, pp 1-23 Kroon, B, van de Voorde, K and van Veldhoven, M (2009), Cross-level effects of high-performance work practices on burn-out: two counteracting mediating mechanisms compared, Personnel Review, Vol 38 No 5 Legge, K (1978), Power, Innovation, and Problem-Solving in Personnel Management, McGraw-Hill, New York, NY Legge, K (1995), Human Resource Management, Rhetorics and Realities, MacMillan Business, London Legge, K (2005), Human Resource Management: Rhetorics and Realities, Palgrave MacMillan, Basingstoke Luna-Arocas, R and Camps, J (2008), A model of high performance work practices and turnover intentions, Personnel Review, Vol 37 No 1, pp MacDuffie, JP (1995), Human resource bundles and manufacturing performance: organisational logic and flexible production systems in the world auto industry, Industrial and Labour Relations Review, Vol 48, pp Oliver, C (1997), Sustainable competitive advantage: combining institutional and resource-based views, Strategic Management Journal, Vol 18 No 9, pp Paauwe, J (2004), HRM and Performance: Achieving Long-Term Viability, Oxford University Press, Oxford

11 Paauwe, J (2009), HRM and performance: achievements, methodological issues and prospects, Journal of Management Studies, Vol 46 No 1, pp Paauwe, J and Boselie, P (2003), Challenging strategic HRM and the relevance of the institutional setting, Human Resource Management Journal, Vol 13 No 3, pp Paauwe, J and Boselie, P (2005), HRM and performance: what s next?, Human Resource Management Journal, Vol 15 No 4, pp Peccei, R (2004), Human resource management and the search for the happy workplace, inaugural address, January 15, Erasmus Research Institute of Management, Rotterdam Porter, ME (1985), Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance, Free Press, New York, NY Purcell, J (1999), Best practice and best fit: chimera or cul-de-sac?, Human Resource Management Journal, Vol 9 No 3, pp Ramsey, H, Scholarios, D and Harley, B (2000), Employees and high-performance work systems: testing inside the black box, British Journal of Industrial Relations, Vol 38 No 4, pp Rousseau, DM (1995), Psychological Contracts in Organizations: Understanding Written and Unwritten Agreements, Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA Sparrow, P, Schuler, R and Jackson, S (1994), Convergence or Divergence: Human Resource Practices for Competitive Advantage Worldwide, International Journal of Human Resource Management, Vol 5 No 2, pp Storey, J (1992), Developments in the Management of Human Resources, Blackwell, Oxford Tayeb, MH (1988), Organizations and National Culture, Sage, London Thelen, K (2001), Varieties of labor policies in developed democracies, in Hall, P and Soskice, D (Eds), Varieties of Capitalism: The Institutional Basis of Competitive Advantage, Oxford University Press, Oxford van der Meer, PH and Ringdal, K (2009), Flexibility practices, wages and productivity: evidence from Norway, Personnel Review, Vol 38 No 5 van Gestel, N and Nyberg, D (2009), Translating national policy changes into local HRM practices, Personnel Review, Vol 38 No 5 van Woerkom, M and Croon, MA (2009), The relationship between team learning activities and team performance, Personnel Review, Vol 38 No 5 Walton, RE (1985), From control to commitment in the workplace, Harvard Business Review, Vol 62, pp Wright, PM and Boswell, WR (2002), Desegregating HRM: a review and synthesis of micro and macro human resource management research, Journal of Management, Vol 28 No 3, pp Wright, PM and Nishii, LH (2007), Strategic HRM and organizational behavior: integrating multiple levels of analysis, Working Paper No 07-03, CAHRS at Cornell Universityo, Ithaca, NY Zucker, L (1977), The role of institutionalism in cultural persistence, American Sociological Review, Vol 42, pp Corresponding author Paul Boselie can be contacted at: jppefboselie@uvtnl To purchase reprints of this article please reprints@emeraldinsightcom Or visit our web site for further details: wwwemeraldinsightcom/reprints