Considering Call Center Developments in E-HRM

Abstract

Technology advances have dramatically affected the ways in which we manage and organize work. With new evolutions of technologically mediated systems, the development of electronic human resource management (e-HRM) practices becomes more accepted for many organizations. For example, on the one hand, organizations have been able to extend job searches to attract new employees from around the globe using the World Wide Web. This recruitment feature has provided matches of special skilled workers with employers and has lessened recruitment costs for other searches for less skilled positions by bringing potential candidates directly to the organization. On the other hand, HRIS technologies within operation structures such as call centers have been tightly integrated into e-HRM practices creating heavily defined performance management systems. The developments in the call center area specifically have resulted in an interesting convergence of HRIS and HR architectures to explore lessons learned and future directions in e-HRM. The purpose of this article is to first provide a background of the call center developments over the past 15 years in light of e-HRM. Specifically, a focus on the technological advancements in call center operations will be overlaid with the developments of e-HRM practices to reveal the ways in which both are integrated and implemented to create an end-to-end process. The second focus of this article is on the development of performance management HR practices such as electronic performance monitoring (EPM), e-coaching, and e-learning using HRIS integrations. Although in many ways this integrated e-HRM model has improved organization performance and effectiveness, there have also been other implications resulting in negative affects on performance outcomes such as turnover, job satisfaction, and customer satisfaction. So finally, this article will draw out the lessons learned from the call center model and e-HRM with a focus on the balance between human resource management practices and operational structural design.