HR Framework for Winning in Economic Upswing: Content Analysis

Abstract

“In recession, HR should coach leaders to make prudent business decisions. Some of this means redesigning HR practices.…………Finally, HR needs to conceive of the future after the recession so that their organization is better positioned to go forward.” (David Ulrich, 2009) After the worst hit recession since great depression, world economy is on recovery phase. Asian economies are fastest in this trajectory of recovery. In this recent scenario, organizations are witnessing that along with the opportunities, new challenges are unfolding. During the crisis and slowdown, mostly organizations adopted the strategy of cost cutting, resulting in far reaching implications on people in the organizations. Human resources were the most affected with the crisis and the strategy of cost cutting during recession. Today with another phase in business cycle, again the key issue in front of the organizations is people issue resulting from broken psychological contract. The purpose of the paper is to outline the challenges unfolding during recovery in managing employees. Based on the content analysis and interview with HR professionals, researcher makes an attempt to create conceptual framework of HR strategies to manage employees during recovery which can be a source to consider in making human resource decisions in organizations in contemporary time.