Capital Readiness Research Articles

Managing multiple forms of strategic training fit through the Balanced Scorecard

Although the literature recognizes training as an essential driver of organizational effectiveness, little is still known about how to explicitly focus and align training to organizational strategic priorities. This note proposes a model that bridges the strategic human resource management (SHRM) literature and the Balanced Scorecard (BSC) literature – which is one of the most widely recognized strategic performance evaluation approaches intended to foster organizational alignment by translating the firm's strategy into a multidimensional set of financial and non‐financial measures. After having briefly discussed the main differences between the return on investment (ROI) model, which represents one of the major attempt to make training strategic within the existing evaluation research, and the BSC model applied to training management, this note highlights multiple forms of strategic training fit and suggests how to manage training through various scenarios of BSC development. Specifically, the note illustrates four forms of strategic fit – the vertical fit, the horizontal inter‐functional fit, the horizontal intra‐functional fit and the human capital readiness – and discusses their pursuit in terms of six scenarios of training management through the BSC. The note expands some exploratory empirical evidence on the feasibility and usefulness of training scorecards (i.e. the application of the BSC to training) in order to develop some theoretical insights and practical guidance on how they can be leveraged to foster the strategic alignment of training.

Design and Implementation of the Human Capital Report: The Case of the Biomedical Branch of the University of Florence

The purpose of this paper is to develop a Human Capital Report focused on the competency profile of the key employees. Employing the case study of Biomedical Branch of University of Florence, we have designed a strategy map centred on key stakeholders: students, university, didactic and research centres, businesses. Furthermore, we have designed a model for the management of human resources, integrating two different approaches: individual and organic. On the basis of this model, semi-structured interview was carried out to obtain rich data on the current competences of key employees, divided in three personal characteristics for each strategic theme: knowledge, skills, aptitudes. The results of our analysis show where the competences of the key personnel are lacking, the strategic initiatives to take in the future, and the lead indicators to use for measure the effects of the initiatives. This study contributes to the previous literature, describing how university institutes can measure the human capital readiness.

Venture capital and investor readiness in a post-crisis and state-rescaling context: Revisiting the North East of England

This paper supplies a historical and geographically rooted account of how three separate but ongoing processes (state-rescaling, recessionary conditions and SME business support reforms) were perceived to be intersecting and manifesting themselves at the juncture of venture capital and investment readiness provision in the North East of England primarily from the perspective of local fund managers in December 2012. The paper demonstrates how these myriad processes played out in both predictable and unusual ways in a region often constructed as lagging and not known for its buoyant levels of venture capital activity. In particular, the paper provides empirical insights into the uncertainties created by the Coalition government during the transition from Regional Development Agencies to Local Enterprise Partnerships while also going beyond investor narratives to highlight how the empirical findings connect to broader debates in local and regional development. Here the way in which venture capital policy speaks to the Coalition aspirations of rebalancing the economy, decentralisation and localism in both complementary and contradictory ways are emphasised. As is how the North East (but also other Northern regions) is embedded in multi-scalar relationships by virtue of its connections to EU funding streams, and in particular equity funding through the JEREMIE programme, thus raising interesting questions about the future direction of UK venture capital policy.

Готовность человеческого капитала к стратегическим преобразованиям промышленного предприятия

The article considers the human capital and its readiness for strategic changes. The authors develop a model of a strategic map and, depending on the type of the strategy, creates the list of key professions, their competences and assessment systems of the human capital readiness for the chosen strategy.