Implications For Human Resource Development Professionals Research Articles

Impact of Intellectual Capital and Social Capital on the Human Resource Performance in the Chemical Industries in Pakistan

An emerging knowledge economy creates major challenges for human resource development (HRD) in organisations. The purpose of this paper is to identify some of these challenges and explore their implications for HRD professionals. The paper takes the form of a literature review to contribute to the ongoing debate about HRD's changing role and tasks. Having set the organisational process of HRD in the context of a knowledge economy and of macro-level socio-economic policy, we explore notions of strategy, structure and knowledge and their implications for those with HRD responsibilities in organisations. We identify and discuss four major challenges that confront the HRD function, and conclude that a knowledge economy invites HRD professionals to play a crucial role in the transformation of organisations. As working, learning and knowing are closely related processes, HRD could become the integrating vehicle for generating human and social capital: primary driving forces in a knowledge society.

Inspecting the Hierarchy of Life Roles

Role salience is a reflection of the importance and value that people attribute to the roles central to their lives and identities. One pivotal aspect of role salience is individual responsibilities to organizational roles. Role salience has meaningful implications for employees and organizations. Understanding and acknowledging the importance of holistic treatment of role salience has the potential to affect organizational policies, HRD practices, and, ultimately, employee learning and performance. In this study, findings from a systematic review of the role salience literature are reported. Following a search of four Human Resource Development (HRD) journals, the PsycINFO database, and the Academic Search Complete database, 67 articles and papers were identified for inclusion in the literature review. The authors argue that role salience research has implications for HRD professionals; however, role salience has largely been ignored in the HRD literature. The authors speculate on why role salience has not been common in HRD literature and ways in which role salience perspectives and related applications can benefit HRD, organizations, and individuals.

Institutionalizing Ethics: A Synthesis of Frameworks and the Implications for HRD

Today, many human resource professionals are faced with the responsibilities of implementing ethics initiatives in the workplace. The integration of ethics is becoming an aspect of organizational life to counter unethical conduct, enhance the organization's reputation, and stimulate the attraction and retention of talent. Scholars believe ethical behavior must be institutionalized—evidenced in daily practices and rooted in organizational culture—to sustain ethics in the workplace. It is becoming increasingly clear that human resource development (HRD) professionals significantly contribute, and even more, to the process of institutionalizing ethics. This article synthesizes the literature by comparing several of the frameworks for the institutionalization of ethics that have been forwarded in research and theory during the past 15 years. Implications for HRD professionals as key contributors in the institutionalization of ethics process are discussed.

Corporate eLearning: Human resource development implications for large and small organizations

This paper compares and contrasts the current attitudes towards, awareness of and take-up of eLearning in large and small organizations and outlines the implications for human resource development (HRD) professionals. An in-depth study was conducted in Ireland with a number of large multinational organizations and a number of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the engineering, electronics, aerospace, pharmaceutical and medical device sectors. The study focused on awareness, perceptions, technology support infrastructure, current and planned involvement, most frequent and most preferred methods of delivery, benefits, barriers, the motivational factors and overall attitudes to eLearning. The comparison describes a number of similarities and a number of differences both within the large organization sector and within the SME sector and between the two sectors. Finally, the implications for HRD professionals are discussed.