Personnel Management Practices Research Articles

Toward a Climate for Work Resumption: The Nonmedical Determinants of Return to Work

People who have been on long-term absence from work because of ill health usually have reduced chances to resume work again. Nevertheless, little is known about its causal factors. The aim of this study is to present and test an empirical model to predict return to work of employees who are long-term absent for physical- or mental ill health reasons. A longitudinal study has been performed with a sample of long-term absents in five European countries (N = 1460). Health improvement is necessary but it alone not sufficient as precondition for return to work. Psychological factors (ie, self-efficacy, depression) and organizational factors have the highest impact. A climate for work resumption and its implications for personnel management practices to reduce/prevent workers to remain in absence leave when the medical symptoms have disappeared are discussed.

HIGH COMMITMENT HR PRACTICES, EMPLOYEE EFFORT, AND FIRM PERFORMANCE.

The article refers to strategic human resource management and discusses an association of employee-based competencies with personnel management practices in professional services firms in the Unite...

RETAINING OLDER WORKERS: USING A CASE STUDY TO FORMULATE PROPOSITIONS ON THE ROLE OF HR BUNDLES.

The article presents management science research on how personnel management practices affect an organization's ability to retain older employees. Construction industry companies are examined as th...

Survey of recent developments

In the recent legislative elections the Democrat Party of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (SBY) was by far the most successful. Support for other major secular-nationalist parties fell significantly, as did that for the Islamic parties as a group. Two new parties led by former generals also performed relatively poorly. At the time of writing SBY seemed the likely winner of the forthcoming presidential election, supported by running mate Boediono, the former governor of Bank Indonesia. Indonesia's performance during the global financial crisis has been vastly better than during the Asian financial crisis, and superior to that of most other countries in the region. Output growth remained positive through Q1 2009, although there were signs of heightened caution within the business community. Deft monetary policy saw inflation decline significantly, with little negative impact on output growth or the banking sector. Much of the earlier declines in the financial markets had been reversed by mid-June. Successful management of exchange rate policy in late 2008 and early 2009 raises the question whether Indonesia would fare better with a more genuinely floating exchange rate and a much lower level of international reserves. Economic outcomes during the SBY administration fell well short of the president's 2004 election campaign promises, but were comparable with those under former president Megawati, reflecting the great policy similarities of the two regimes. A key feature of the presidential election campaign has been the use of the term ‘neo-liberal’ to attack one's opponents. It has been implied that those following ‘neo-liberal’ policies favour the business sector and foreigners over the people, whereas the real issue is what types of policies are more likely to benefit the Indonesian people as a whole. The debate provides the opportunity potentially to resolve long-standing disagreements as to the relative efficacy of free market- and interventionist-type policies. Public sector accounting reform is an important aspect of efforts to improve governance. Newly introduced accounting standards require a shift to double-entry accounting, and away from the single-entry system inherited long ago from the Dutch. This requires the listing of government entities’ assets and liabilities in a balance sheet, and should lead to far greater accuracy in government financial reporting. In turn, this has the potential to be a powerful anti-corruption instrument. But progress is significantly limited by a severe shortage of accountants in the public sector, and by dysfunctional personnel management practices.

Evaluating HR Management Strategies for Recruiting and Retaining IT Professionals in the U.S. Federal Government

Public personnel management research and practices increasingly focus on creative human resource management (HRM) strategies for recruiting individuals with information technology (IT) expertise and retaining employees with institutional knowledge, particularly in light of impending retirements. Some agencies face unique workforce demographic challenges, while others face shifts in missions or technologies. For these reasons, the U.S. Office of Personnel Management relaxed some regulations to allow federal agencies to meet their staffing needs. This article presents an evaluation of the effectiveness of creative HRM strategies during the late 1990s, when federal agencies sought to hire and keep IT professionals to do Year 2000 conversions.

Nuo nomenklatūros iki pseudobiurokratijos : posovietines viešosios biurokratijos bruožai Lietuvoje

This article attempts to substantiate a persistence of features of the soviet bureaucratic-administrative system to the extent these can be discussed, and their influence on the public bureaucracy of the independent republic of Lithuania. it is claimed that the purpose of the reforms in Lithuania’s state civil services was to develop a stable, professional, and politically neutral public bureaucracy, i.e., a classical bureaucracy based on Max Weber’s type of an ideal bureaucracy. certain aspects of reforms were successfully implemented. However, at the behavioral level, the public bureaucracy in post-soviet Lithuania is still predominately a variant of a pseudo-bureaucracy. signs of protecting managers at the expense of ordinary employees, a practice rooted in the nomenklatura, can still be found in Lithuania’s civil service. They become clear when observing how the instruments for a career and compensation are in reality applied in civil service. The outcome of the annual performance evaluations from 2003 to 2006 of Lithuanian civil servants for a career in civil service was clearly disproportionate with respect to the financial incentives for those public bureaucrats who hold managerial or senior positions. Political control of the bureaucracy noticeably weakened from 2002 to 2008. This is first of all related to the corrections made to the Law on civil service and other laws. on the one hand, the purpose for the reforms was to counter the practice of politicized personnel management in civil service. on the other, needed attention was not paid to the twofold nature of politicization. along with personnel management that is politicized, the functional politicization of the upper levels of civil service is also known.[...].

The Adaptation of Western Management Methodology to the Investigation of Personnel Management Practices in Russia

The aim of this paper is to consider the changes in Russian personnel management practice with reference to western management methodology. At first appearance, the Russian labour sector is observing processes similar to those in Western countries; it is establishing contract rules and procedures, is increasing all types of flexible work patterns, and is developing social partnership institutions. At the same time, the transformational nature of these processes among countries in transition, is encountering difficulties and contradictions. The choice of western theoretical approaches for the analysis of Russian personnel management practice was based both on the study of Russian bibliography on the subject, and on empirical databases, communicated in interviews with personnel mangers in Russian organizations.JEL: M12, J81, P31

Personnel management in Finnish social and health care

The purpose of this study is to examine components of good personnel management and how they come true in accounts of social and health care managers. The data were obtained by means of a postal survey sent to middle-line managers in positions above the first-line management level in the responsibility area of Tampere University Hospital. The questionnaire was sent to 703 managers; 433 sent in responses indicating a response rate of 62 percent. Middle-line managers considered themselves as interactive, responsibility-sharing and understanding leaders, but found shortcomings in the leadership style of their superiors. Only 18 percent of the middle-line managers received feedback and only 42 percent received support from their superiors when needed. There were significant differences between genders, activity sectors and professional backgrounds in the responders' accounts concerning personnel management practices. The results of this study reliably describe how middle-line managers consider things to be, not necessarily how things are in reality. The findings confirm the assumption that the importance of personnel management is still not perfectly understood in the upper management levels of the social and health care sector. At the same time the self-evaluations of middle-line managers implied an ambition towards better personnel management. This study identifies components of good personnel management from literature and uses them as the basis for analysing the data.

Changes in Occupational Satisfaction and Implications for Effective Public Personnel Management Practices

Changes in Occupational Satisfaction and Implications for Effective Public Personnel Management Practices

The struggle to regain effective government under democracy in Indonesia*

With Soeharto's demise, Indonesia gained democracy but lost effective government. A return to sustained, rapid economic growth will require an overhaul of Indonesia's bureaucracy and judiciary which, along with the legislatures, the military and the state-owned enterprises, had been co-opted by the former president into his economy-wide ‘franchise’—a system of government designed to redistribute income and wealth from the weak to the strong while maintaining rapid growth. This franchise has disintegrated, its various component parts now working at cross-purposes rather than in mutually reinforcing fashion. The result has been a significant decline in the security of property rights and, in turn, the continued postponement of a sustained economic rebound. To reform the civil service it will be necessary to undertake a radical overhaul of its personnel management practices and salary structures, so as to provide strong incentives for officials to work in the public interest. * Much of this paper was written while the author was a visitor at the School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University.

Managing people in Venezuela: where are we headed?

This paper reviews the evolution of human resource (HR) management in Venezuela and the challenges at hand. Key aspects are identified in assessing current experience in a wide range of organizations, together with ongoing difficulties being faced in light of local and international demands. Following a description of the origins of personnel management practices, the stages of development of Venezuelan organization units concerned with human resources are examined up to the present time, and the need for sweeping management change in current HR policy, practices and training is outlined.

Characteristics of a Successful Respiratory Therapy Education Program

Because of the increasing demand for program effectiveness, program outcomes have become important for quality assessment in respiratory care education. Respiratory care programs and their institutions must ensure that programs in which they invest their time, energy, and money have there sources necessary to provide quality preparation of program graduates. To determine how well an educational program achieves its goal in producing competent respiratory therapists, respiratory therapy programs must be assessed through key personnel, teaching, clinical education, and enrollment management. The processes such as developing faculty,improving instruction and enhancing students' learning, and strengthening the structure of the respiratory therapy program with competent personnel and effective enrollment management practices determine the direction and rate of success of the respiratory care program at GSU.

Изменения в практиках управления персоналом на российских предприятиях

Изменения в практиках управления персоналом на российских предприятиях

Symposium

In this post–September 11, 2001 era, it can be argued that civil service reform has increasingly taken on a sense of urgency. By any measure, the current reforms in process at the federal level are unprecedented. A number of federal agencies under pressure to improve performance have been allowed to depart from traditional personnel management practices. The Departments of Defense and Homeland Security are the most recent examples of agencies exempted from Title 5 provisions, with the concomitant authority to develop human resource systems that are both “contemporary” and “flexible.” Exceptions to pay and other provisions of the 1949 Classification Act are under way, and pay-for-performance is gaining ground. Management challenges abound across the federal government, not least in the Department of Homeland Security. This symposium, titled “ Federal Civil Service Reform: Another Legacy of 9/11?” presents an opportunity to examine path-breaking human resource reform from both theoretical and applied perspectives.

An empirical investigation of interviewer‐related factors that discourage the use of high structure interviews

AbstractHigh structure interviews appear to be less frequently used in personnel management practice than might be expected given their good reliability and validity. Although several authors have speculated on the factors of resistance to high structure interviews, empirical research is very scarce. Two studies are conducted among experienced human resources representatives who frequently conduct employment interviews. The first study provides a fine‐grained description of the degree of structure used in interviews, showing that in most interviews constraints are placed only on the topical areas to be covered and that scoring is done only on multiple criteria. The second study tests various hypotheses regarding interviewer‐related factors, which may lead to lower levels of structure in interviews. Results show that when interviewers are concerned about establishing an informal contact with interviewees, want to have discretion over interview questions, and want to develop interviews efficiently, they are less inclined to use higher levels of structure in interviews. Conversely, people who participated in interviewing workshops and Conventional types report using significantly higher levels of structure. Implications for improving interviewer motivation to use higher levels of structure in interviews are discussed. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Actions by Political Officials Have Weakened the Federal Government Workplace: Downsizing Has Cut Lower Level Workers the Most and Replacing Federal Employees with Private Corporations Costs Much More, Creating the Need for Immediate Reform

Abstract The authors of this paper are four practitioners each of whom has many years of experience working in the Federal government and also has pursued doctoral studies in public or business administration. Three ideas developed in this paper are that: (1) the Federal civil service has been changed from being a model workplace to a much less desirable one; (2) although downsizing has been touted as an efficiency and economy measure, lower level employees experienced the most cuts and (3) the current practice of replacing Federal employees with private corporations costs much more. Over the past two decades private sector workplaces in the United States, and now the Federal government workplace, have experienced so much change that previous theories, concepts, models, and expectations no longer hold. Just as private industry workplaces have been changed by downsizing, reorganizations, mergers, elimination of middle management, and outsourcing, so, too, has the Federal government workplace been fundament...

Effective personnel management practices in the Philippines

Provides a brief outline of the Philippines before looking at the values held by the culture and the management style commonly adopted. Outlines personnel management practices with references to short case studies. Concludes that one must first understand the culture in relation to feelings, honour and relationships and the successful company is one which has formed effective relationships with not only customers but employees, suppliers and dealers and also provides staff with development opportunities.

The management of labour in Japanese manufacturing plants in China

While there is now considerable scholarship concerning Japanese management practices in their overseas production operations in Europe and North America, little is known about Japanese investment in other parts of the world, especially in Asia. This paper draws on on-going research into the nature and operations of Japanese manufacturing investments in China. The paper focuses on interviews primarily with Chinese managers in twenty plants in three locations within China, to examine their personnel polices and practices, and draw from this their overall industrial relations strategies. The main findings were, first, that, despite claims of cultural similarity between China and Japan, personnel management practices were generally not transferred from Japan to the plants in China. Second, practices that may appear as Japanese inspired were often informed by local practices. Third, there was diversity in the forms of practices used, indicating neither sophistication nor a singular recipe of management methods. Thus, the paper seeks to challenge proponents of Japanization who claim, essentially, that Japanese management techniques are predicated on the construction of particular forms of social relations around work that allow sophisticated, and integrated, production-management systems to function. Instead, depending on a complex interrelation between location industry and the history of each plant, managers sought to use various local and 'universal' (generic to capitalism) strategies and practices to control and utilize labour.

Work attitudes in Vietnam

The article explores the effect of employees' attitudes on the competitiveness of companies in Vietnam. In transition economies, the effect of a shift from a planned to market economy on personnel management practices can cripple an organization. Research on employee attitudes in Vietnam is examined as an indicator of effective labor force management policies. Such issues as employees' organizational commitment, job satisfaction, and work values are considered. Some qualifications for regional differences are also stated.

The Americans with Disabilities Act

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is important legislation designed to prohibit discrimination against disabled persons, but most state and local governments covered by the Act were already prohibited from discrimination against the disabled by provisions of Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. This article reports the results of a national survey designed to measure the perceptions of personnel managers from state government departments and agencies regarding the impact of the ADA on public personnel management practices given concurrent coverage of the Rehabilitation Act. A majority of the managers from organizations subject to the Rehabilitation Act reported that the ADA had no significant effects on their organizations. Substantial proportions of respondents agreed, however, that the ADA did have certain more narrowly defined effects on public personnel practices. Possible explanations for the perceived effects of the ADA despite coverage by the Rehabilitation Act are considered.