Theme 1: BLACK BOX DEBATE
Lecture 1
Success is not always the same as profit.
Relative success= As long as you are doing better than your competitors you will in the end still
survive and doing fine.
Key aspects of HRM can have a significant positive impact on organizational success
Debate about the nature of this relationship
How/why? Black box debate
When? Contingency perspective/best practice-best fit debate
For whom? Dark-side perspective
Differentiated workforce
Who? HR devolution
HRM exists of:
1) skill: careful recruitment and selection, extensive training and development
2) empowerment: encouragement of participation, extensive communication
3) motivation: extensive performance management, extensive pay and benefits
Performance management= increase the effort that employees want to put in your company
and link this to promotion possibilities
Describe organizational success: within different contexts, different indicators of success matter. It
depends on the sector and context which strategy works best.
The more HR practices you offer the higher your operational and financial outcomes even though the
outcomes differ a bit.
Relationship between HRM and profit is cross-sectional: you can’t say for sure which influences what
Knowledge clip 1
Blackbox debate= The idea that the adoption by organizations of a more
sophisticated set of HR practices has a positive impact on performance. But it is
unclear how many steps there are in the link between these HR-practices and
performance which is called the black box debate.
Impact of HRM on organizational performance: 3 theories
1. Resource based view – Barney: organizations can build advantages
based on resources that are valuable, rare, imperfectly imitable and non-
substitutable
Capable of delivering superior competitive results, not easily obtained by competitors,
hard to copy and hard to replace.
Different types of resources within organizations: organizational, physical and human
resources.
Human resource advantage can consist of the following:
Human capital advantage= a situation where there is a stock of exceptional
human talent working within the organization, whose knowledge, abilities and
skills match the strategic needs of the firm.
Human process advantage= the presence of difficult-to-imitate, historically
evolved processes within the organization, such as intense forms of co-
operation between people.
, The RBV logic provides a rationale for how HR practices positively affect
organizational performance by building a better human capital pool and by
stimulating better processes within the organization.
2. AMO framework – Applebaum: people perform well if they have the ability, motivation and
opportunity to do so.
Ability= the employee can perform well on the job because he/she possess the
necessary knowledge and skills which can be influenced by HR for example training
Motivation= employees perform well on the job because they want to perform well.
Career opportunities and extensive rewards motivate employees to perform well.
Opportunity= having the opportunity to perform well. HR practices such as enabling
participation in decision making.
The AMO provides a argument for how HR practices impact organizational
performance by increasing employees’ ability, motivation and opportunity to produce
high performance.
3. SHRM process model – Nishii & Wright: highlights the distinction between HR practices
that senior managers intend to implement in the organization, the practices that are actually
implemented by line managers and employees’ perceptions of these implemented practices.
Also explains why there is sometimes a disconnect between those three; line managers
may have lack of time or skills to do so, employees can interpret the same practices in
different ways because of factors.
So this model addresses the question of how HR practices impact organizational
performance by looking at how these practices are implemented in the workplace, and
how employees experience and respond to them.
Based on these 3 theories, we can conclude that employees (HR) play a key role in explaining the
impact of HR practices on organizational performance.
Lecture 2
Holy grail of SHRM: HRM organizational performance. How many boxes are there in between and
what is in these boxes? black box debate
Resource based view: about explaining why some organizations do better than others. Two streams
of literature:
1. Industrial organization view:
Focus is on the outside of the organization, and based on the environment you decide
your position in this field.
Resources are homogeneous and mobile
No sustained competitive advantage
5-stage model – Porter: based on the 5 forces you have to determine your strategy and
position in the field.
2. Resource based view:
Always let your internal strengths be your guidance, so built your competitive
advantage on employees etc.
You look inside the organization
Advantage is sustainable:
Valuable: it should be able to add value and help organizations to be more
effective and efficient.
Rare: the resources should not be easily obtainable
Inimitable: people cannot copy it easily
Unique path
Social complexity
Causal ambiguity
Non-substitutable: others are not able to use another thing to get to the same
success.
Lecture 1
Success is not always the same as profit.
Relative success= As long as you are doing better than your competitors you will in the end still
survive and doing fine.
Key aspects of HRM can have a significant positive impact on organizational success
Debate about the nature of this relationship
How/why? Black box debate
When? Contingency perspective/best practice-best fit debate
For whom? Dark-side perspective
Differentiated workforce
Who? HR devolution
HRM exists of:
1) skill: careful recruitment and selection, extensive training and development
2) empowerment: encouragement of participation, extensive communication
3) motivation: extensive performance management, extensive pay and benefits
Performance management= increase the effort that employees want to put in your company
and link this to promotion possibilities
Describe organizational success: within different contexts, different indicators of success matter. It
depends on the sector and context which strategy works best.
The more HR practices you offer the higher your operational and financial outcomes even though the
outcomes differ a bit.
Relationship between HRM and profit is cross-sectional: you can’t say for sure which influences what
Knowledge clip 1
Blackbox debate= The idea that the adoption by organizations of a more
sophisticated set of HR practices has a positive impact on performance. But it is
unclear how many steps there are in the link between these HR-practices and
performance which is called the black box debate.
Impact of HRM on organizational performance: 3 theories
1. Resource based view – Barney: organizations can build advantages
based on resources that are valuable, rare, imperfectly imitable and non-
substitutable
Capable of delivering superior competitive results, not easily obtained by competitors,
hard to copy and hard to replace.
Different types of resources within organizations: organizational, physical and human
resources.
Human resource advantage can consist of the following:
Human capital advantage= a situation where there is a stock of exceptional
human talent working within the organization, whose knowledge, abilities and
skills match the strategic needs of the firm.
Human process advantage= the presence of difficult-to-imitate, historically
evolved processes within the organization, such as intense forms of co-
operation between people.
, The RBV logic provides a rationale for how HR practices positively affect
organizational performance by building a better human capital pool and by
stimulating better processes within the organization.
2. AMO framework – Applebaum: people perform well if they have the ability, motivation and
opportunity to do so.
Ability= the employee can perform well on the job because he/she possess the
necessary knowledge and skills which can be influenced by HR for example training
Motivation= employees perform well on the job because they want to perform well.
Career opportunities and extensive rewards motivate employees to perform well.
Opportunity= having the opportunity to perform well. HR practices such as enabling
participation in decision making.
The AMO provides a argument for how HR practices impact organizational
performance by increasing employees’ ability, motivation and opportunity to produce
high performance.
3. SHRM process model – Nishii & Wright: highlights the distinction between HR practices
that senior managers intend to implement in the organization, the practices that are actually
implemented by line managers and employees’ perceptions of these implemented practices.
Also explains why there is sometimes a disconnect between those three; line managers
may have lack of time or skills to do so, employees can interpret the same practices in
different ways because of factors.
So this model addresses the question of how HR practices impact organizational
performance by looking at how these practices are implemented in the workplace, and
how employees experience and respond to them.
Based on these 3 theories, we can conclude that employees (HR) play a key role in explaining the
impact of HR practices on organizational performance.
Lecture 2
Holy grail of SHRM: HRM organizational performance. How many boxes are there in between and
what is in these boxes? black box debate
Resource based view: about explaining why some organizations do better than others. Two streams
of literature:
1. Industrial organization view:
Focus is on the outside of the organization, and based on the environment you decide
your position in this field.
Resources are homogeneous and mobile
No sustained competitive advantage
5-stage model – Porter: based on the 5 forces you have to determine your strategy and
position in the field.
2. Resource based view:
Always let your internal strengths be your guidance, so built your competitive
advantage on employees etc.
You look inside the organization
Advantage is sustainable:
Valuable: it should be able to add value and help organizations to be more
effective and efficient.
Rare: the resources should not be easily obtainable
Inimitable: people cannot copy it easily
Unique path
Social complexity
Causal ambiguity
Non-substitutable: others are not able to use another thing to get to the same
success.
