Family-Friendly Management, Organizational Performance and Social Legitimacy

Research on family-friendly practices has concentrated on the predictors of their use, particularly from the perspective of either institutional theory or the high involvement or commitment management vogue. This paper first shows how such perspectives can be used to generate hypotheses about the link between family-friendly management and organizational performance. Second, the paper reports research designed to test these, using data from a national representative sample of workplaces across the British economy, the Workplace Employment Relations Survey of 2004 (WERS2004). The results support the high commitment thesis that family-friendly management will strengthen the relationship between commitment and key economic outcomes, as the relationships between workforce commitment and productivity or quality are stronger in organizations when friendly management is high, which is consistent with social exchange theory. Family-friendly management is not, however, related to the human resource outcomes of labour turnover and absenteeism. Nor does the study find support for the argument that its use in conjunction with high involvement management enhances the performance effects of both. Equally, there is no support for the hypothesis from the institutional thesis that family-friendly management has positive effects on the legitimacy of the organization

Examining nonlinear relationships between quality management and financial performance

Purpose A thorough analysis of nonlinear relationships between quality management (QM) and organizational outcomes has largely been ignored in the current empirical QM literature, which can have profound theoretical and managerial implications. The existence of nonlinear relationships implies taking a contingent view in that QM practices are more effective depending on their level of implementation in an organization. The purpose of this paper is to focus on this possibility and undertake an in-depth study of the sparse nonlinear relationship suggested by the literature. Design/methodology/approach The authors introduce an empirical study carried out on a sample of 168 service firms belonging to sectors experienced in QM and, through polynomial regression analysis, identify the nature of the relationship between QM and financial performance (return on assets). Findings The results, by showing an S-shaped curve, support a nonlinear association between these two variables. The presence of this functional form provides a satisfactory solution to the growing debate among researchers who, from a linear perspective, defend the positive effects of QM on organizational outcomes, those who find no significant effect, and still others who claim that QM has a negative effect. Originality/value The results show that in organizations with a low level of QM implementation, managers should increase investment in QM, even though this increase will not be correspondingly beneficial in the same proportion. In contrast, in organizations with a high level of QM implementation, managers are advised to reflect on undertaking projects that represent an additional investment in QM, with the aim of finding their optimal level

Having Two Bosses; Considering the Relationships between LMX, Satisfaction with HR Practices, and Organizational Commitment

The current study went beyond previous research on leader-member exchange (LMX) by examining employees who are supervised by more than one boss. Using data from 122 PhDs from a Dutch university, the current study had three research objectives. First, to examine the effects of PhDs' LMX with both their promoter and their assistant promoter on affective organizational commitment (AOC). Second, to examine the mediating role of satisfaction with HR practices in the two LMX - AOC relationships. Since the promoter as the higher level boss has more influence on different HR practices the third objective was to examine whether the LMX - AOC relationship is stronger for the promoter than for the assistant promoter. The results showed that both promoter LMX and LMX assistant promoter were positively related to PhDs’ AOC, and both relationships were fully mediated by PhDs’ satisfaction with HR practices. As expected, these effects were significantly stronger for the promoter than for the assistant promoter

Editorial Essay: Introduction to a Special Issue on Work and Employment Relations in Health Care

[Excerpt] This special issue of the ILR Review is designed to showcase the central role that work organization and employment relations play in shaping important outcomes such as the quality of care and organizational performance. Each of the articles included in this special issue makes an important contribution to our understanding of the large and rapidly changing health care sector. Specifically, these articles provide novel empirical evidence about the relationship between organizations, institutions, and work practices and a wide array of central outcomes across different levels of analysis. This breadth is especially important because the health care literature has largely neglected employment-related factors in explaining organizational and worker outcomes in this industry. Individually, these articles shed new light on the role that health information technologies play in affecting patient care and productivity (see Hitt and Tambe; Meyerhoefer et al.); the relationship between work practices and organizational reliability (Vogus and Iacobucci); staffing practices, processes, and outcomes (Kramer and son; Hockenberry and Becker; Kossek et al.); health care unions’ effects on the quality of patient care (Arindrajit, Kaplan, and Thompson); and the relationship between the quality of jobs and the quality of care (Burns, Hyde, and Killet). Below, we position the articles in this special issue against the backdrop of the pressures and challenges facing the industry and the organizations operating within it. We highlight the implications that organizational responses to industry pressures have had for organizations, the patients they care for, and the employees who deliver this care

The Relationship Between HR Practices and Firm Performance: Examining Causal Order

Significant research attention has been devoted to examining the relationship between HR practices and firm performance, and the research support has assumed HR as the causal variable. Using data from 45 business units (with 62 data points), this study examines how measures of HR practices correlate with past, concurrent, and future operational performance measures. The results indicate that correlations with performance measures at all three times are both high and invariant, and that controlling for past or concurrent performance virtually eliminates the correlation of HR with future performance. Implications are discussed

Collective Turnover at the Group, Unit, and Organizational Levels: Evidence, Issues, and Implications

Studies of the causes and consequences of turnover at the group, unit, or organizational level of analysis have proliferated in recent years. Indicative of its importance, turnover rate research spans numerous academic disciplines and their respective journals. This broad interest is fueled by the considerable implications of turnover rates predicting broader measures of organizational effectiveness (productivity, customer outcomes, firm performance) as well as by the related perspective that collective turnover is an important outcome in its own right. The goal of this review is to critically examine and extract meaningful insights from research on the causes and consequences of group, unit, and organizational turnover. The review is organized around five major “considerations,” including (1) measurement and levels of analysis issues, (2) consequences, (3) curvilinear and interaction effects, (4) methodological and conceptual issues, and (5) antecedents. The review concludes with broad directions for future research

Human Resource Management, Service Quality, and Economic Performance in Call Centers

This paper examines the relationship between human resource practices, operational outcomes, and economic performance in call centers. The study draws on a sample of 64 call centers serving the mass market in a large telecommunications services company. Surveys of 1,243 employees in the 64 centers were aggregated to the call center level and matched to archival data on service process quality, as measured by customer surveys; call handling time, revenues per call, and net revenues per call. Our path analysis shows that human resource practices emphasizing employee training, discretion, and rewards lead to higher service quality, higher revenues per call, and higher net revenues per call. In addition, service quality mediates the relationship between human resource practices and these economic outcomes. There is no significant relationship between HR practices and labor efficiency, as measured by call handling time; and labor efficiency is inversely related to revenue generation

The Viability of Alternative Call Center Production Models

[Excerpt] The central question of this paper is whether a mass customization strategy coupled with high involvement work practices is an economically viable model for service and sales call centers. If so, under what conditions and why? To answer these questions, in the next section, we describe alternative models of call center management. In section III, we present a conceptual framework for understanding the relationship between management practices, workers reactions to those practices, and performance outcomes. We then review empirical evidence on these relationships, focusing primarily on studies of call centers or related service workplaces. In section IV, we draw on evidence from two recent quantitative studies of call centers to examine the performance outcomes of high involvement practices in this context. We close with a discussion and critique of existing evidence and suggestions for future research

The Role of Management Practices in Closing the Productivity Gap

There is no doubt that management practices are linked to the productivity and performance of a company. However, research findings are mixed. This paper provides a multi-disciplinary review of the current evidence of such a relationship and offers suggestions for further exploration. We provide an extensive review of the literature in terms of research findings from studies that have been trying to measure and understand the impact that individual management practices and clusters of management practices have on productivity at different levels of analysis. We focus our review on Operations Management (om) and Human Resource Management (hrm) practices as well as joint applications of these practices. In conclusion, we can say that taken as a whole, the research findings are equivocal. Some studies have found a positive relationship between the adoption of management practices and productivity, some negative and some no association whatsoever. We believe that the lack of universal consensus on the effect of the adoption of complementary management practices might be driven either by measurement issues or by the level of analysis. Consequently, there is a need for further research. In particular, for a multi-level approach from the lowest possible level of aggregation up to the firm-level of analysis in order to assess the impact of management practices upon the productivity of firms