What do Social Processes mean for Quality of Human Resource Practice?

Well implemented human resource practice (HRP) is linked to increased performance, innovation, and the well-being of both managers and employees. In the literature, a distinction between the hard and the soft HRM-models is drawn: the hard model focuses on employees as a cost, whereas the soft HRM-model treats them as a potential Nielsen (2008a). However, little is known about the informal aspects of HRP and which social processes actually lead to implementation success or failure. The purpose of this paper is to develop a concept of social processes between managers and employees that can increase the implementation and quality of HR-performance Two studies of HRP within two manufacturing companies are used to illustrate the pros and cons of this new theoretical concept from a performance perspective. Involvement, commitment, and competence development are identified as key aspects of the quality of HRP. Moreover, a good psychological working environment and systematic priority of HRP are essential contextual factors that can enable or hinder social processes. Otherwise, production pressure and power relations between managers and employees can hinder the implementation of the new concept. The concept of social processes can help HRP to contribute on social processes between managers and employees as important aspects of quality in work with human resources. However, the influence of team organization and the social processes between employees needs to be explored further

Complexity Management in Mass Customization SMEs

AbstractAs mass customization is being widely adopted, manufacturing companies are faced with an increasing challenge of establishing and maintaining manufacturing systems with sufficient flexibility to meet customers’ diverse needs and yet be efficient enough to be competitive. This is also the case in Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs), which are also experiencing a demand for increased product variety. However, increased variety in the product portfolio often implies increased complexity in manufacturing costs, which combined with low manufacturing volumes in SMEs often implies that parts of the product portfolio may prove unprofitable. This is often found to be a product management issue, where complexity increases over time, as new variety is introduced in the product portfolio, not following an explicit procedure for assessing impact of increased product variety and complexity. This paper investigates the impact of excess product variety and complexity in four different SMEs, and describes experiences with using a structured approach to assessing variety and consolidating the product portfolio. The issues found in the cases are SME specific, as the volume-variety relationship as well as the organizational resources available to perform product management in relation to new product development and adaption of the product portfolio to accommodate requirements for specific customer orders