Bas Koene

Situated human agency, institutional entrepreneurship and institutional change

Purpose – This paper evaluates the influence of the institutional context on the dynamics of institutional change and the possibilities for human agency in this process.Design/methodology/approach – A comparison of the emergence of the temporary work agency industry in five countries is used to illustrate the influence of three elements of the institutional context: high/low pressure field emergence, societal confidence, and power and discretion of the emerging industry.Findings – The analysis reveals how these three elements affect the dynamics of new field development. It shows the interaction between institutionalising and de‐institutionalising pressures and the dialectical nature of the process when comparing the developments over time between different national (institutional) contexts.Research limitations/implications – Propositions for further research are formulated. Combining the effects of the three situational variables three models of industry institutionalization are established: autonomous d...

Contingent Employment in the Netherlands

In the last decade the Dutch labour market has demonstrated an admirable capacity to generate jobs. Consequently, the unemployment rate has significantly decreased. However, the newly generated jobs are a-typical in the sense that they are not full-time jobs based on open-ended contracts. Instead, the job growth has relied on the growth of part-time and contingent jobs. While the creation of part-time jobs seems to be employee-driven, contingent employment, in contrast, seems to be driven by motives of employers to gain numerical flexibility. Data from the Netherlands show that, with the exception of student workers, contingent work is predominantly involuntary. This paper analyses the growth of contingent employment in the Netherlands.

Construct measurement of evaluative style: a review and proposal

This paper focuses on the need to revise the conceptualisation and measurement of evaluative style in future Reliance on Accounting Performance Measures (RAPM) research. Based on a review of the existing literature, we identify a number of issues in the conceptualisation and measurement of evaluative style and conclude that none of the existing measures is ideal for use in future research. We see two general dimensions of evaluative style that need specific attention in future research. The first dimension addresses the evaluative focus of the superior (e.g. budgets, other quantitative targets, short or long-term targets, etc.). The second dimension addresses the superior’s way of handling the evaluation process (e.g. rigid or flexible, fixing blame, using it as a learning opportunity, etc.). Building on these two dimensions, there i a need for studies that assess how specific performance measures are used in different way within a particular organisational context, enabling a distinction between the design and the use of control tools. These conclusions suggest a need for qualitative indepth field studies within single organisations rather than quantitative survey research across organisations in future research on evaluative style and its behavioural consequences.

Private equity and human resource management: ‘Barbarians at the gate!’ HR’s wake-up call?:

A private equity buyout (PEB) constitutes an important organizational event that usually heralds major organizational transformations. As such, the announcement of a possible PEB can be expected to impact the organization and require careful management of the pre-PEB process. This article investigates the role and contribution of human resource management (HRM) during a two-year process of negotiations preceding a PEB. It shows the vulnerability of HR-based change contributions to uncertainty about the future, as uncertainty accentuates the ambiguity inherent in HRM based change. Furthermore, it highlights the importance of the role of top-management and the possibilities for HRM during the period leading up to a PEB.

Institutional change and the multinational change agent: A study of the temporary staffing industry in Spain

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of multinational corporations (MNCs) in local institutional change. To what extent do multinational organizations help or hinder change, in particular new industry creation?Design/methodology/approach – The paper presents a qualitative case study examining the role of multinational temporary work agencies in the development of temporary agency market in Spain.Findings – The authors find that while multinational firms were less constrained by the norms, values and logics of the home environment, they also encountered specific challenges in the implementation of new practices. First, high‐profile introduction of a novel practice requires checks and balances to manage unanticipated developments, such as undesirable activities by opportunistic actors that may derail the change process. Second, rapid growth is not conducive to concerted efforts at industry level, leaving the public identity of the institutional innovation extremely vulnerable. Third, h...