Intan Osman

The relationship between human resource practices and firm performance: an empirical assessment of firms in Malaysia

Purpose – The objective of this study is to gain more insight into Malaysian human resource management, in terms of its history and current HR practices. Also, this paper also intends to examine the impact of implementing HR practices on the overall organizations performance based on a sample of 217 Malaysian based companies.Design/methodology/approach – Data were collected via questionnaires from human resource managers and top executives responsible for the managing human resources in their respective organizations. A sample of 217 Malaysian firms participated in this study. Using SPSS, a regression analysis was used to measure the impact of human resource practices on organizational performance.Findings – The key finding of this study is that HR practices do have a significant impact on the performance of Malaysian organizations. In a nutshell the results of this study suggest a positive association between HR practices and firm performance.Originality/value – This study contributes to the understandi...

HR managers in five countries: what do they do and why does it matter?

The 1980s saw the need for change in the organizational role of human resource (HR) professionals, from the traditional employee champion and administrative expert to strategic business partner and change agent. The argument posited was that a more challenging environment compels organizations to turn to managing their HRs as a source of competitive advantage and that means an increasing business partnership for HR professionals. However, very few studies examine the execution of these multiple, sometimes contradictory roles, despite the risk that neglecting traditional roles endanger organizational performance in the long term. This five-country comparative study finds that multiple roles are at least moderately executed, and that these HR roles have different impact depending on the aspect of organizational performance. As well, a more challenging environment, defined here as legal constraints and industry challenges, generally does not have a significant moderating effect on the impact of the different HR roles on organizational performance.