John Bratton

Work and organizational behaviour

PART I: WORK AND ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOUR Capitalism and Organizational Behaviour The Social Nature of Work Studying Work and Organizations PART II: INDIVIDUALS AND WORK Personality and Identity Perception and Emotion Learning and Innovation Motivation at Work Gender, Race, Disability and Class PART III: GROUPS AND SOCIAL INTERACTION Groups and Teams PART IV: ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE, PROCESSES AND PERFORMANCE Organizational Design Technology in Work Organizations Organizational Culture Leadership and Change Communications Decision Making and Ethics Power, Politics and Conflict Human Resource Management

Towards critical human resource development education (CHRDE): using the sociological imagination to make the HRD profession more critical in the post-crisis era

In the wake of the post-2008 global financial crisis, there has been a failure by those in the HRD profession to critically challenge key assumptions relating to their own practice. The result is a continuation of its status as a ‘weakened’ profession. This article explores a failure by professionals and academe to address this position. An argument is made for Critical HRD Education (CHRDE), aiming at the United Kingdom’s professional education scheme. We seek to show how everyday issues that occur in HRD practice can be linked to a socio-economic context through the use of C. Wright Mills’ view of The Sociological Imagination. Examples of use are provided before implications for practitioners, and theorizing is considered.

Human Resource Management in Transition

Successful corporate leaders recognize that their competitive edge in today’s market place is their people. They also acknowledge that few organizations know how to manage human resources effectively, primarily because traditional management models are inappropriate in our dynamic work environment.1

Towards Critical Human Resource Management Education (CHRME): a sociological imagination approach

This article explores the professional standing of the discipline of human resource management (HRM) in business schools in the post-financial crisis period. Using the prism of the sociological imagination, it explains the learning to be gained from teaching HRM that is sensitive to context, power and inequality. The context of crisis provides ideal circumstances for critical reflexivity and for integrating wider societal issues into the HRM curriculum. It argues for Critical Human Resource Management Education or CHRME, which, if adopted, would be an antidote to prescriptive practitioner-oriented approaches. It proceeds to set out five principles for CHRME: using the ‘sociological imagination’ prism; emphasizing the social nature of the employment relationship; investigating paradox within HRM; designing learning outcomes that encourage students to appraise HRM outcomes critically; and reflexive critique. Crucially, CHRME offers a teaching strategy that does not neglect or marginalize the reality of structural power, inequality and employee work experiences.

Human Resource Development

Only by drawing on the combined brainpower of all its employees can a firm face up to the turbulence and constraints of today’s environment.1

Employee Health and Safety

In Britain today more people die from occupational disease than from accidents at work but nearly half the working population has no access to an occupational health service.1

Labour Relations and Collective Bargaining

Following protests of early labour movements in Britain, Australia and the United States of America to introduce the eight-hour workday, there has been a substantial reduction in the number of working hours in many parts of the world since the industrial revolution in the 19th century. Working time was the subject of the very first international labour standard, the Hours of Work (Industry) Convention, 1919 (No. 1), which introduced the eight-hour workday at the international level. Since then, working time has continued to be of pivotal importance to the work of the ILO as well as to national labour legislation and collective agreements.

Communications and Employee Participation

The way forward is to run your business mainly on trust, not to police them [employees]. I don’t seem to sign anything any more and this is the way it should be.1

Global Capitalism and Competitive Advantage

A last-ditch effort is being made to prevent Chrysler, America’s third-largest car firm, from going to the wall … It has now laid off nearly 43,000 production workers indefinitely.1

Patterns of Change

Chapter 3 focused on developments in British labour relations occurring over the last decade at national level. Throughout the period trade unions have faced major challenges in coming to terms with industrial relations legislation and management-led initiatives. For much of the time trade unions were on the defensive, but they were not destroyed, and by the late 1980s there were signs of a more combative unionism. Some writers argue that trade unions have changed their approach and moved towards ‘new realism’ (Bassett, 1986). Other studies offer contrasting interpretations (Kelly, 1988). The state of the global economy, compounded by government economic policy and the long-term trend in British competitiveness has had a profound impact on British labour relations. As unemployment grew and union membership collapsed in the early 1980s there was a shift in the balance of power, certainly within manufacturing, towards management.