Rita Fontinha

HR attributions and the dual commitment of outsourced IT workers

Purpose – Outsourced information technology (IT) workers establish two different employment relationships: one with the outsourcing company that hires them and another with the client organization where they work daily. The attitudes that an employee has towards both organisations may be influenced by the interpretations or attributions that employees make about the reasons behind the human resource (HR) management practices implemented by the outsourcing company. This paper aims to propose that commitment‐focused HR attributions are positively and control‐focused HR attributions are negatively related to the affective commitment to the client organization, through the affective commitment to the outsourcing company.Design/methodology/approach – These hypotheses were tested with a sample of 158 highly skilled outsourced employees from the IT sector. Data were analyzed with structural equation modeling (SEM).Findings – The papers hypotheses were supported. It can conclude that, if an employee interprets t...

Global talent management in knowledge intensive firms in and between Western Europe and India: future research directions

Considering the multinational dimension of numerous organisations, there is a growing concern with the management of talent at a global level. Accordingly, in this chapter, we focus on important theoretical and empirical research related to talent management in knowledge intensive firms, focusing specifically on Western Europe and India, especially the business process offshoring industry, with an aim to provide future research directions, as there is a vast gap in research in this area. We provide a thorough description of talent management strategies implemented in Western Europe and then move on to discuss the emerging talent management strategies in India, aiming to emphasise some specificities between the two regions. We additionally describe and analyse the talent flow patterns from Western Europe to India, and challenges for these European expatriates in India. Our overall aim is to understand the specific challenges of talent management focusing on the two regions, aiming to provide some hints to both researchers and practitioners.

Training and the commitment of outsourced information technologies' workers: psychological contract fulfillment as a mediator

Outsourced workers in information technologies (IT) generally have high skills and a high value on the job market. Their IT outsourcing organizations are likely to provide them with training, in the first place for skill development, but perhaps also as a way to bind the workers to them. This can be understood along the role of the psychological contract. Outsourced IT workers may see training as a fulfillment of their psychological contract. Accordingly, we hypothesize that psychological contract fulfillment mediates the relationship between training and affective commitment to the IT outsourcer. This was tested in a sample of 158 Portuguese outsourced IT workers. The results showed that employees who considered that they were receiving good training opportunities felt a greater affective commitment to their IT outsourcers. This relationship was mediated by the fulfillment of the relational psychological contract.

Contingencias del Empleo Contingente: Contrato Psicológico, Inseguridad en el Puesto y Empleabilidad de los Trabajadores Contratados

Drawing on psychological contract literature, the present study examines the emerging contin- gent employment relationships, which involve the contracted workers, the employment agency and the client organization on whose premises these employees work. This sample includes eighty-eight white-col- lar employees working for four Portuguese agencies. The results suggest that the perceived fulfilment of clients obligations relates positively to the perceived fulfilment of agencys obligations and that these con- structs are independent of one another. Furthermore, as expected, we have found that the perception of job insecurity relates negatively to the fulfilment of agencys obligations. No relationship was found between employability and the perceived fulfilment of clients obligations. The results have implications for prac- Resumen. Basandonos en la literatura del contrato psicologico, el presente estudio examina la emergen- cia de relaciones de empleo contingentes, que implican a los trabajadores contratados, la agencia de empleo y la organizacion cliente en cuyas instalaciones trabajan los empleados. Esta muestra incluye 88 empleados de oficina, que trabajan para cuatro agencias portuguesas. Los resultados sugieren que el cum- plimiento percibido de las obligaciones del cliente se relaciona positivamente con el cumplimiento perci- bido de las obligaciones de la agencia y que estos constructos son independientes uno de otro. Ademas, como se esperaba, hemos encontrado que la percepcion de inseguridad en el trabajo se relaciona negativa- mente con el cumplimiento de las obligaciones de la agencia. No se encontraron relaciones entre la emple- abilidad y el cumplimiento percibido de obligaciones del cliente. Los resultados tienen implicaciones para la practica y la investigacion futura. Palabras clave: trabajadores contratados, empleo contingente, contrato psicologico, inseguridad laboral, empleabilidad.

Global Talent Management in Knowledge Intensive Firms in Europe and India

Considering the multinational dimension of numerous organisations, there is a growing concern with the management of talent at a global level. Accordingly, in this chapter, we focus on important theoretical and empirical research related to talent management in knowledge intensive firms, focusing specifically on Western Europe and India, especially the business process offshoring industry, with an aim to provide future research directions, as there is a vast gap in research in this area. We provide a thorough description of talent management strategies implemented in Western Europe and then move on to discuss the emerging talent management strategies in India, aiming to emphasise some specificities between the two regions. We additionally describe and analyse the talent flow patterns from Western Europe to India, and challenges for these European expatriates in India. Our overall aim is to understand the specific challenges of talent management focusing on the two regions, aiming to provide some hints to both researchers and practitioners.

Quality of working life of academics and researchers in the UK: the roles of contract type, tenure and university ranking

Quality of working life has been defined as the part of overall quality of life that is influenced by work. We developed a mediation model where home–work interface, job and career satisfaction, control at work, and working conditions are considered to be positively related to employee commitment and to the absence of stress at work. These two variables were ultimately related to general well-being. We considered possible differences between workers with different contract types (permanent vs. temporary), as well as the roles of tenure and average position of the University in the UK rankings. Quantitative survey data from 510 academics and researchers working in 8 British Universities were analysed via a multi-group analysis with structural equation modelling. Our model presented a good fit, and a bootstrapping analysis confirmed the significance of indirect effects. Significant differences were found between permanent and temporary workers and striking results were found regarding tenure.

Human resource management and performance at the Indian railways

High-performance-work-practices (HPWP) have been well documented within private organisations in developed country economies. Such practices, however, remain under-investigated in the public sector and in emerging economies. This paper aims to work towards filling this void, by empirically evaluating HPWP within an Indian public-sector undertaking (PSU), also the world’s largest commercial public sector employer: The Indian Railways.