The (potential) demise of HRM?

• Date: 01 July 2018
• Author: Tony Dundon,Anthony Rafferty
• Published date: 01 July 2018
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/1748-8583.12195

PROVOCATION PAPER

The (potential) demise of HRM?

Tony Dundon |Anthony Rafferty

Work and Equalities Institute, Alliance

Manchester Business School, University of

Manchester

Correspondence

Tony Dundon, Work and Equalities Institute,

Alliance Manchester Business School,

University of Manchester, UK.

Email: tony.dundon@manchester.ac.uk

Abstract

This article seeks to provoke that human resource man-

agement (HRM), both as an academic field of study and

as a form of professional practice, is at risk of

impoverishment. The main reasoning for this is because

of ideological individualism and marketisation with an

attendant neglect on wider organisational, employee, and

societal concerns. Following a review of the context of

financialised capitalism, three contemporary developments

in HRM are used to illustrate the argument: reward strat-

egies, talent management, and high performance work

systems. Implications for the practice of HRM and the

way the subject area is taught in mainstream business

schools are considered.

KEYWORDS

financialisation, HRM education, hyper‐individualism, reward, talent

management

1|INTRODUCTION

The first wave of provocations in this journal suggest the subject of human resource management (HRM) is in a

state of unrest: it has been plagued with conceptual problems (Thompson, 2011), theory is mostly inadequate

to fully explain the links to performance (Guest, 2011), and the intellectual space may have been colonised by

uncritical positivistic psychology (Godard, 2014). Alongside these provocations are the voices of others. Kochan

(2007) warns of a crisis of legitimacy for the profession, having failed to establish authority among higher execu-

tives. Marchington (2015) argues that the human resource (HR) function has been “too busy looking up”(to the

boardroom) by focusing on short‐term performance metrics to the neglect of long‐standing values and concerns

of other stakeholders.

In this provocation, we advance the argument that HRM is at risk of intellectual and professional impoverishment

because of a pro‐market ontology rather than a more inclusive pro‐business orientation. By pro‐business, we mean a

focus on longer‐term sustainability of both organisations and people, rather than just immediate shareholder interests

of profit‐taking. As an approach, it embraces a fuller recognition of the interests of wider stakeholders beyond share-

holders, including employees and community groups. The pro‐business idea we advocate has potential contributions

Received: 28 October 2016 Revised: 27 January 2018 Accepted: 4 March 2018

DOI: 10.1111/1748-8583.12195

Hum Resour Manag J. 2018;28:377–391. © 2018 John Wiley & Sons Ltdwileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/hrmj 377