Idea Group - e-Human.Resources Magement - Managing Knowledge People pdf

e-Human Resources

Management:

Managing Knowledge People

Teresa Torres-Coronas

Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Spain

Mario Arias-Oliva

Universitat Rovira Virgili, Spain

Hershey • London • Melbourne • Singapore

IDEA GROUP PUBLISHING

Acquisitions Editor: Mehdi Khosrow-Pour

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Printed at: Yurchak Printing Inc.

Published in the United States of America by

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Copyright © 2005 by Idea Group Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be repro￾duced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, without

written permission from the publisher.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

e-Human resources management : managing knowledge people / Teresa Torres-Coronas,

Mario Arias-Oliva, editors.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 1-59140-435-5 (h/c) -- ISBN 1-59140-436-3 (s/c) -- ISBN 1-59140-437-1 (eISBN)

1. Personnel management. 2. Information technology--Management. 3. Knowledge

management. I. Torres-Coronas, Teresa, 1966- II. Arias-Oliva, Mario, 1968-

HF5549.E14 2005

658.3'00285'4678--dc22

2004016385

British Cataloguing in Publication Data

A Cataloguing in Publication record for this book is available from the British Library.

All work contributed to this book is new, previously-unpublished material. The views expressed in

this book are those of the authors, but not necessarily of the publisher.

As we were writing this preface, Madrid went through one of the

worst days in its history. This is why we want to dedicate this

book to the memory of those who are no longer with us, to the

memory of those who lost their lives in the bomb attack on a train

in Madrid on March 11, 2004. They were going to work, struggling

to balance work and life; they were part of our human capital;

they were inimitable, irreplaceable, and very special assets…they

should be here.

Dedication

E-Human Resources

Management:

Managing Knowledge People

Table of Contents

Preface ................................................................................................. vii

SECTION I: THE CUTTING-EDGE IN HRM

Chapter I.

Web-Based Organizing in Traditional Brick-and-Mortar Companies:

The Impact on HR ................................................................................. 1

Jaap Paauwe, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands

Elaine Farndale, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands

Roger Williams, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands

Chapter II.

Integrating Handheld Computer Technology into HR Research and

Practice ................................................................................................. 31

Scott A. Davies, Hogan Assessment Systems, USA

Robert F. Calderón, Caliber Associates, Inc., USA

Chapter III.

Social Network Mapping Software: New Frontiers in HRM ............ 68

Mousumi Bhattacharya, Fairfield University, USA

Christopher Huntley, Fairfield University, USA

SECTION II: REDESIGNING HR ADMINISTRATIVE PROCESSES

Chapter IV.

E-Recruiting: Categories and Analysis of Fortune 100 Career

Web Sites ............................................................................................. 86

In Lee, Western Illinois University, USA

Chapter V.

Employee Self-Service HR Portal Case Study: Access, Content,

& Application ..................................................................................... 101

Andrew Stein, Victoria University, Australia

Paul Hawking, Victoria University, Australia

Chapter VI.

Human Resource Portals and the Protean Career: A Three-Factor

Model ................................................................................................. 122

Constant D. Beugré, Delaware State University, USA

SECTION III: E-LEARNING STRATEGIES

Chapter VII.

Keeping Up with the Corporate University: Resources for HRM

Faculty and Practitioners................................................................... 144

Pamela D. Sherer, Providence College, USA

Timothy Shea, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, USA

Chapter VIII.

E-Learning Strategies of Italian Companies .................................... 171

Anna Comacchio, University of Ca’ Foscari, Italy

Annachiara Scapolan, University of Ca’ Foscari, Italy

SECTION IV: MANAGING IT AND ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGES

Chapter IX.

Is Organizational e-Democracy Inevitable? The Impact of

Information Technologies on Communication Effectiveness .......... 206

Bernadette M. Watson, University of Queensland, Australia

Gavin M. Schwarz, University of New South Wales, Australia

Elizabeth Jones, Griffith University, Australia

Chapter X.

Managing and Practicing OD in an IT Environment: A Structured

Approach to Developing IT Project Teams ...................................... 236

Joseph Logan, AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals, USA

About the Authors.............................................................................. 269

Index ................................................................................................... 276

Preface

vii

Aim of This Book

In 1998, a highly innovative film, Antz, directed by Eric Darnell and Tim Johnson,

was released. In the first scene of the movie, Ant Z 4195 is talking to his

psychoanalyst and saying:

“…and my job, don’t get me started on, cause it really annoys me…I feel

physically inadequate, I, I, my whole life I’ve never been able to lift 10

times my own body weight and when you get down to it, handling dirt

is…yuck, you know is not my idea of a rewarding career. It’s this whole

gung-ho super-organism thing that I, I, you know I can’t get, I try but I

can’t get it. I mean you know, what is it, I’m supposed to do everything

for the colony, and what about my needs, what about me? I mean I gotta

believe there’s someplace out there that’s better than this! Otherwise I’d

just curl up in a larva position and weep! The whole system out there just

makes me feel...insignificant!”

Z 4195 is striving to reconcile his own individuality with the communal work

of the ant colony. Our unhappy and depressed ant is working for a traditional

hierarchical organization, where people are not treated as valuable assets and

IT systems are not yet implemented. Even worse, he is currently working for

an organization that may have neither examined people management prac￾tices, nor made a real connection between people and organizational perfor￾mance. While this behavior is still prevalent in many of today’s companies, we

are presenting a book about e-HRM, about how IT is changing traditional

HRM functions, about how e-HRM practices are implemented. Could this be

a paradox? We hope so, because as Junipier (1996) pointed out: “Paradox is

viii

an excellent creativity facilitator; it delivers a seismic jolt to dominant ideas,

themselves the most efficient suppressor of original thinking” (p. 19). We need

creative facilitators to develop the new e-HRM landscape.

The above presents one of our oldest concerns about managing people: Most

organizations are far from considering people as their most important asset.

They are also far from applying common sense practices such as those to be

found in Pfeffer’s book, The Human Equation (Harvard Business School

Press, 1996). These organizations are now entering the knowledge era, using

IT solutions to solve their old HRM problems in one out of 10 cases, and in an

uncreative way. Those in the world of HRM are being accused of living in an

ivory tower, managing the human side of their organizations in ways that lack

relevance in the new information era. The impetus for the HRM change comes

from recognition of recent developments in the HRM profession and a real￾ization that current practices do not reflect those changes, especially those

concerning IT strategies. The problem often results in policies, practices, and

strategies that may be outdated.

Organizations are progressively incorporating ITCs into their processes, using

different tools and solutions. These tools are applied in a wide variety of ways

(i.e., manufacturing resource planning, office automation, computer-supported

cooperative work, distributed teams, supply chain, enterprise-wide resource

planning, or virtual integration). The entry into service of the first high-capac￾ity transatlantic cable in 1956 and the launch of Sputnik in 1957 marked the

beginnings of the era of global information exchange. In 1956, for the first

time in history, the number of white-collar workers exceeded that of blue￾collar workers (Naisbitt, 1984).

The factor we would stress in this growth in TICs is not the increase in the

amount, capacity, or inter-connectivity of technology in organizations. The

strategic key lies in the organization’s ability to integrate these technologies

into their current business processes, and also in their ability to reorganize the

said processes (Orlikowski, 1999, p. 3). And this is what this book is all

about.

Content of This Book

e-HRM: Managing Knowledge People responds to the challenge of docu￾menting recognizable, innovative, and creative approaches to e-HRM. Its aim

is to define and carry forward the debate in a complex and versatile matter.

ix

Future research will continue the process of clarifying and documenting the

evolution of e-HRM. In the meantime, however, human resources manage￾ment researchers, faculty, practitioners, and consultants may find the ideas

and experiences offered in this book genuinely helpful and illuminating.

This book is presented in four sections — the first intended to be more gen￾eral in nature, the following three devoted to specific aspects of the HRM field

in the new information era. Section I, The Cutting-Edge in HRM, presents an

overview of how ITCs are modifying general HRM processes and functions.

This is the aim of the first three contributions.

In the first chapter, Web-Based Organizing in Traditional Brick-and-Mor￾tar Companies: The Impact on HR, Jaap Paauwe, Elaine Farndale, and

Roger Williams, based mostly on their personal experience, focus on how old

economy organizations are developing new business models. These models

are changing both customers’ and suppliers’ relationships with the organiza￾tion and, of course, e-commerce strategy as a whole. With these new models

being implemented, the potential implications for HRM need to be explored.

The effects of Web-based organizing in HRM, including workers’ selection,

training and development, learning, trust-building within an organization, and

knowledge sharing, among others, are discussed. One relevant conclusion of

their analysis is that “internal improvements, necessary for the successful trans￾ference of business to the Internet, will enable the HR function to justify its

existence in financial terms.”

Scott A. Davis and Robert F. Calderón, in their chapter Integrating Handheld

Computer Technology into HR Research and Practice, present potential

applications of handheld computers for HR practice and research. They an￾ticipate major improvements and widespread implementation of wireless net￾works with resulting implications for worker mobility, availability, and com￾munication. These factors will impact work planning, schedules, conducting

meetings, organizational data sharing, and an optimum balance between work

and life. Their model, which integrates empirical research and practical

knowledge, will be useful for those researchers and practitioners eager

to explore handheld computer technology applied to strategic HR plan￾ning and management.

Mousumi Bhattacharya and Christopher L. Huntley’s chapter, Social Net￾work Mapping Software: New Frontiers in HRM, discuss the connections

between social network mapping software and the effectiveness of HRM pro￾grams. Their study is based upon research into social networks and the ef￾fects of these networks on both business processes and HRM. The authors

clearly show the uses of information on social networks in HRM processes

x

and what information is generated by social network mapping software (SNMS).

They classify the functionality offered by SNMS in the categories of data

collection, descriptive modeling, and decision support. They also discuss how

each of these functions provides information relevant to different HRM func￾tions.

Section II, Redesigning HR Administrative Processes, explains how some

HRM functions, such as e-recruitment and developing appropriate systems

for employee relationships, are being implemented in the knowledge era.

As hiring qualified employees is a critical organizational decision in the knowl￾edge-based economy, In Lee, in his chapter E-Recruiting: Categories and

Analysis of Fortune 100 Career Web Sites, analyzes the corporate career

Web sites of the Fortune 100 companies. He identifies 33 attributes that char￾acterize corporate career Web sites and groups them into four major areas:

recruiting methods, job search tools, job application tools, and information on

organizational attributes. Knowing how other organizations are using Web

sites to recruit their human capital is a first step towards finding breakthrough

ideas for one’s own organization.

In the next chapter, Employee Self-Service HR Portal Case Study: Access,

Content, & Application, Andrew Stein and Paul Hawking examine the de￾velopment of the human resources (HR) ESS portal. Without any doubt, the

added value in this chapter consists of the case studies of three Australian

organizations that have implemented an ESS portal. The authors show the

information and process focus of these organizations’ ESS portals, which are

used to place the organizations into Brosche’s (2002) portal development

model.

Focusing on the development of human resources, Constant D. Beugré’s chap￾ter, Human Resource Portals and the Protean Career: A Three-Factor

Model, develops a three-point model (individual attributes, characteristics of

the human resource portals, and organizational factors) to describe the fac￾tors in the effective use of Web-based human resource services. On the basis

of this model, he argues that the effective use of Web-based human resource

services plays an important role in the management of the protean career.

As organizations have started to recognize e-learning as having the power to

transform the performance, knowledge, and skills landscape (Gunasekaran,

McNeil, & Shaul, 2002, p. 44), Section III, E-Learning Strategies, concen￾trates on the e-training and e-learning world.

Pamela D. Sherer and Timothy Shea, in their chapter Keeping Up with the

Corporate University: Resources for HRM Faculty and Practitioners, dis-

xi

cuss the major factors that influence the growth and role of the corporate

university within organizations: in terms of strategy and human resources,

knowledge management, and technology and e-learning. They also include in

their chapter an annotated compendium of key resources in each of these

areas, especially Internet resources. These resources are a good starting point

to begin digging deeper into this rapidly changing subject.

E-Learning Strategies of Italian Companies, a chapter by Anna Comacchio

and Annachiara Scapolan, is devoted to the empirical study of country-spe￾cific e-learning models, focusing on the e-learning experience of Italian com￾panies in the pharmaceutical and banking industries. How are companies imple￾menting e-learning? How are they analyzing the most important features of the

e-learning strategies: users, contents, infrastructure, and service and support?

The two cases presented will help the reader to answer these questions.

Section IV, Managing IT and Organizational Changes, discusses the pro￾cesses for achieving success when implementing IT solutions within organiza￾tions.

In the chapter, Is Organizational e-Democracy Inevitable? The Impact of

Information Technologies on Communication Effectiveness, Bernadette

M. Watson, Gavin M. Schwarz, and Elizabeth Jones consider the relation￾ships between social identity and e-democracy. They also discuss the inevita￾bility of organizational e-democracy in organizations pursuing information tech￾nology changes. They investigate perceptions of changes in effective commu￾nication during the implementation of organizational change in a hospital. Their

findings are discussed in terms of the implications that arise for HR practitio￾ners.

Finally, Joseph Logan, in his chapter Managing and Practicing OD in an IT

Environment: A Structured Approach to Developing IT Project Teams,

outlines a framework for improving success in IT projects by leveraging the

organization development (OD) practitioner’s expertise in fostering coopera￾tion and learning in teams. In the author’s opinion, failures in IT projects are

caused by a lack of integration of OD and IT.

In summary, this book’s content sets out to highlight the trends in theory and

practice which are likely to influence human resource management practices

in the IT era, to examine innovative e-HR strategies from a variety of empiri￾cal and theory-based perspectives, to provide insightful analysis, and to pro￾mote the discovery and dissemination of innovative theories and best prac￾tices. But there are important strategic HRM issues missing, such as, for ex￾ample: e-work and teleworking, the development of new industrial relations

xii

models, managing the e-workforce in multinational organizations, e-ethics, or

managing values and IT. Of course, some critical reflections on competencies

and abilities should have been considered (i.e., IT competencies for an HR

manager, e-leadership and e-team skills, e-facilitation and e-coaching, e-trust,

or e-creativity — developing skills of creative application of IT on organiza￾tions). So, there is still a lot work to do!

The Book’s Audience

e-HRM: Managing Knowledge People presents insights gained by leading

professionals from the practice, research, and consulting side of the e-HRM

field. This book should be useful to a variety of constituencies who are inter￾ested in the interrelationships between human resources management and IT,

including managers who treat their personnel as a key factor for organizational

success, leaders wishing to develop the human side of their organizations, IT

experts, human resources managers, researchers, consultants, and practitio￾ners. Each audience may have different levels of interest in the theoretical

concepts, practical experiences, and empirical data presented in this book.

As we are exploring an evolving discipline, we assume that any of these read￾ers will begin, but not complete, an exploration of the e-HRM new world.

Enjoy the reading and enjoy the learning!

References

Brosche, C. (2002). Designing the corporate portal. Masters Thesis, De￾partment of Computer Science, University of Gothenburg, Sweden.

Gunasekaran, A., McNeil, R.D., & Shaul, D. (2002). E-learning: Research

and applications. Industrial and Commercial Training, 34(2), 44-53.

Junipier, D. (1996). Human resource and creativity. Work Study, 45(7), 15-

22.

Naisbitt (1984). Megatrends. New York: Warner Bros.

Orlikowski, W. (1999). The truth is not out there: An enacted view of the

digital economy. Understanding the digital economy—Data, tools,

and research. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Commerce.

xiii

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With gratitude, love, and respect we thank…

Our publisher, Idea Group Inc., who supported this project and, of course,

Jennifer Sundstrom, for her great job during the complex work of editing this

book. Both our contributors and reviewers. The contents of this book were

made possible because of contributors and the generous cooperation and valu￾able suggestions given by the reviewers. We are indebted to them for sharing

their knowledge with us. All those working to expand and enhance scientific

knowledge in the field of human resources management and IT, and who have

contributed — and continue to do so — to the development of guidelines to

achieve more efficient, effective management.

And last but not least:

To my beloved husband Jordi and my charming sons Arnau and Jordi,

who have made my life a fascinating journey. (Teresa’s special thanks)

To my wife, Mar, who has always supported me. (Mario’s special thanks)

Teresa Torres-Coronas & Mario Arias-Oliva

March 11, 2004

Section I

The Cutting-Edge

in HRM