Building a Workforce: the

Challenge of Interest Alignment

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
 Lecture outline

Goal: To discuss the challenges that managers face in

aligning their interests with those of workers as they try
to build and renew a workforce

Content:
• Talent management: building and renewing a workforce
• Job quality and organisational attractiveness

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
 Talent management: definition and issues

Talent management covers the ways in which managers try to

construct and renew the kind of workforce their organisation needs

Decisions about the quantity and quality of the workforce have

major impacts on the outcomes of HRM

In terms of quantity, both under-staffing and over-staffing are

dangerous in terms of their economic consequences

In terms of quality, a poor mix of human capabilities will seriously

compromise the firm’s performance

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
Talent management: labour shortages and talent
inflows
A failure to recruit and retain sufficient numbers of suitably qualified
people compromises the firm’s ability to meet its customers’ needs
and constrains its ability to grow: with consequences for profit

Problems of labour shortages are primarily dealt with through

recruitment and selection, which are concerned with the in-flow of
talent and are sometimes called the ‘buy’ option in human capital

Question: What is meant by ‘employer branding’ and what is an

‘employment value proposition’ (EVP)? In what kind of conditions
can firms struggle to develop an attractive EVP?

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
 Talent management: labour surpluses and
organisational viability

On the other side of the coin, over-staffing an

organisation is also a strategic threat because it, too, can
directly cut into the firm’s profitability and affect its
financial viability, as the GFC of 2008-9 demonstrated

Question: To minimise the impact of downsizing on the

firm’s reputation, what kind of practices can managers
put in place to deal with major fluctuations in their firm’s
needs for labour?

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
Talent management: the quality of human talent

The quality of the talent in a workforce is also decisive

for its success, as shown in Figure 5.1, which
categorises the workforce according to the current
performance and long-run potential of the individuals in it

Question: what are the strengths and limitations of the

kind of framework shown in Figure 5.1?

Question: what is meant by (a) a talent blockage, (b) a

talent ghetto, (c) a talent spiral, (d) a pivotal position?

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
 Figure 5.1 Mapping the quality of performance and potential in a workforce

Solid citizens Stars

Performance
Marginal performers
Burnt out or
disempowered
employees
Chronic underachievers

Potential

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
 Talent management: enhancement through
training, development and performance appraisal
In-flow activities in talent management are inevitably complemented
with some use of the ‘make’ option: developing the people who are
already in place

On-the-job training is a way of facilitating, or channelling, the natural

human propensity to learn. It is commonplace in organisations

Question: In what circumstances, and for whom, do managers

typically complement on-the-job training with more costly types of
investment in training and employee development?

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
Talent enhancement through training, development
and performance appraisal …
Performance appraisal (PA) systems, which involve formal methods
of planning and evaluating employee performance, are growing, at
least in the UK

It is typical for PA systems to include some form of planning for

employee development

Question: Why are managerial intentions in the PA area so often

associated with disappointing outcomes?

Question: What political issues arise with PA systems and what can
senior managers do about them?

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
 Job quality and organisational attractiveness

To really understand talent management, however, we must turn the

tables and examine how workers view the quality of jobs and the
attractiveness of organisations

If managers wish to foster alignment between individuals and

organisations, they need a theory of what employees are seeking:
what needs are workers trying to meet and what do they consider a
good bargain for their talents?

The extent to which employment relationships are mutually

beneficial is very variable

It is particularly damaging for a firm if it continually loses talented

people from roles that are critical to the organisation’s success

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
Job quality and organisational attractiveness: the
intrinsic quality of work

People differ in the kinds of work they find attractive or a meaningful

use of their time. Some people will only consider work for which they
have a consuming passion or a sense of calling

Question: What are Holland’s (1973) six vocational types? What

implications do they have for matching people to jobs?

Whatever their vocational preferences, people generally prefer jobs

that deploy the skills they have developed (‘skill utilisation’)

Question: Why might hairdressers have higher job satisfaction than

lawyers?

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
Job quality and organisational attractiveness: the
intrinsic quality of work…

Several theoretical traditions recognise the scope for employee

control as central to the quality of working life, enabling employees
‘to make use of their individual creativity in work and to develop their
abilities over time’ (Gallie 2007: 212)

Question: What are the 4 categories in Karasek’s (1979) demand-

control model of job strain?

Question: In which category is learning and development argued to

be the greatest? Why?

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
Job quality and organisational attractiveness: the
intrinsic quality of work…

The Job Demands Resources (JDR) framework (Demerouti et al

2001) builds on, and enlarges, the Karasek model and is now a very
valuable way of analysing the balance between the demands on an
individual at work and the resources they have available to them

Question: What two processes and what two outcome variables are
central to the JDR framework?

Question: What is the distinction between challenge demands and

hindrance demands? Can you see any difficulties with this
distinction?

Question: What role can social support play in enhancing job

quality?

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
Job quality and organisational attractiveness:
the extrinsic quality of work

T able 5.1 Job facet priorities of B ritish w orkers

Job facet priorities Chosen first % Chosen second %

The actual work 27 18
Job security 25 18
Pay 22 26
Using initiative 10 13
Good relations with manager 8 13

Source: A d a p te d fro m R o se (2 0 0 3 ).

Question: What does Rose’s (2003) survey tell us about the

relative importance of intrinsic and extrinsic factors in the quality
of work?

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
Job quality and organisational attractiveness: the
extrinsic quality of work …

Job security is a very important extrinsic motivator

Economic crisis and uncertainty have made feelings of insecurity

pervasive and have made gaining, and retaining, a permanent job
more important to people

Question: What does Guy Standing (2011) mean by the term, the
‘precariat’, and what impacts are there on people’s well-being and
place in society when they are members of it?

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
Job quality and organisational attractiveness: the
extrinsic quality of work …

Pay is also a very important extrinsic motivator. There are three

objectives that pay theorists have traditionally advocated:
• External equity – paying competitively in the labour market in order
to recruit and retain suitable people
• Internal equity – a fair system of internal pay relativities between
jobs of differing demands (which can involve ‘job evaluation’)
• Performance equity – paying more to higher performing
employees (which may involve merit pay or bonus systems)

Questions:
1. What is a ‘honey trap’ and what are its likely consequences?
2. What tensions can occur between external and internal equity in
pay systems and how should these be managed?
3. What are ‘perverse incentives’ and how have they been a
problem in the banking industry?

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave
 Lecture conclusions

1. Managers in all firms are engaged in an ongoing process of

constructing and renewing a workforce (talent management)
2.There are major risks associated with under-staffing or talent
shortages and with over-staffing or talent surpluses
3. Organisations in which there are talent blockages, talent
ghettos or chronic, unaddressed problems of human
performance perform less effectively
4. Managers that address these challenges more effectively
are those who are more attuned to questions of mutuality or
reciprocity in employment relationships. They appreciate the
importance of interest alignment
5. This involves an understanding of the intrinsic and extrinsic
factors that attract individuals to jobs and to organisations.
There are valuable theories and frameworks that can help us
to better understand these factors and the relationships among
them

Boxall and Purcell (2016) Strategy and Human Resource Management. 4th Edition. Palgrave