Human Resource Management 8e by Beardwell, Thompson

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Human Resource Management 8e by Beardwell, Thompson is the 8th edition of the Human Resource Management: A Contemporary Approach textbook edited by Julie Beardwell and Amanda Thompson, De Montfort University, Leicester, and published by Pearson Education Limited, Harlow, United Kingdom in 2017.

  • Academy Schools. State-maintained independent schools set up with the help of external sponsors -- usually business, religious or voluntary organisations.
  • Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS). Founded in 1975, aims to improve employment relations. It provides information, advice and training and will work with employers and employees to solve problems.
  • ACFTU. The All China Federation of Trade Unions.
  • Added value. Technically the difference between the value of a firm's inputs and its outputs; the additional value is added through the deployment and efforts of the firm's resources. Can be defined as FVA (financial value added), CVA (customer value added) and PVA (people value added).
  • AEL. Accreditation of Experiential Learning.
  • Alienation. Marx suggests it is a condition in which a worker loses power to control the performance, processes and product of his/her labour. Thus the very worker becomes a thing rather than a human being, in which state they experience powerlessness, meaninglessness, isolation and self-estrangement.
  • Androgogy. 'The art and science of helping adults learn' (Knowles et al., 1984).
  • Annualised hours contract. Relatively novel form of employment contract that offers management, and sometimes workers, a considerable degree of flexibility. The hours that an employee works can be altered within a very short time frame within a day, a week, or even a month. So long as the total hours worked do not exceed the contractually fixed annual amount an employee can be asked and expected to work from zero up to anything in excess of 80 hours in any one week.
  • APL. Accreditation of Prior Learning.
  • Appraisal. The process through which an assessment is made of an employee by another person using quantitative and/or qualitative assessments.
  • Appraisal (360 degree). A system of appraisal which seeks feedback from 'all directions' -- superiors, subordinates, peers and customers.
  • Attitude survey. Survey, usually conducted by questionnaire, to elicit employees' opinions about issues to do with their work and the organisation.
  • Balanced scorecard. An integrated framework for balancing shareholder and strategic goals, and extending these balanced performance measures down the organisation.
  • BERR. Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform, now part of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills -- see BIS.
  • Best fit. Models of HRM that focus on alignment between HRM and business strategy and the external context of the firm. Tend to link or 'fit' generic type business strategies to generic HRM strategies.
  • Best practice. A 'set' or number of human resource practices that have the potential to enhance organisational performance when implemented. Usually categorised as 'high commitment', 'high involvement' or 'high performance'.
  • BIS. Department for Business, Innovation and Skills.
  • Broadbanding. Pay systems which have a wide range of possible pay levels within them. Unlike traditional narrow systems, there is normally a high degree of overlap across the grades.
  • BS 5750. British standard of quality, originally applied to the manufacture of products but now also being used to 'measure' quality of service. Often used in employee involvement (EI) as a way of getting employees to selfcheck their quality of work against a standardised norm.
  • Bundles. A coherent combination of human resource practices that are horizontally integrated.
  • Business process re-engineering (BPR). System that aims to improve performance by redesigning the processes through which an organisation operates, maximising their value-added content and minimising everything else (Peppard and Rowland, 1995: 20).
  • Cabinet Office. A senior government department alongside the Treasury, the Cabinet Office supports the Prime Minister, the Cabinet and the Civil Service in managing government policy.
  • Career. 'The evolving sequence of a person's work experiences over time' (Arthur et al., 1989: 8); 'the individual's development in learning and work throughout life' (Collin and Watts, 1996: 393).
  • Causal ambiguity. The cause or source of an organisation's competitive advantage is ambiguous or unclear, particularly to the organisation's competitors.
  • CBI. Confederation of British Industry. Powerful institution set up in 1965 to promote and represent the interests of British industry. Financed by subscription and made up of employers' associations, national business associations and over 10,000 affiliated companies. Works to advise and negotiate with the government and the Trades Union Congress.
  • CCT. Compulsory competitive tendering.
  • Chaos and complexity theories. In contrast to traditional science, these more recent theories draw attention to the uncertainty, non-linearity and unpredictability that result from the interrelatedness and interdependence of the elements of the universe.
  • CIPD. Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development -- the professional organisation for human resource and personnel managers and those in related fields such as training and development. Website: www.cipd.co.uk.
  • Closed system. System that does not interact with other subsystems or its environment.
  • Collective bargaining. Process utilised by trade unions, as the representatives of employees, and management, as the representatives of employers, to establish the terms and conditions under which labour will be employed.
  • Competence. 'The ability to perform the activities within an occupational area to the levels of performance expected in employment' (Training Commission, 1988).
  • Competences. Behavioural repertoires that people input to a job, role or organisation context, and which employees need to bring to a role to perform to the required level (see also Core competences).
  • Competency-based pay. An approach to reward based on the attainment of skills or talents by individuals in relation to a specific task at a certain standard.
  • Competitive advantage. The ability of an organisation to add more value for its customers than its rivals, and therefore gain a position of advantage in the marketplace.
  • Configurational approach. An approach that identified the benefits of identifying a set of horizontally integrated HR practices that were aligned to the business strategy, thus fitting the internal and external context of the business.
  • Constructivism. Concerned with individual experience and emphasises the individual's cognitive processes.
  • Contingent pay. Elements of the reward package which are contingent on other events (performance, merit, attendance) and are awarded at the discretion of the management.
  • Cooperatives. Organisations and companies that are collectively owned either by their customers or by their employees.
  • Core competences. Distinctive skills and knowledge, related to product, service or technology, that can be used to gain competitive advantage.
  • Corporate governance. The set of systems, principles and processes by which a company is governed.
  • Cost minimisation. This refers to a managerial approach that perceives human resources as costs to be controlled as tightly as possible. HR practices are likely to include low wages, minimal training, close supervision and no employee voice mechanisms.
  • CPSA. Civil and Public Servants Association.
  • Culture. The prevailing pattern of values, attitudes, beliefs, assumptions, norms and sentiments.
  • Danwei. Work units around which social and economic organisation was structured and were central to the state owned enterprises in Communist China.
  • DCSF. Department for Children, Schools and Families.
  • DfES. Department for Education and Skills now subsumed into the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills -- see BIS.
  • Deskilling. The attempt by management to appropriate and monopolise workers' knowledge of production in an effort to control the labour process. To classify, tabulate and reduce this knowledge to rules, laws and formulae, which are then allocated to workers on a daily basis.
  • DETR. Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions.
  • Development. The process of becoming increasingly complex, more elaborate and differentiated, by virtue of learning and maturation, resulting in new ways of acting and responding to the environment.
  • Development centres. Normally used for the selection of managers. They utilise a range of intensive psychological tests and simulations to assess management potential.
  • Discourse. The shared language, metaphors, stories that give members of a group their particular way of interpreting reality.
  • Disengagement. The converse of engagement. Employees feel psychologically remote from the organisational values and isolated from other employees.
  • DIUS. Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills. Now part of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills -- see BIS.
  • Downsizing. Possibly the simplest explanation is given by Heery and Noon (2001: 90) as 'getting rid of employees'. A modern 'buzzword' used to indicate the reduction of employment within organisations.
  • Double-loop learning. See Single-loop learning.
  • DTI Department for. Trade and Industry, now subsumed into the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills -- see BIS.
  • Dual system. German system of vocational training for apprentices, which combines off-the-job training at vocational colleges with on-the-job training under the tutelage of meister (skilled craft) workers.
  • Efficiency. The sound management of resources within a business in order to maximise the return on investment.
  • Efficiency wages. Wages paid above the market rate to attract better workers, induce more effort and reduce turnover and training costs.
  • Effectiveness. The ability of an organisation to meet the demands and expectations of its various stakeholders, albeit some more than others.
  • EHRC. Equality and Human Rights Commission, UK statutory body with a remit to promote and monitor human rights; and to protect, enforce and promote equality across the nine 'protected' grounds -- age, disability, gender, race, religion and belief, pregnancy and maternity, marriage and civil partnership, sexual orientation and gender reassignment.
  • EI. Employee involvement; a term to describe the wide variety of schemes in which employees can be involved in their work situation.
  • EIRO. European Industrial Relations Observatory -- produces regular reports on employment relations in EU Member States.
  • e-Learning. Use of new technology such as e-mail, the internet, intranets and computer software packages to facilitate learning for employees.
  • Emergent. Strategies which emerge over time, sometimes with an element of trial and error. Some emergent strategies are incremental changes with embedded learning, others may be adaptive in response to external environmental changes.
  • Employability. The acquisition and updating of skills, experience, reputation -- the investment in human capital -- to ensure that the individual remains employable, and not dependent upon a particular organisation.
  • Empowerment. Recent term that encompasses EI (employee involvement) initiatives to encourage the workforce to have direct individual and collective control over their work processes, taking responsibility for improved customer service to both internal and external customers. Generally confined to workplace-level issues and concerns.
  • Engagement. Generally seen as an internal state of being -- physical, mental and emotional -- that brings together earlier concepts of work effort, organisational commitment, job satisfaction and 'flow' (or optimal experience).
  • Enterprise unions. Japanese concept of employee unions associated with only one enterprise and the only one recognised by the company. One of the 'three pillars' of the Japanese employment system.
  • Epistemology. The assumptions made about the world which form the basis for knowledge.
  • ESOPS. Employee share option scheme, whereby employees are allowed to purchase company shares or are given them as part of a bonus.
  • ET. Employment training.
  • Ethnic penalties. The economic and non-economic disadvantages black and minority ethnic groups experience in the labour market compared to non-ethnic minority groups of the same human and social capital.
  • EU. European Union, so named in 1992 (formerly EC).
  • Exit policy. Policy/procedures that facilitate prompt and orderly recovery or removal of failing institutions through timely and corrective action. There were restrictions placed on closure and retrenchment in view of the social costs and their political ramifications that are now being eased.
  • Factor of production. An input into the production process. Factors of production were traditionally classified as land (raw materials), capital (buildings, equipment, machinery) and labour. Labour is usually seen as a variable factor of production because labour inputs can be varied quite easily at short notice, unlike capital, the amount of which cannot be varied easily in the short run. Internalising the employment relationship transforms labour into a quasi-fixed factor of production because it restricts the employer's freedom to cut jobs at short notice.
  • FIEs. Foreign invested enterprises.
  • Firm-specific skills. Skills that can be used in only one or a few particular organisations.
  • Fit. The level of integration between an organisation's business strategy and its human resource policies and practices. 'Fit' tends to imply a top-down relationship between the strategy makers and the strategy implementers.
  • Forked lightning. The Mae West Language and concepts used by city financiers working on the international currency and commodity markets. Used to describe the patterns formed by fluctuating price movements as they get represented on dealers' screens.
  • Foundation schools. State-financed schools that own school land and other physical assets of the school, are the employers of school staff and which have authority over admissions.
  • FSB. Federation of Small Businesses.
  • FTSE. The FTSE Group provides a series of indices (measures) relating to share prices and other aspects of economic activity. The FTSE100 index is an index of the share prices of the top 100 firms by share value.
  • Functional flexibility. The ability of management to redeploy workers across tasks. Functional flexibility can be horizontal -- redeployment across tasks at the same level of skill, and/or vertical -- the ability to perform tasks at different (higher) levels of skill.
  • GDP. Gross domestic product -- a measure of the total value of goods and services produced within a country, excluding income from investments abroad.
  • Glass ceiling. Metaphor used to describe the barrier facing women who seek to gain access to senior management positions, often women can see the jobs at the very top but find there is an impenetrable barrier which prevents them securing the positions.
  • Globalisation. A controversial term that has generated considerable debate as to its meaning. Generally seen to involve increased internationalisation of investment and production, the growing importance of multinational companies and the emergence of transnational regulation of economic activity.
  • GNVQs. General National Vocational Qualifications.
  • Guanxi. Chinese term that refers to the concept of drawing on connections or networks to secure favours in personal or business relations.
  • Hard HRM. A view of HRM that identifies employees as a cost to be minimised, and tends to focus on 'flexibility techniques' and limited investment in learning and development (see also Soft HRM).
  • Hegemony. The imposition upon others of a powerful group's interpretation of reality.
  • High-commitment management. Used to describe a set of HR practices aimed at enhancing the commitment, quality and flexibility of employees.
  • High-performance work practices. A term that gained currency in the 1990s that sought to link bundles of HR practices with outcomes in terms of increased employee commitment and performance which in turn enhances the firm's sustained competitive advantage, efficiency and profitability.
  • HMSO. Her Majesty's Stationery Office. Publishers of parliamentary proceedings, official government documents and reports. Privatised in 1996 and now known as The Stationery Office (TSO).
  • Holistic. Treatment of organisations, situations, problems as totalities or wholes as opposed to a specific, reductionist approach.
  • Horizontal integration. Level of alignment across and within functions, such that all functional policies and practices are integrated and congruent with one another.
  • HRD. Human resource development.
  • Hukou. The household registration system required by law in China that provides residency entitlement and citizenship rights to its citizens.
  • Human capital. The knowledge, skill and attitudes, the intangible contributions to high performance, that make employees assets to the organisation.
  • Human relations. Associated with the pioneering work of Roethlisberger and Dickson, Elton Mayo and others, who studied the importance of community and collective values in work organisations. These studies first identified that management needed to attend to the 'social needs' of employees.
  • ICT. Information and communication technology.
  • Ideology. The set of ideas and beliefs that underpins interpretations of reality.
  • IIP. Investors in People.
  • ILO. International Labour Organization. International body set up in 1919 to promote employment rights and decent employment standards. Now an agency of the United Nations.
  • IMS. The Institute of Manpower Studies. Located at the University of Sussex.
  • Independent Pay Review Bodies. These are in place to offer expert advice to the government on the pay of certain groups of public-sector employees: armed forces, doctors and dentists, school teachers, certain groups of NHS nursing and healthcare staff, police officers and highly paid public officials such as judges and senior civil servants.
  • Indexation. Procedure linking pay, pensions or other financial benefits to changes in the retail price index to protect against inflation or in some cases to the growth of average earnings to protect the relative as well as the absolute value of pay, etc.
  • Informal labour. Workers without any legal, employment or social security benefits provided by the employers. They are often the most vulnerable, poor and exploited segment of workers.
  • Institutions. Social structures and processes of a society and structure, its social patterns and norms. They are historically embedded and constitute the social organisation and economy of a country.
  • Institutional vacuum/representation gap. Situation in which collective bargaining is no longer the dominant form of establishing terms and conditions of employment, but no recognisable or regulated channel of employee representation or employee voice has emerged to replace it.
  • Intellectual capital. The hidden value, and capital, tied up in an organisation's people (knowledge, skills and competencies), which can be a key source of competitive advantage and differentiate it from its competitors.
  • Iron rice bowl. The system of lifelong employment, wage equality and comprehensive welfare provision for workers in China.
  • IRDAC. Industrial Research and Development Advisory Committee of the Commission of the European Communities.
  • IRS. Industrial Relations Services. A data gathering and publications bureau that collects and analyses movement in key variables of importance to the study and practice of industrial relations.
  • ITBs Industrial. Training Boards. Set up in 1964 to monitor training in various sectors of the economy. Most were abolished in 1981, but a few still survive.
  • JCC. Joint consultative committee; body made up of employee representatives and management, which meets regularly to discuss issues of common interest.
  • Job enlargement. Related to job rotation, whereby a job is made bigger by the introduction of new tasks. This gives greater variety in job content and thereby helps to relieve monotony in repetitive jobs such as assembly line working.
  • Job enrichment. Adds to a cycle of work not only a variety of tasks but also increased responsibility to workers. Most associated with autonomous work groups introduced into Volvo's Kalmar plant in Sweden in the 1970s.
  • Job rotation. Originally introduced in the 1970s for members of a team to exchange jobs to enliven work interest, but also used recently to promote wider skills experience and flexibility among employees.
  • JV. Joint venture.
  • Keiretsu. A form of inter-company organisation in Japan that consists of a set of companies that hold shares in each other and have shared business relationships.
  • Knowledge-based age. Reflects the move to a global environment, where tacit and explicit knowledge becomes a key source of competitive advantage for organisations.
  • Knowledge-based organisation. One that manages the generation of new knowledge through learning, capturing knowledge and experience, sharing, collaborating and communicating, organising information and using and building on what is known.
  • Labour process. The application of human labour to raw materials in the production of goods and services that are later sold on the free market. Labour is paid a wage for its contribution, but capital must ensure that it secures value added over and above what it is paying for. Some call this efficiency. Others prefer the term 'exploitation'.
  • Learning. Complex cognitive, physical and affective process that results in the capacity for changed performance.
  • Learning cycle. Learning seen as a process having different identifiable phases. Effective learning may be facilitated if methods appropriate to the various phases are used.
  • Learning style. Individuals differ in their approaches to learning, and prefer one mode of learning, or phase of the learning cycle, to others.
  • Learning organisation (LO). 'A Learning Company is an organisation that facilitates the learning of all its members and consciously transforms itself and its context' (Pedler et al., 1997: 3).
  • LECs. Local Enterprise Companies. Locally based agencies in Scotland whose function is to promote training and business and wider economic development. There are 22 in existence. For the UK see LSC.
  • Leverage. The exploitation by an organisation of its resources to their full extent. Often linked to the notion of stretching resources.
  • Licence-quota regime. The practice in a state-regulated economy where a business has to obtain permission to manufacture (licence) as well as the quantity to produce (quota) from the licensing authority (state) before commencing production.
  • Lifetime employment. Japanese concept whereby in large corporations employees are guaranteed a job for life in exchange for loyalty to the organisation. One of the 'three pillars' of the Japanese employment system.
  • Living wage. Promoted by the Living Wage Foundation, the living wage is based on the amount an individual needs to earn to cover the basic costs of living. The living wage differs from the minimum wage in that the latter is set by law (see National Minimum Wage) yet can fail to be sufficient to meet requirements for a basic quality of life.
  • Loose labour market. Sometimes called a 'surplus' labour market, where unemployment is running high and labour supply exceeds demand.
  • LMS. Local management of schools.
  • LSC. Learning and Skills Council. Set up in 2001 to replace the Training and Enterprise Council the LSC is responsible for funding and planning post-16 education and training in England. The equivalent body in Wales is Education and Learning Wales (ELWa). The LSC has 47 local offices known as Local Learning and Skills Councils (LLSCs) and ELWa has four regional offices.
  • Maastricht Protocol. Part of the Maastricht Treaty dealing with the Social Chapter (Social Charter), allowing Britain to sign the treaty without signing the Maastricht Protocol or Social Chapter.
  • Maastricht Treaty. The content was agreed at a meeting at Maastricht in the Netherlands and signed in a watered-down form in Edinburgh in 1992. It was rejected and then accepted by the voters of Denmark in two referendums. It concerns extending aspects of European political union (EPU) and European and Monetary Union (EMU).
  • Management gurus. Phenomenon of the 1980s, when academics, consultants and business practitioners began to enjoy celebrity status as specialists on the diagnosis of management problems and the development of 'business solutions'. Includes people such as Tom Peters, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, John Harvey Jones and M.C. Robert Beeston.
  • McDonaldisation. The reduction of organisation to simple, repetitive and predictable work processes that make the labour process more amenable to standardised calculation and control.
  • MCI (Management Charter Initiative). Employerled initiative with the aim of developing recognised standards in management practice.
  • Measured day work (MDW). A system within which pay is fixed against specific levels of performance during the 'day' rather than by the hourly performance or piece-rates.
  • Mentor. More experienced person who guides, encourages and supports a younger or less experienced person.
  • MSC (Manpower Services Commission). Previously had responsibility for training but was abolished in 1988.
  • Mission statement. A statement setting out the main purpose of the business.
  • NACETT. National Advisory Council for Education and Training Targets, now incorporated into the Learning and Skills Councils.
  • NALGO. National and Local Government Officers Association. See Unison.
  • NASUWT. National Association of School Masters/Union of Women Teachers.
  • National curriculum. Obligatory subjects of the UK school system, introduced via the Education Reform Act 1989.
  • National Minimum Wage. Introduced by the National Minimum Wage Act 1998, this sets the minimum rate of reward any worker can receive on an hourly basis. The scale is age-related and linked to inflation through an annual upgrade.
  • NATO. North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Western defensive alliance set up originally in 1949 to promote economic and military cooperation among its members. The original members were Belgium, Britain, Canada, France, Italy, Norway, Portugal and the Netherlands. Greece and Turkey joined in 1952, and the former West Germany in 1955.
  • NCU. National Communications Union.
  • NCVQ (National Council for Vocational Qualifications). Government-backed initiative to establish a national system for the recognition of vocational qualifications.
  • Nenko. Japanese term meaning seniority and ability. One of the 'three pillars' of the Japanese employment system.
  • Networking. Interacting for mutual benefit, usually on an informal basis, with individuals and groups internal and external to the organisation.
  • New Deal. Government initiative that provides training for 18–24 year-olds who have been out of work for more than six months, and 25-year-olds and over who have been unemployed for longer than two years.
  • New Deal in America. Programme of economic and social reconstruction initiated by President F.D. Roosevelt in 1933 that aimed to lift the USA out of the Great Depression that hit the country in 1929.
  • NHS. National Health Service.
  • NHS Trusts. Local NHS organisations responsible for distributing NHS funds and managing services. Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) are responsible for managing 80 per cent of NHS funds and they cover GP services, dentists, opticians and pharmacists. Other trusts are ambulance trusts, hospital trusts and mental health and social care trusts.
  • NIZ (New Industrial Zone). These are new industrial zones in India, which have emerged since the 1990s, driven by the dynamics of high levels of foreign direct investment in manufacturing, neoliberal state policies and a large pool of workers.
  • Non-union firms. Organisations which do not recognise trade unions for collective bargaining purposes; this may be throughout the organisation or at plant or business unit level. So, for example, IBM, frequently quoted as an example of a soft-HRM non-union firm, does in fact recognise unions in Germany, as does McDonald's, another organisation strongly associated with an anti-union stance.
  • NSTF. National Skills Task Force.
  • Numerical flexibility. The ability of management to vary headcount in response to changes in demand.
  • NVQs. National Vocational Qualifications. An attempt to harmonise all VET qualifications within the UK by attributing five levels to all qualifications, from level 1, the lowest, to level 5, the highest.
  • ONS. Office of National Statistics.
  • Open system. System that is connected to and interacts with other subsystems and its environment.
  • OSC. Occupational Standards Council.
  • Over-education or over-qualification. A situation whereby people hold qualifications over and above those required for their job.
  • Paired comparisons. A system of appraisal that seeks to assess the performance of pairs of individuals, until each employee has been judged in relation to each other.
  • Paradigm. A well-developed, and often widely held, set of associated assumptions that frames the interpretation of reality. When these assumptions are undermined by new knowledge or events, a 'paradigm shift' occurs as the old gives way (often gradually and painfully) to a new paradigm.
  • Payment by results. Reward systems under which worker output or performance determines elements of the package.
  • PCT. Primary Care Trust -- see NHS Trusts.
  • Performance-related pay. Payment systems which in some way relate reward to either organisational or individual performance. Often used as a way to motivate white-collar workers, usually based on a developed appraisal system.
  • Phenomenology. Concerned with understanding the individual's conscious experience. It takes a holistic approach and acknowledges the significance of subjectivity.
  • Pluralism. Theoretical analysis of the employment relationship that recognises inequality between capital and labour where each of the interest groups has some conflicting and some common aims. To address these issues, pluralists argue that employees should be facilitated to act collectively, usually as a trade union, to redress such imbalances. Management, as the representatives of employers, should engage in collective bargaining with trade unions to establish consensual agreements on issues of conflict and commonality.
  • Positivism. The orthodox approach to the understanding of reality, and the basis for scientific method.
  • Post-Fordism. A claimed epochal shift in manufacturing that sees a move away from mass production assembly lines and the development of flexible systems that empower and reskill line workers. Associated with the move towards niche products and volatile consumer demand.
  • Postmodernism. A term used (often loosely) to denote various disjunctions from, fragmentations in, or challenges to previously common understandings of knowledge and social life.
  • PRB. Pay review body.
  • Predetermined motion time systems (PDMT systems). A member of the time-rate pay systems family under which rewards are calculated based on time and piece. As a standard form of incentive bonus scheme, PDMT schemes rewards are set using the pseudo-scientific measurement of activity.
  • Profit sharing. Scheme whereby employees are given a bonus or payment based on a company's profits.
  • Private Finance Initiative (PFI). Where the government contracts out projects such as prison management, hospital building, road construction, etc. to the private sector, and then leases back the service over an extended period of time.
  • Privatisation. The transfer of productive activities from public to private ownership and control. Privatisation was a key element of economic policy under the Conservative governments of the 1980s and 1990s when the coal and steel industries, the telephone service, water, gas and electricity supply and railways among others were transferred from public to private ownership.
  • Psychological contract. The notion that an individual has a range of expectations about their employing organisation and the organisation has expectations of them.
  • Psychological testing (psychometric testing). Specialised tests used for selection or assessing potential. Usually in the form of questionnaires. They construct a personality profile of the candidate.
  • Public–Private Partnerships (PPP). Collaboration between public bodies, e.g. government or local authorities, and private businesses to provide goods and services. See Private Finance Initiative.
  • Quality circle (QC). Group made up of 6 to 10 employees, with regular meetings held weekly or fortnightly during working time. The principal aim is to identify problems from their own area.
  • Ranking. A method of assessing and ordering individual performance using a predetermined scale.
  • Rating. A determined measure or scale against which an individual's performance is measured.
  • Reification. The conceptualisation and treatment of a person or abstraction as though they were things.
  • Resource-based view. Strategy creation built around the further exploitation of core competencies and strategic capabilities.
  • RCN. Royal College of Nursing.
  • Rhetoric. The often subtle and unacknowledged use of language to 'persuade, influence or manipulate'.
  • Rightsizing. -- see Downsizing.
  • Scientific management. -- see Taylorism.
  • Single-loop learning. Detection and correction of deviances in performance from established (organisational or other) norms. Double-loop learning is the questioning of those very norms that define effective performance (compare efficiency and effectiveness).
  • Single-table bargaining. Arrangement under which unions on a multi-union site develop a mutually agreed bargaining agenda, which is then negotiated jointly with management.
  • Single-union deal. Arrangement under which one trade union operates to represent all employees within an organisation; this is usually a preferred union sponsored by management.
  • Social Chapter. Another name for the Social Charter, which emerged from the Maastricht meeting in 1989.
  • Social Charter. A programme to implement the 'social dimension' of the single market, affording rights and protection to employees.
  • Social complexity. The complex interpersonal relationships that exist within organisations, within and between teams and individuals.
  • Social constructionism. Holds that an objective reality is not directly knowable. The reality we do know is socially constructed through language, discourse and social interaction.
  • Social partnership. Process whereby employers and employees establish a framework of rights based upon minimum standards in employment, flexibility, security, information sharing and cooperation between management and employees' representatives.
  • Social relations of production. The patterns and dynamics produced and reproduced in action by individuals and collectives employed in the labour process.
  • Sociotechnical. The structuring or integration of human activities and subsystems with technological subsystems.
  • SOE. State-owned enterprise.
  • Soft HRM. A view of HRM that recognises employees as a resource worth investing in, and tends to focus on high-commitment/high-involvement human resource practices; see also Hard HRM.
  • Stakeholders. Any individual or group capable of affecting or being affected by the performance and actions of the organisation.
  • Stakeholder society. One in which individuals recognise that only by making a positive contribution to contemporary society can they expect a positive outcome from society.
  • Stakeholders in social partnership. Those groups with an interest in promoting strong social partnerships at work, i.e. the state, employers and their organisations, employees and their organisations.
  • Strategic management. The process by which an organisation establishes its objectives, formulates strategies to meet these objectives, implements actions and measures and monitors performance.
  • Suggestion scheme. Arrangement whereby employees are encouraged to put forward their ideas for improving efficiency, safety or working conditions. Payment or reward is often given related to the value of the suggestion.
  • Supervisory boards. Part of the dual management board structure required by law in all German enterprises listed on the German stock exchange. Day-to-day management is the responsibility of the management board, which is accountable to the supervisory board. The supervisory board appoints, oversees and advises the management board. It also participates directly in key strategic decisions. Supervisory boards are elected by shareholders and where firms employ more than 500 employees in Germany, membership of the board must also include employee representatives. Employee representatives make up one-third of the supervisory board membership in companies having 500–2000 employees and half of the membership in companies having over 2000 employees.
  • Sustainable competitive advantage. The ability of an organisation to add more value than its rivals in order to gain advantage and maintain that advantage over time.
  • SVQs. Scottish Vocational Qualifications.
  • Synergy. Added value or additional benefit that accrues from cooperation between team members, or departments, such that the results are greater than the sum of all the individual parts.
  • System. Assembly of parts, objects or attributes interrelating and interacting in an organised way.
  • Systemic. Thinking about and perceiving situations, problems and difficulties as systems.
  • Tacit knowledge. Knowledge that is never explicitly taught, often not verbalised, but is acquired through doing and expressed in know-how.
  • Taylorism. Taylorist a systematic approach to work organisation named after Frederick Winslow Taylor. Involves time and motion study, specialised sub-division of labour and close management control. Also referred to as 'scientific management'.
  • Team briefing. Regular meeting of groups of between four and 15 people based round a common production or service area. Meetings are usually led by a manager or supervisor and last for no more than 30 minutes, during which information is imparted, often with time left for questions from employees.
  • TECs. Training and Enterprise Councils. These operated in England and Wales and were made up of local employers and elected local people, to create local training initiatives in response to local skill needs. Their function was taken over in 2002 by Learning and Skills Councils -- see LSC.
  • Theory 'X' and 'Y'. Based on McGregor's thesis on managerial change. Two contrasting views of people and work. Theory X sees people as inherently lazy, unambitious and avoiding responsibility. Theory Y sees work as natural as rest or play and being capable of providing self-fulfilment and a sense of achievement for those involved.
  • Thinking performer. A set of competencies that should guide CIPD members (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development) through their careers.
  • Tight labour market. Sometimes called a 'shortage' labour market, where there a high levels of employment and demand exceeds supply or the supply for certain types of workers with specific skills sets is insufficient to meet demand.
  • TQM. Total quality management, an all-pervasive system of management-controlled employee involvement based on the concept of quality throughout the organisation in terms of product and service, whereby groups of workers are each encouraged to perceive each other (and other departments) as internal customers. This ensures the provision of quality products and services to external customers.
  • Transferable skills. Skills that can be used anywhere in the economy.
  • Tripartism. Systems of industrial relations whereby the state, employers' associations and trade unions oversee and govern labour market initiatives and related policies, e.g. wage levels and increases.
  • Trust Schools. State-funded schools supported by a charitable trust that has enhanced freedom to manage its own operations; see also Foundation schools.
  • TUC. Trades Union Congress.
  • TUPE. Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations.
  • UNICE. Union of Industrial and Employers Confederations of Europe.
  • Underemployment. An employment situation that is insufficient in some important way for the worker, relative to a standard. The term is most widely used to explain the predicament individuals find themselves in when they occupy a part-time job despite desiring full-time work.
  • Unison. Public service union formed following merger of COHSE, NALGO and NUPE.
  • Unitarism. Theoretical analysis of the employment relationship based on managerial prerogative, valuing labour individually according to market assessments, and which views organised resistance to management authority as pathological.
  • Value chain. A framework for identifying where value is added and where costs are incurred.
  • VET. Vocational education and training.
  • Vertical integration. In terms of SHRM, the level of alignment between an organisation's business strategy and its HR strategy, policies and practices.
  • Vision (statement). A desired future state, or an attempt by an organisation to articulate that desired future state.
  • VQs. Vocational qualifications.
  • Wa. Japanese term for harmony.
  • Wage drift. A gradual and uneven increase in wages in certain sectors of the economy resulting from variable, informal bargaining activities reflecting areas of localised union strength. Such increases are supplementary to any formally agreed wages formula. If allowed to grow unchecked, this practice can lead to inflationary measures.
  • Weberian bureaucracy. Associated with the research and writing of the sociologist Max Weber (1864–1920), who observed and studied the growth of vast organisational bureaucracies. Notable for the extreme degree of functional specialisation, formal rules and procedures, and long lines of command and authority. Staffed by professional, full-time, salaried employees who do not own the resources and facilities with which they work.
  • WERS. Workplace Employment Relations Study. The Workplace Employment Relations Study (WERS) series commenced in 1980 and has mapped employment relations extensively over three decades. It provides insights into employment relations in Britain by collecting data from a representative sample of British workplaces. The sixth survey was carried out in 2011.
  • Works councils. Committees made up either solely of workers or of joint representatives of workers, management and shareholders, which meet, usually at company level, to discuss a variety of issues relating to workforce matters and sometimes general, wider-ranging organisational issues. Usually supported by legislation, which compels organisations to set them up.
  • YT. Youth Training (formerly Youth Training Service, YTS).
  • Zaibatsu. Large, diversified Japanese business groups, which rose to prominence in the early twentieth century, such as Mitsubishi, Mitsui and Sumitomo.
  • Zero-hours contract. A contract of employment containing provisions which create an 'on call' arrangement between employer and employee. It does not oblige the employer to provide work for the employee, nor does it oblige the employee to accept the work offered. The employee receives compensation only for hours worked.
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