Call for papers – Special Issue on the Topic:
Paradoxes and tensions in HRM:
Exploring the field and moving ahead
to be published in Zeitschrift für Personalforschung
(German Journal of Research in Human Resource Management)
Paradoxes and tensions are inherent aspects of organizational life generally and HRM in particular. Since Karen Legge (1978) characterized HR managers as ‘victims of ambiguity’ caught in ‘vicious cycles’, scholars have explored different types of tensions and their consequences for HR practitioners. More recently, it has also become clear that other HR actors encounter tensions in relation to their HR roles including line managers.
The identification and naming of such tensions is an interesting development and counters some of the problems of unitarism and managerialism that dominated work on HRM for many years. However, while the terms duality, paradox, ambiguity and tension are widely used in contemporary HRM research, the underlying concepts and theoretical assumptions are rarely explored systematically as is common in broader management and organization theory. Research has focused largely on describing tensions, their effects on actors, and resulting negative consequences (e.g., stress, dissatisfaction, helplessness, work-related health problems or inertia in decision-making). HR and general managers as well as employees easily become framed as passive ‘victims of ambiguity’.
With this call for papers we invite work from scholars who draw on and develop conceptual approaches to paradox, tension and ambiguity in HRM.
In order to be considered for publication in this Special Issue, an extended abstract of approx. 1500 words should be sent to the editors by March 31th, 2014. The deadline for the full papers is August 31th, 2014.