IHRM Webinar Series: Questioning Elitism in International Human Resource Management Studies

This event is part of an IHRM Webinar Series, organized by the Centre for Global Workforce Strategy at Simon Fraser University (Canada), the Center for International Human Resource Studies at the Pennsylvania State University (USA), Pennsylvania Western University (USA), ESCP Business School and RIT Croatia (Europe).

About this event

I will argue that IHRM (like business and management studies in general and human resource management studies specifically) has operated from an elitist base: that has not only led to a distortion in our research but has led to some unwanted, negative and even nefarious outcomes. This has been caused by our focus on the interests of owners of businesses (when the vast majority of people are not owners); on large international organizations (when 95% of people work in small local ones); on managers and executives (when 80% of people are neither); on talent management (when 95% of people are not classed as talent); on western organizations (when most of the world does not fit into that category); on employed people (when increasing proportions of workers are outside employment); on indigenous populations (when increasing numbers are migrants); etc. What this means is that we have largely ignored the problems and issues of most people in the world. I will suggest that focusing on the non-elite will avoid contributing further to the negative impact our work has created so far and positively address some of the Grand Challenges that the world is facing.

Speakers

  • Chris Brewster is Professor of International Human Resource Management at Henley Business School, University of Reading, UK.
  • This session will be moderated by Maja Vidovic, Senior Lecturer of the Faculty of Economics and Business at RIT Croatia.

Date: 15 September 2022.
Time: 5:30 p.m. – 6:30 p.m. CEST (Vienna, Berlin, Paris, Zagreb)
More information & free registration here. This event will be hosted virtually on Zoom. Event access links will be provided 24 hours prior to the event start.
Inquiries: beedie-events@sfu.ca

Previous installments of the IHRM Webinar Series are available online at our YouTube Channel.