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I am delighted to invite you to read five influential papers published in Human Relations. All five papers were nominated for the 2014 Paper of the Year Award, demonstrating broad readership appeal, sound methods and theory that advances our understanding of human relations at work.
Read, cite and share these articles – free for a limited time only*
Paper of the Year 2014:
NGOs management and the value of 'partnerships' for equality in international development: What's in a name?
By Alessia Contu and Emanuela Girei
http://hum.sagepub.com/content/67/2/205.full.pdf+html
A closely observed case study of the politics around international development. It recasts the idea of partnership in ways relevant to many other fields.
Abstract
'Partnership' is a buzzword for agents delivering policy solutions, funding and implementation strategies for effective international development. We call such an ensemble of policies and practices the 'partnership discourse'. We explore the value of the term 'partnership' in international development with an empirical focus on the African context and issues of equality in relations between international and national non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that are routinely characterized as partnerships. The results of our research in Uganda indicate that a hiatus exists between the rhetoric and reality of such partnerships. Partnerships on the ground reproduce relations of inequality characterized by subordination and oppression. The retroductive explanation we offer for such an emergent picture is to recast partnerships not as neutral management tools, but as political processes actualized in a terrain that is contested and uneven. Our theoretical contribution is to develop a political theorization of inter-organizational relations that allows us to explore the social consequences, specifically on inequality, associated with the partnership discourse. Our substantive contribution is to elaborate the value of the term 'partnership' in the international development domain. Its value is to smooth over antagonism and co-opt dissent by proposing a solution to effective development that is both ethically and managerially good.
You can't go home again: And other psychoanalytic lessons from crossing a neo-colonial border
By Ajnesh Prasad
http://hum.sagepub.com/content/67/2/233.full.pdf+html
A compelling auto-ethnography, using personal experiences of crossing a neo-colonial border to consider reflexivity and ethics in fieldwork.
Abstract
The purpose of this article is to situate the nexus between reflexivity and fieldwork through autoethnographic analysis. Specifically, drawing on psychoanalytic and postcolonial thought, this article utilizes introspective data from field research conducted in the occupied Palestinian territories to explore how Qalandiya – a neo-colonial militarized border crossing between Jerusalem, Israel and the West Bank's twin cities of Ramallah and al-Bireh – came to significantly alter the researcher's conceptions of self and Other. Namely, drawing on first-hand experiences at Qalandiya – reconstructed through monologue style voice recordings, emails with colleagues, telephone conversations, personal diary entries, and memory – this article illuminates the discursive impact the field has upon the researcher's self. Finally, this article concludes with a discussion of the ontological, the epistemological, and the ethical implications of pursuing research at neo-colonial sites in organization studies.
Terms of engagement: Political boundaries of work engagement–work outcomes relationships
By Rachel E Kane-Frieder, Wayne A Hochwarter, and Gerald R Ferris
http://hum.sagepub.com/content/67/3/357.full.pdf+html
Uses weighty evidence from 4 studies to explore how organisational politics affect the relationship between engagement and outcomes. It offers some provocative conclusions.
Abstract
Although research to date has established the criterion validity of work engagement, little research has examined relevant boundary conditions capable of altering its documented positive effects on important workplace outcomes, despite widespread appeals to do so (e.g. Parker and Griffin, 2011). In the present four-sample investigation, a competing hypotheses format was adopted, pitting against each other perspectives of 'politics as a hindrance stressor' and 'politics as a challenge stressor' as moderators of work engagement–work outcomes relationships (e.g. job tension, job satisfaction, work intensity, job performance). Cross-sample findings demonstrated that organizational politics perceptions strengthened positive work engagement–work outcomes relationships, such that engaged individuals were less stressed, more satisfied, worked with greater intensity and exhibited greater performance when they perceived their job environments to be political. This series of results affirms the challenge/opportunity stressor properties of politics perceptions for individuals more actively involved in their jobs and workplaces. Cross-disciplinary implications of these results for theory and practice, strengths and limitations, and directions for future research are provided.
Enhancing performance of geographically distributed teams through targeted use of information and communication technologies
By Arvind Malhotra and Ann Majchrzak
http://hum.sagepub.com/content/67/4/389.full.pdf+html
Deploys multiple methods to unpack the nature of ICTs and their implications for geographically dispersed teams.
Abstract
Increasingly, geographically dispersed teams are relying exclusively on sophisticated information and communication technologies (ICTs) to coordinate their knowledge. Current research argues that the reliance on the technology (versus face-to-face) for communication may inhibit geographically distributed team performance. In contrast, we argue that previous research associates negative performance effects with the level or degree of exclusive reliance on ICT without regard to the specific form or ways in which team members use ICT. We hypothesize that teams will be more successful when they use ICT to specifically facilitate the situational awareness needs created by their teams' composition and task. We studied 54 geographically dispersed teams that all relied exclusively on ICT (with minimal to no face-to-face interactions) for coordination in order to control for the effect of the level of reliance on ICTs. Our multi-source/multi-method study demonstrates that the form of use can have a positive association with team performance even in teams relying exclusively on ICT depending on the team composition and nature of task being performed. Our findings suggest that, instead of assuming that technology reliance negatively impacts team performance, researchers studying distributed teams should separate the level of reliance (degree of use) from form of reliance (type of use) on ICT.
An 'emerging challenge': The employment practices of a Brazilian multinational company in Canada
By Roberta Aguzzoli and John Geary
http://hum.sagepub.com/content/67/5/587.full.pdf+html
A distinctive and original case study of an MNC. In contrast to the usual focus on the transfer of practices from developed countries, it shows how a Brazilian firm was able to reconstitute employment relations in Canada.
Abstract
Although the literature in international human resource management has developed greatly over recent years, our understanding of the dynamics of the transfer of HR practices in multinational companies (MNCs) from emerging economies with subsidiaries in advanced economies is found wanting. This study addresses this gap in our knowledge by investigating the transfer of employment policies of a Brazilian MNC to its Canadian subsidiaries. It examines interrelated questions about the influence of an emerging-economy parent-business system and how this interacts with the well-developed institutional regulation of the host country in a context of complex relations of dependence and dominance. Our prior expectation that the MNC would have had to adapt its policies to the 'Canadian way' was not borne out by the evidence. Instead the Brazilian MNC was found to be adept at capturing significant components of the host country's institutional setting in a manner that gave it the space to determine the 'rules' for its own advantage. That it was able to do so was, in large part, shaped by the market context of the firm and by Canada's dependence on foreign investment and, in turn, by the political relations of dependence that such reliance engendered. Broader lessons from the case analysis are offered.
Sincerely,
Paul Edwards,
Editor-in-Chief, Human Relations
Website: www.humanrelationsjournal.org
OnlineFirst preview articles: http://hum.sagepub.com/content/early/recent
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WHY PUBLISH IN HUMAN RELATIONS?
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Human Relations is an A* journal – the highest category of quality – in the Australian Business Deans Council (ABCD) Journal Quality List 2013. It is also ranked 4 in the Chartered Association of Business Schools (CABS) Academic Journal Guide 2015. Human Relations is a top 5 interdisciplinary social sciences journal:
2-year impact factor: 2.398 - Ranked: 35/185 in Management and 5/95 in Social Sciences, Interdisciplinary
5-year impact factor: 3.187 - Ranked: 37/185 in Management and 3/95 in Social Sciences, Interdisciplinary
Source: 2014 Journal Citation Reports® (Thomson Reuters, 2015)
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CALLS FOR PAPERS
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Special issue: Conceptualising flexible careers across the life course – submit by 1 March 2016
http://www.tavinstitute.org/humanrelations/special_issues/Flexible%20careers.html
Special issue: Global supply chains and social relations at work – submit by 30 April 2016
http://www.tavinstitute.org/humanrelations/special_issues/Global%20supply%20chains.html
Special issue: Politicization and political contests in contemporary multinational corporations – submit by 30 September 2016
http://www.tavinstitute.org/humanrelations/special_issues/Politics%20and%20MNCs.html
NEW: Special issue: Organizing feminism: Bodies, practices and ethics – submit by 30 November 2016
http://www.tavinstitute.org/humanrelations/special_issues/Organizing%20feminism.html
Human Relations welcomes critical reviews and essays:
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