Humanizing organizations: The professional role of HRM in organizational transformation

Abstract

The trend towards digitalization continues, calling for a reconsideration of what defines work, organizations, and society. This also encompasses the role of Human Resource Management (HRM) and its professional ethos, including the competencies and ways in which HRM asserts and professionalizes its field of expertise against other competing professions and new technology. Drawing from Diversity Management, we reconstruct the path of professionalization taken by HRM in the past and provide a conceptual framework. Using the two examples of People Analytics and Remote Work, we illustrate how HRM as a profession can claim responsibility for a particular problem in the face of an emerging technology and gain a new terrain and professional jurisdiction. Based on these current examples, we discuss the legitimacy of HRM and argue for its conceptualization as a profession dedicated to people in the changing world of work-a view that is fundamentally different from the idea of HRM as a business partner.