The Role of Human Resource System in Developing a Culture of Innovation

Abstract

The Research aims on Human Resource Management and innovation has to date relied on a theoretical assumption that there exists an identifiable set of HR practices which organizations seeking to be innovative should adopt. However, analysis of the various prescriptions of HR practices for innovation reveals a high level of internal inconsistency, leading to conflicting advice for practitioners. Furthermore, a review of empirical research on the topic indicates that HR practices within innovative organizations are remarkably similar to those found in the best practice literature This raises questions about the link between strategy and HRM, and about the theoretical foundations of research on HRM and innovation. Drawing on recent research on HRM and firm performance, I suggest that research on HRM and innovation can benefit from incorporating elements from both contingency theory and best practice approaches into the existing configuration theory approach. A change in direction for both theoretical and empirical research on HRM and innovation is proposed. This paper is laid out as follows. In part one, I ask what a strategy of innovation is, and consider what employee behaviors are believed to be consistent with such a strategy. The second section compares and contrasts different authors’ prescriptions of HR practices for innovation, and also compares the findings of research on HRM and innovation with the findings of the best practice approach. In the final part I consider the implications of MY review for future research on this topic. I propose a broadening of the theoretical base on which research on HRM and innovation is founded, and discuss the particular challenges involved in conducting empirical research on HR systems for innovation.