Human Resource Research Proposal

Course: Human Resource Management

Faculty: Dr. Jing Zhong

Subject:

1. Gary Dessler. 2006. Expanding into China? What foreign employers should know about human resource management in China today. S.A.M. Advanced Management Journal, 71, 4, 11-23.

2. Cherrie Jiuhua Zhu, S. Bruce Thomson, and Helen De Cieri. 2008. A retrospective and prospective analysis of HRM research in Chinese firms: implications and directions for future study, HRM, 47, 1, 133-156.

The subject matter of these two articles, in simple words, was very fascinating to me. Organizing an effective human resource management is a core tool in every successful enterprise, no matter if it’s state-owned or foreign-invested. As an expat living and studying, hopefully working in the future, here in Shanghai, China I found the articles very useful in getting general idea of how the human resource management handles problems and comes up with solutions. The main point of Gary Dessler’s article is that there is a positive relationship between high-performance human resource management practices and firm performance. Many researchers found that many Asian companies with the best human capital management practices deliver significantly more shareholder value than those with poor people practices. Many western companies found it difficult to enter to Chinese market and successfully launch their businesses, mainly because of the cultural differences. Western firms’ emphasis on employee empowerment may be somewhat alien to those raised in the more traditional, rule-driven, saving face Chinese business culture. From here we can see the main conflict between Chinese and Western human resource management. While in China employees tend to sell themselves short to the employers, in West the more you talk about your good qualities the more is the possibility of the employer hiring you. In the past, specifically between 1949 and 1990, in China personnel departments had mostly an administrative role, meaning...