Reframing Human Resource Management

Download or read book Reframing Human Resource Management written by Barbara Townley and published by SAGE Publications Limited. This book was released on 1994-09-09 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drawing on the work of Michel Foucault, this book reconceptualizes the field of human resource management (HRM) and explores an alternative politics and ethics of work. The central thesis is that personnel//HRM techniques play a crucial role in constituting the self, in defining the nature of work, and in organizing and controlling the workforce. Human resource management, it is argued, comprises a nexus of disciplinary practices - a technology of power - aimed at making employees' behaviour and performance predictable and calculable, in a word, `manageable'. The author analyzes a wide range of HRM procedures, including job evaluation and ranking, selection, appraisal and self-assessment, relating these to