Human Resource Management, 8th edition

Human Resource Management is divided into six parts. Part I, “Introduction”, defines human resource management (HRM) as “… policies and practices one needs to carry out – the ‘people’ or human resource aspects of a management position, including recruiting, screening, training, rewarding and appraising …” and outlines the context of HRM and its strategic role in building the “high‐performance organization”. This chapter also offers an overview of HR activities and responsibilities, as well as giving pointers to research linking HR to organizational performance. The next chapter on “equal opportunity and the law” will be mostly inappropriate for those practising HRM outside the USA.

Part II, “Recruitment and placement”, takes us through job analysis in great detail, though it relies heavily on the Dictionary of Occupational Titles, a US Department of Labor publication. The chapter on planning and recruiting has some useful guidelines for using HR information systems, and forecasting labour supply and demand, though again some of this information is not appropriate for non‐US practitioners (guidelines on US Privacy Acts, reference to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics and other US agencies). The chapters on selection and interviewing are comprehensive, and cover a range of techniques and devices, as well as offering brief examples of guidelines or pro formas which could be of immediate, practical use to HR practitioners. Again, however, these refer to US legislation and US regulatory bodies.

Part III, “Training and development”, includes sections on the training process, individual development schemes and management development. The (largely revised) chapter on organizational change includes sections on TQM, business process re‐engineering and running teams. The next chapter on appraisal in this section is likely to be a useful, quick reference guide to those conducting appraisals regularly, as well as outlining a wide range of techniques and methods (graphic rating, paired comparison, forced distribution, MBO, critical incident, etc.) allowing more experienced practitioners to broaden their skills, or experiment with new ways of appraising. There is also a chapter on “managing careers and fair treatment”, which made for interesting reading, although, again, some of this is irrelevant for those working in a European legal context.

Part IV, “Compensation”, offers comprehensive coverage of pay issues, from setting up pay plans, and benefit schemes, to different methods of incentivising work. Part V “Labor relations and employee security”, is largely irrelevant outside the USA, as it focuses on the history of the US union movement and US employment law in relation to health and safety. The final, briefest section, Part VI, “International HRM”, is more concerned with how multinational companies can work outside the USA than with offering in‐depth comparison of HR practice in different countries.

The main differences from earlier editions are the “first fully developed online course for HRM”, and an appendix on HR and information systems. One chapter, “Managing organizational renewal”, has been revised, and this edition claims (p. xxiii) to offer an integrating theme, “The high‐performance organization: building better, faster, more competitive organizations through HR”. A second organising theme (p. 26) is that HR is not the job of the HR department, but “… the responsibility of every manager …” and the book is indeed set out in such a way that “every manager” could quickly find a section relevant to their particular problem, together with a case study or two, cluster of definitions and check‐list of dos and don’ts. Pro forma examples, such as the job analysis questionnaire (pp. 89‐90), applicant interview guide (pp. 217‐18) or sample career‐planning workshop (p. 367), would also help increase someone’s basic understanding of key HR functions, and help in drafting personnel documents. There are also brief snippets on “small‐business applications” of HRM ideas, and recurring references to managing diversity (“diversity counts”). Both these themes are highlighted in the contents pages.

The layout is, on the whole, very reader‐friendly. One particularly helpful device is the brief definitions of key terms in the left margin. I also liked the emphasis on learning objectives at the beginning of each chapter, and the way that each chapter ends with a brief summary to test understanding. There is a choice of case‐study exercises, which could form the basis for a discussion or seminar, though I felt that some of these were a bit thin. There is no overall bibliography, and in the text a variety of different sources is anonymously referred to as “experts”. Personally, I disliked having to constantly flick to the end of the chapter to see who the “experts” were. Students would probably appreciate the many references to Web sites, and the site accompanying the book is user‐friendly and easy to navigate. Human Resource Management itself is very well laid out, and designed in such a way as to make it easy to skim through, or revise after more careful reading. There are also many glossy tables, figures and photos to keep the eye interested, though at times this can be distracting and leave you wondering where the in‐depth content actually is, particularly if you are after any remotely critical analysis of the impacts of changing work practices on individual employees.

Much of the book is list‐like, and this is a limitation, because, to my mind, there is no coherent body of propositional knowledge when it comes to managing people. It is perhaps unfair to criticise the book on this point, as this may simply reflect a difference of opinion, given that Dessler’s preface emphasises his view that “… all managers … need a strong foundation in personnel management concepts and techniques …” It is fair to say that one limitation of a list‐like, “how‐to” approach means that it could be unwise to recommend Dessler to students, who are often understandably keen to see “the answer” to a problem or question in terms of simple frameworks or unqualified, reductionist models of complex behaviours. Anyone who has marked undergraduate essays on motivation will testify to this. A cynical point is that this approach does make it a lot easier to design “… the first fully‐developed online course for HRM …”, because, if you assume that you have a codified body of knowledge, this means that it is far easier to remotely administer self‐test questions.

Dessler’s book is not likely to be top of a must‐buy list for practitioners outside the USA, who may well find the constant references to US law and US bodies tiresome. Nonetheless, he does provide a useful summary of a large range of other management theorists. There are also references to real‐world cases of HR in action, which are likely to spice up a lecture or attract the attention of flagging listeners at a presentation. At times it was difficult to tell the difference between the opening one‐paragraph “vignettes” and a press release. For example, the first “vignette” relates how “Mead corporation wisely built their design and installation around the needs of the plant’s employees …” and you might find your hackles rising when you come across the example of Union Carbide (of Bhopal infamy) as a “progressive multinational”. A quick trip to the Web site reveals other PR plugs, masquerading as test questions. One which caught my eye was “How does Philip Morris try to be a model corporate citizen of the world?” – how indeed?

There is no doubting that this is a very comprehensive outline of the kinds of things HR people do, and Dessler covers a wide range of topics which other HRM textbooks do not, for example, the section on how to manage video‐conferencing (pp. 262‐3). There are also many sections on the impact of the Internet and related technologies on core HR functions (e.g. recruiting on the Internet: pp. 153‐4). Overall I found the book interesting but, perhaps because of its comprehensive scope, no coherent message emerges. Dessler’s claim that “the high‐performance organization” is the integrating theme to this edition seemed empty. After all, isn’t HRM supposed to deliver that anyway? It also seems circular or tautologous, where case studies show a “best practice” organization, to use the “high‐performance” label.

Nonetheless, the goal of offering a “… foundation in personnel management concepts and techniques …” is consistently followed through. The book offers “how‐to” tips, case studies and lists on a wide range of topics. These all have the potential to be of immediate practical use, or to be a springboard for further research. Still, I would have reservations about someone relying solely on Human Resource Management (or in fairness any single book) as their guide when it comes to “policies and practices one needs to carry out – the ‘people’ aspects of a management position”. This is because it would be all too easy for someone to apply the Dessler tool‐kit without thinking critically about what they are actually doing. It offers a “plug and play” approach to HRM, which is consistent with the formidable multi‐media battery of tools (video, manual, Web site) accompanying this text, but not consistent with the most important aspects of the “… ‘people’ or human resource aspects of a management position …”, which take shape in complex social interactions. Even so, the book is a useful addition to any HRM mini‐library, partly because it offers an archetypal, no‐nonsense, US approach to managing people at work, but mainly because, as a reference text, it covers a wide range of contemporary HR themes. It could also form part of a course on HR (if complemented by other, more critical texts), though the continual references to US law might make this difficult to administer.