Paradox theory as a lens of theorizing for sustainable HRM

1. Paradox Theory as a Lens of
Theorizing for Sustainable HRM
Dr. G C Mohanta, BE(Mech), MSc(Engg), MBA, PhD(Mgt)
Professor
Al-Qurmoshi Institute of Business Management,
Hyderabad - 500005

2. Sustainable HRM
 Sustainable HRM is defined as long-term conceptual
approaches and activities aimed at socially responsible
and economically appropriate recruitment
, selection, development, deployment and release of
employees.
 Sustainable HRM can be used for organizational change
situations, as these often make too great demands on
the people involved.
 Sustainable HRM could help sustaining employee
dignity in case of staff reduction and warranting their
employment on the job market.

3. Work-Life-Balance
Individual
Companies
Strategies  Objectives
Instruments  Methods 
Processes  Structures
Culture  Attitudes  Values
Model of a Sustainable HRM

4. Three Pillars of Sustainability
Work-Life-Balance
: Growing importance of professional career
: Growing importance of private and family life
Individual Responsibility
Increased autonomy and self-determination in questions of
professional development
Employability
Focus on continuous development and professional agility rather
than specific activity

5. Central Objectives in
Sustainable HRM
• Contributing to achievement of economic objectives
• Promoting individual responsibility
• Ensuring adequate pay and promoting employee
health
• Enhancing employability

6. Major Instruments of Sustainable
HRM
• Recruitment: requirement & job profiles; labour market research
• Deployment: health management; staff composition; advanced working-
time management
• Development: encouraging continuous education; career planning;
promoting individual responsibility & participation
• HR marketing: image analysis & improvement
• Retention: sophisticated incentive systems
• Disemployment: exit interviews; outplacement
• Management & Leadership: participative management styles; MBO;
assessment of superiors

7. Paradox
 According to Oxford Dictionary a paradox is ‘‘a statement or
tenet contrary to received opinion or expectation; often with
the implication that it is marvellous or incredible’’
 Paradox is the simultaneous existence of two inconsistent
states, such as, between innovation and efficiency,
collaboration and competition, or new and old.
 A paradox is an idea involving two opposing thoughts or
propositions which, however, contradictory, are equally
necessary to convey a more imposing, illuminating, life-
related or provocative insight into truths than either factor
can muster in its own right.
 What the mind seemingly cannot think it must think; what
reason is reluctant to express it must express.

8. Key Paradoxes for Sustainable HRM
 The first key paradox addresses the problem that organisations
need to deploy employees efficiently and effectively to reach
organisational objectives and to remain competitive.
 The development of qualified and motivated employees who are
needed for future problem-solving, takes time.
 One of the main problems in making an investment into the future
workforce is that many companies report today, that they are
underlying continuous change and restructuring processes.
 Under these conditions it is nearly impossible to predict which
skills, competencies, and qualifications are needed in the future.
 This first key paradox addresses the ability of Sustainable HRM to
sustain the HR base from within and is called ‘‘efficiency-
substance paradox’’ or ‘‘consumption-reproduction-paradox’’ or
‘‘efficiency-existency-dilemma’’ and is located at the individual,
organisational or HRM systems level.

9. Key Paradoxes for Sustainable HRM (Contd.)
 The second key paradox addresses the individual employee level
and the ability of employees to perform, regenerate and develop
themselves.
 Here, this paradox is called the ‘‘performance-regeneration-
paradox’’ (similar: to the problem addressed in the work-life
balance literature).
 The performance-regeneration-paradox describes the general
dilemma of an employee to invest, time and energy into work
processes.
 Simultaneously, however, every hour invested into work cannot be
invested into regeneration or other activities.
 Regeneration, however, is necessary to retain mental and physical
health or the capability to be creative and productive over time.
 Both paradoxes become particularly salient when the temporal
dimension is taken into account and when short and long-term
aspects are considered.

10. Key Paradoxes for Sustainable HRM (Contd.)
 The third paradox is short &long-term paradox: HR
practitioners find themselves faced with contradictory
demands between short-termed profit making (e.g. labour-
cost pressure) on the one hand and long-term organisational
viability on the other.
 One of the most important tasks for organisations is to balance
exploitation of resources and simultaneously develop future
business opportunities.
 For HR executives the challenge lies in deploying employees
efficiently, to provide them enough room for regeneration and
work-life balance;
 Simultaneously, HR have to be ‘‘reproduced’’ encompassing
the long-term perspective on sustaining access to highly
skilled and motivated people.

11. Application of Paradox Theory for
Sustainable HRM
 HRM in many companies is increasingly challenged by
strategic tensions.
 On a long-term basis, those companies were most
successful which were capable of reconciling tensions.
 Paradox has been frequently used to explain
organisational success and failure.
 From a paradox lens, those companies are assumed to
be successful which have the ability of managing across
mutually exclusive but simultaneous opposites.
 Many successful companies failed because they over-
excessively focused on what they perceived as factors of
success.

12. Application of Paradox Theory for
Sustainable HRM
Four reasons have been identified for corporate
failures of successful companies:
 (1) excessive and fast growth (sales growth, large number
of acquisitions, intensive investment in growth areas),
 (2) uncontrolled change (endless restructuring, loss of
corporate identity),
 (3) autocratic leadership (powerful, overly ambitious
CEOs, blind faith in them, weak boards), and
 (4) an excessive success culture (strong competition
between employees, high degree of employee stress, poor
communication).

13. Application of Paradox Theory for
Sustainable HRM
To avoid failure, companies should pursue:
 Sustainable growth (limited growth at a firm specific
‘‘optimum rate’’),
 Stable change (both stability and change),
 Shared power (a ‘‘healthy’’ balance between CEO and
board powers, and
 A ‘‘healthy’’ organisational culture with both trust and
competition, i.e. an overall balanced approach.