Interference among conflicting institutions and technical-economic conditions: the adoption of the Assessment Center in French, German, Italian, UK, and US multinational firms

Abstract

We analyze the adoption of the Assessment Center (AC), one of the most complex human resource management techniques, in 161 British, French, German, Italian and US multinational firms both at the headquarters and in their Italian subsidiaries. Combining both quantitative analysis and qualitative accounts, we investigate how different and partially contradictory institutional influences stemming from national business systems and professions, global corporate networks and professions, and different technical-economic conditions affect the adoption of the AC. Our study shows that AC-diffusion is similar at headquarters level in all national contexts, testifying to the paramount importance of transnational institutions of Anglo-American origin for MNCs of any nationality, despite great local variation in the degree of institutionalization of the AC, which ranges from fully-fledged support in culture and the professions as, for example, in Germany, the UK and the USA, to weak or negative backing as in France and Italy. However, the study also reveals how different characteristics of the corporate field of firms with headquarters in different countries, as well as organizational size and labor market conditions, still explain adoption of the AC in their subsidiaries in Italy.

Keywords:

• Assessment Center
• HRM practices
• institutional interference
• institutional theory
• transnational institutions