HRM philosophies and policies in semi-autonomous agencies: identification of important contextual factors

Figures & data

Figure 1. Conceptual framework of our study

Table 1. Characteristics of sample and population.

	Sample (n= 30)	Population (n= 166)
Type
Type 1	27%	17%
Type 2	53%	63%
Type 3	20%	20%
Task
Maintenance/management	27%	48%
Registration and licensing	10%	5%
Inspection and control	30%	26%
Payments and collection of money	17%	7%
Research, training and education	7%	6%
Security	3%	4%
Health care	7%	4%
Size (number of employees)
Small (< 100)	13%	48%
Medium (100–1000)	40%	32%
Large (1000 >)	47%	20%
Parent ministry
General Affairs	0%	1%
Interior and Kingdom Relations	7%	10%
Defense	0%	1%
Economic Affairs	20%	21%
Finance	10%	12%
Infrastructure	13%	16%
Education, Culture and Science	10%	13%
Social Affairs and Employment	7%	2%
Security and Justice	13%	14%
Health, Welfare and Sport	20%	11%

Table 2. Number of cases for dominant HRM philosophies and policy domains^a.

	Abilities	Motivation	Opportunities	Mixed^b	Total
Accumulation	0	1	1	5	7
Facilitation	3	9	1	3	16
Mixed^b	2	1	0	4	7
Total	5	11	2	12

^a Definitions of the philosophies and policy domains are found in Appendix A.

^b These cells represent those cases that did not emphasize a single dominant philosophy and/or policy domain.

Table 3. Internal and external factors influencing HRM philosophies mentioned by interviewees.

Philosophy	Important factors		Example quote
Facilitation	SCL dimension	Societal trends	‘And you have the view on humanity of course. That self-reliance is something you see around you. That is not something we make up.’ – Organization 11
		Parent ministry	‘[..] that self-directed model that is actually promoted by VWS (parent ministry). We get guidelines from them and then we have to implement it.’ – Organization 7
Accumulation	PMT dimension	Digitalization	‘[..] the world is changing so fast, mainly because of digitalization. Therefore, you need to make sure that your people are becoming flexible and adaptive to keep doing their job.’ – Organization 25
	Organizational characteristics	Organizational strategy	‘Actively supporting employee development [..] is based on the mission, vision, strategy of the whole organization until 2020.’ – Organization 2
		Type of work	‘Making sure that we guide the people physically and mentally as good as possible for them to stay until the end of their career. This is especially important for us because a large part of our organization works in 24-hour team shits.’ – Organization 25
	Influential actors	Head of HR	‘I’m here for seven years now. When I came here I actively pursued the idea of constant development.’ – Organization 13

Table 4. Internal and external factors influencing HRM policies mentioned by interviewees.

Policies	Important factors		Example quote
Common policies^a	SCL dimension	Central government	‘They have sent a letter to the Lower Chamber, the mobility letter [..] A letter in which they prescribe policies around HR planning. But also, the implementation of performance appraisals. That is the same government-wide.’ – Organization 4
		Parent ministry	‘I think we are more flexible than ministries. That doesn’t mean we are completely free to make decisions if there is money. We still have to go to VWS [parent ministry] to hire an extra employee.’ – Organization 7
		Politics	‘I have experienced both an expansion and reduction of tasks. That means, in case of an expansion, that we have to make plans on how many people we have to hire on what level, on who is going to do what, what kind of training people have to take [..] But if we have to do a reduction, we have to plan a reorganization. This definitely affects what we do.’ – Organization 21
	PMT dimension	Labor market	‘We have experienced a time that when we had a vacancy, we received around 180 application letters. But we also noticed with IT positions, when there was a shortage on the labor market, that it was really difficult to hire those people. So, we do get influenced by the labor market and we adapt our recruitment policy accordingly.’ – Organization 21
		Technology	‘We are probably going to need more people who perform analytical tasks instead of data entry. That means we are going to try to develop people towards a higher level of thinking.’ – Organization 5
Less common policies^b	Organizational characteristics	Publicness	‘We have a certain social responsibility. That applies to the whole organization of course. That is also something we want to express in our policies.’ – Organization 25
		Task	‘It is really difficult to fill a vacancy for a foreign account manager for example. Then it is nice that there are 4 to 5 people who have been a foreign business analyst account. It is easier for them to move to the position of account manager.’ – Organization 23
	Influential actors	Board	‘We believe that you can only be fit mentally if you are fit physically. This is being stimulated by the board actively, because our chairperson is an enthusiastic runner.’ – Organization 27
		Shareholders	‘At the same time, we get the request from the ministry of Finance to mention matters around income equality and diversity. There I see the influence, and this partly shapes your HRM policies of course.’ – Organization 27

^a Training and development, HR planning, recruitment and selection, performance management.

^b Internal promotion, working conditions, diversity, job design.

Table

Template codes	Definition	Examples of inductive codes
HRM philosophies	General principles or overall philosophy guiding HRM developed and shared by management. (Becker & Gerhart, 1996; Lepak et al., 2004)
Accumulation	Based on maximum involvement by attracting people with great potential and developing them over time, consistent with the organization’s needs. (Schuler, 1989)	Strong employer/employee relation Strong connection between employees Stimulating employee commitment
Utilization	Based on high efficiency for human resources by mainly focusing on technical skills. People are mostly employed on a short-term basis and matched with the organization’s short-term needs. (Schuler, 1989)	No inductive codes found
Facilitation	Based on self-motivated employees, who are encouraged to develop those abilities and skills that they deem to be important. The role of the organization is one as facilitator. (Schuler, 1989)	The right person on the right place Balance between in- and outflow Employee responsibility for performance
HRM policies	Specific employee-focused programs that influences the choice of HRM practices, based on the AMO model (Appelbaum et al., 2000; Lepak et al., 2006)
Abilities	Policies aimed to increase employee knowledge, skills, and abilities. (Lepak et al., 2006)	Training and development Recruitment and selection
Motivation	Policies aimed to increase employee motivation and to manage employee effort. (Lepak et al., 2006)	Internal promotion Performance management HR planning
Opportunities	Policies aimed to provide employees opportunities to contribute. (Lepak et al., 2006)	Teamworking Direct participation
External factors
S/C/L dimension	External factors that are related to an organization’s need to achieve legitimacy with its environment through coercive, normative, and mimetic pressures. (Paauwe, 2004)	Policy central government Societal trends Shareholders
P/M/T dimension	External factors that are related to an economic rationality. (Paauwe, 2004)	Digitalization Labor market
Internal factors
Organizational configuration	Internal factors related to the organization’s combination of past choices, organizational structure and culture (Paauwe, 2004)	Specialization of work Level of expertise staff Having legal personality
Influential actors	Internal factors related to strategic choices and actors involved in these choices. (Paauwe, 2004)	Head of HR Works council

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