مدیریت منابع انسانی در سازمان های پروژه محور: رفاه کارمند و رفتار اخلاقی

As part of a wider study into human resource management (HRM) practices in project-oriented organizations, we investigated the issue of employee well-being. Project-oriented organizations adopt temporary work processes to deliver products and services to clients. This creates a dynamic work environment, where additional pressures can be imposed on the employee from fluctuating work-loads, uncertain requirements, and multiple role demands. These pressures can create issues for employee well-being and ethical treatment, which need to be managed. HRM has traditionally had two roles, a management support role, providing the organization with competent people to undertake the work processes, and an employee support role, caring for the well-being of employees. In this paper we report our results on the HRM practices adopted in project-oriented organizations to fulfil the second role. We find that by and large in project-oriented organizations the management support role dominates, and they are not very good at caring for employees. The need for profit and responding to client demands often takes precedence over employee well-being. However, some of the organizations we interviewed have adopted HRM practices to care for employees, and we report those. Also providing employees with career development opportunities is as important for the individual as it is for the organization, and we report practices for that.

Huemann et al [1] suggested the conditions under which human resource management (HRM) emerges in the project-oriented organization may differ from those associated with mainstream HRM, which is shaped by typically large, classically managed organizations, [2] and [3]. Project-oriented organizations adopt project-based ways of working, [4], [5] and [6], in response to customers’ demands for bespoke products or services, [7]. They use temporary organizations in the form of projects and programs, and associated temporary work processes to deliver products and services to their customers. This creates a transient and dynamic work environment. Every time a new project or program starts or an old one finishes the configuration of human resource in the organization changes, as people are transferred from the line to new projects, or from old projects back to the line. This can create additional pressures for the employees of a project-oriented organization through: • peaking work-loads making it difficult to achieve a work-life-balance. • uncertainty about future assignments, including the nature of the assignment, its location and future work colleagues. • matching assignments to career development objectives. Managing these pressures requires positive action both by the individual and by the organization. Looking after the well-being of employees, and their ethical treatment, requires specific HRM practices to be adopted by the organization [8], [9] and [10]. Pastoriza et al. [11] have shown that the ethical treatment of employees, and looking after their well-being, can increase the social capital of an organization. As part of a wider investigation into the HRM practices adopted by project-oriented organizations [12], we also investigated how and to what extent the practices adopted support the well-being and ethical treatment of project workers. We report the results in this paper. We start by summarizing the nature of work in the project-oriented organization, and the pressures it can create for project workers and other employees. We then describe our methodology. We describe what we found about the nature of the problem and what organizations do or do not do to manage. We found that often organizations do not manage the problem, or do not care about it, for the sake of profit maximization and because of client demands. In fact it is often the demands of clients that exacerbate the problem. However, some organizations do take positive steps to manage the problem and we report those. In spite of the heavy pressures that project working creates we found that bay and large project workers enjoy the nature of the work, but that it tends to be self-selecting, so that those who can manage the pressures stay with the career. We also report practices adopted to match project assignments to career development needs

As we have seen, the dynamic work environment in the project-oriented organization imposes considerable pressures on employees, as also reported by Packendorff [33]. In this paper we considered the problem of employee well-being in this dynamic environment. In our research we confirmed that it is a problem, and, unfortunately, by and large project-oriented organizations are not very good at dealing with the problem, both because it is often a threat to profitability, and because to deal with the problem effectively requires an effective resource management system. We outlined that pressures are especially high in small to medium sized external projects, where employees work simultaneously in more than one project, and unexpected projects add on to the work-load. These findings are confirming prior research by Eskerod [34], Blichfeldt and Eskerod [16]. However, there were some welcome examples of organizations taking positive steps to improve employee well-being, to make project management a job for working 9–5. In spite of, or perhaps because of, the pressures of project working, it is a career those who choose it enjoy, although it tends to be self-selecting; those who don’t like it as a career opt out within five years. This can lead to issues of diversity, with all project managers in an organization looking the same, which Company 16 was taking positive steps to manage. Finally, if project management is to be made an attractive career to as wide a range of people as possible, organizations must ensure that project assignments match people’s career aspirations.